End of Watch by Stephen King

End of Watch by Stephen King
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

End of Watch is the final in the Bill Hodges trilogy by Stephen King and King finally lets us have the weirdness we've been waiting.

Brady Hartsfield has been physically depleted since his attempt to set off a bomb at a concert full of young girls. He's been stuck in his useless body for years since and while his brain function improves so does his ability to manipulate. Obsessed with revenge and suicide, Brady finds out that he has new powers of persuasion through telepathy and telekinesis. He finds a way to not only hypnotize others, but use their bodies in order to set a larger scale murder into motion.

Hodges and Holly are called in to assist on a murder-suicide where everything is not as it seems. From here, the cat and mouse game between Hodges and Brady is amplified until the climatic conclusion.

Unfortunately this book is the last in the series. It's done so with definite finality. This is a shame, because I could read the adventures of Hodges, Holly, and Jerome for a lot longer.

I thought I had the ending figured out. I didn't. I was moderately disappointed in the way that it ended, I felt it would have been more dynamic to have Brady "die" by having to inhabit Hodges and there being an internal struggle. Instead, King goes for the no guts, no glory approach.


As a whole trilogy I found the series to have been wonderful. From start to finish I was entrenched in this world with Hodges, Holly, and Jerome. I'm glad I've gone back to King after all these years away. I'm looking forward to whatever comes next.

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