The Regulators
Richard Bachman (aka Stephen King)

It's a summer afternoon in Wentworth, Ohio, and on Poplar Street everything's normal. The paper boy is making his rounds; the Carver kids are bickering at the corner convenience store; a Frisbee is flying on the Reed's lawn; Gary Soderson is firing up the backyard barbecue. The only thing that doesn't quite fit is the red van idling just up the hill. Soon it will begin to roll, and the killing will begin. A quiet slice of American suburbia is about to turn to toast.
The mayhem rages around the seemingly still point, a darkened house lit fitfully from within by a flickering television screen. Inside, where things haven't been normal for a long time, are Audrey Wyler and the autistic nephew she cares for, eight year old Seth Garin. They're fighting their own battle, and its intensity has turned 247 Poplar Street into a prisonhouse.
By the time night falls on Poplar Street, the surviving residents will find themselves in another world, one where anything, no matter how terrible, is possible... and where the regulators are on their way. By what power they have come, how far they will go, and how they can be stopped - these are the desperate questions. The answers are absolutely terrifying.

This is the sister novel to Stephen King's Desperation, and in my opinion should be read first. However, the author had never officially said which book should be read first. They contain most of the same characters, but in two different alternate realities.

While this book is interesting - a child with some sort of demon named Tak residing in him who can make both the character from a movie called The Regulators and from a TV show called MotoCops 2200 appear in their vans and kill people, and also change the entire area to a desert wasteland - somehow it falls flat. With the exception of Seth and Audry, there are so many characters in this book that they not only aren't as fleshed out as one would like, but it's easy to forget who is who as the novel goes on.

The action is the main thing that will keep the reader going, and also the question of who will survive and who will not. It's an odd book and I have to admit that the use of an autistic eight year old as the only vessel that can hold this demon Tak, and make the things that are killing off the entire neighborhood, somewhat annoys me. There's enough stigma in this day and age associated with Autism and too few people understand what it really is. So, this is the main thing I did not like about the book.

I can understand why this one was written by a pseudonym. While it's not a bad book, it's not a great one like most people would expect from King. It's an interesting read, but don't expect too much from it.

My rating: Three out of five snails.