It’s also very much a part of ours as well, with a few Donald Trump references and a foreshadowing of the COVID-19 crisis as Billy hunkers down and has to watch life go by outside, less because of a pandemic and more because of his morally questionable chosen profession. Those worried he’s gone full Raymond Chandler, never fear: King makes it clear that Billy Summers very much exists in his creepily familiar world. When the job turns out to be a setup, Billy must switch gears and rewrite his plans entirely. Billy Summers is an ex-Marine sniper, now killer for hire, who only kills ‘bad people’. He’s a hired assassin, and if he doesn’t think like who and what he is, he’ll never get clear. First up if you are looking for a Stephen King horror novel, this is not for you. King’s known for his literary villains, yet in creating his killer title protagonist, he exquisitely gets into the mind of a hitman and roots around in there to figure out what kind of person would do wetwork, the loneliness involved for those who choose that as a career path and the effect it would have on friends and loved ones. Billy Summers is a top-tier assassin with a heart of gold. The ever prolific King moves from his trademark horror into the realm of the hard-boiled noir thriller. Actually is as good at the hard-boiled prose – in this case, the tale of an extremely effective assassin trying to get out after one last job – as he is the scary stuff. When interacting with others, Billy takes the precaution of projecting his dumb self, comparing it to a seatbelt.
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