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Intensity
Intensity
Author: Dean Koontz
Past midnight, Chyna Shepherd, twenty-six, gazed out a moonlit window, unable to sleep on her first night in the Napa Valley home of her best friend's family.  Instinct proves reliable.  A murderous sociopath, Edgler Forman Vess, has entered the house, intent on killing everyone inside.  A self-proclaimed "homicidal adven...  more »
Info icon
ISBN-13: 9780345384362
ISBN-10: 0345384369
Publication Date: 9/30/1996
Pages: 436
Rating:
  • Currently 4/5 Stars.
 305

4 stars, based on 305 ratings
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Type: Paperback
Other Versions: Hardcover
Reviews: Member | Amazon | Write a Review

Top Member Book Reviews

reviewed Intensity on + 159 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 6
I made a comment somewhere else on this site that my favorite Dean Koontz books were Darkfall and Twilight Eyes. I mis-spoke. I have to add this one to my list of favorites. This is an excellent, creepy, scarey book that will have you looking at R.V.'s as you go down the road in a whole new light! The movie I thought was great and followed the plot pretty well, but of course just cannot compare to the multitude of details in the book. One of Koontz's finest works. AND I liked the fact that the hero in this book is actually a heroine. One who is an everyday, normal (though somewhat dysfunctional) woman who could be any one of us.
esjro avatar reviewed Intensity on + 946 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 5
Intensity is a scary, scary book! The story concerns Chyna, a young woman with a troubled past, who through bad luck attracts the attention of a serial killer. Though she is relentlessly pursued, Chyna puts her fear aside to help another young victim.

I read this book in two sittings, though I would have read it in one had my vision not stared blurring. Intensity is like a really good scary movie - you are scared to look but you'll be unable to look away. Highly recommended for those who can handle reading about a sadistic killer without getting nightmares.
reviewed Intensity on + 159 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 5
I love Dean Koontz. I've read most of his works. THIS is definitely one of my favorites (the other is Twilight Eyes). This story is fast-paced....I didn't find it dragging at all. And I liked that it went into detail about the heroine's past. I thought the look into her past showed where her strength of character came from and why. I liked having that little bird's eye view. Needless to say this is an excellent book and difficult to put down once it's started. They made a mini-series out of it a while back which was good too.
reviewed Intensity on + 19 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 4
This is the book that got me started on Dean Koontz. Made the hairs on the back of my neck stand out. Worth the read for any horror fan.
reviewed Intensity on
Helpful Score: 4
This was the creepiest book I have ever read! I can't park next to or even drive down the freeway next to run down RV's anymore thanks to this book!!!
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reviewed Intensity on + 54 more book reviews
This is THE most terrifying and fantastic book that I have ever read. It grabs you from the first chapter and holds you right on through to the ending. I read the book first and then saw the movie-I couldn't tell you which was better. After you read this book, you will ALWAYS think about leaving a room like you have never been in it. Think "Norman" stayed with you from the shower scene at Bates Hotel? HA! That was nothing! You have got to read this one!
oddfella39 avatar reviewed Intensity on + 4 more book reviews
The most heart-stopping novels I've ever read! Left me breathless throughout.
Jewels4 avatar reviewed Intensity on + 5 more book reviews
I read this book years ago; and yet there are still scenes that I can remember so vividly as if I just read them.

A great thriller!
reviewed Intensity on + 3 more book reviews
Scary Book. Could not put it down.
reviewed Intensity on + 1568 more book reviews
I'm going to give this a medium rating, because it IS well written, but it was just too scary for me, so I couldn't finish it.

From back cover: Past midnight, Chyna Shepherd, twenty-six, gazed out a moonlit window, unable to sleep on her first night in the Napa Valley home of her best friend's family. Instinct proves reliable. A murderous sociopath, Edgler Forman Vess, has entered the house, intent on killing everyone inside. A self-proclaimed "homicidal adventure," Vess lives only to satisfy all appetites as the arise, to immense himself in sensation, t o live without fear, remorse or limits, to live with intensity. Chyna is trapped in his deadly orbit.
Chyna is a survivor, toughened by a lifelong struggle for safety and self-respect. Now she will be tested as never before. At first her sole aim is to get out alive-until, by chance, she learns the identity of Vess's next intended victim, a faraway innocent only she can save. Driven by a newly discovered thirst for meaning beyond mere self-preservation, Chyna musters every inner resource she has to save an endangered girl--as moment by moment, the terrifying threat Edgler Foreman Vess intensifies.
sheri-wilson avatar reviewed Intensity on + 5 more book reviews
You won't be able to put this one down once you start! Though not his usual fare, was a very good read.
reviewed Intensity on
This is my favorite Dean Koontz book!
MKSbooklady avatar reviewed Intensity on + 983 more book reviews
This book will very well keep you up all night. Even after you've finished reading it, you will go over it, and that definitely will keep you up at night. The end is very good-and it alone will keep you up!! A quick read.
readingfrenzy avatar reviewed Intensity on + 45 more book reviews
This book lives up to it's title, Intensity. Can you say suspense? Reading this book was just like watching a movie. Intensity has an interesting story line and captures you the whole way. Some of the situations were a little drawn out but overall this is a great book. I will be reading more books by Dean Koontz and will recommend it to others.
reviewed Intensity on + 5 more book reviews
This book was very good from page 1 to the end.This book was so hard to put down I read it in 1 day.
timberhawkeye avatar reviewed Intensity on + 5 more book reviews
Out of the thirty-plus Dean Koontz books that I've read, Intensity is my favorite. Edge of your seat type of suspense you're sure to enjoy.
Kit avatar reviewed Intensity on + 68 more book reviews
At one o'clock in the morning, in a house in Napa Valley, California, Chyna Shepherd, twenty-six, sits at a guest-room window, gazing at the moonlit vineyards. A dark and turbulent childhook has taught her to fear strange houses. Now she cannot sleep on the first night in the home of her college friend Laura. Instinct proves reliable. A muffled scream from another room alarms her. Soon it is evident that a homicidal sociopath, Edgler Vess, is intent on killing everyone in the house. Life has taught Chyna to be a survivor, but now she will be tested as never before.

Through a series of astonishing developments, Chyna finds herself inside Vess's motor home-a dungeon and morgue on wheels-without his being aware of her presence. Vess lives for one purpose: to satisfy all appetites as they arise, to seek ever more outrageous experience, to immerse himself in sensation, to live with intensity. And now Chyna is trapped in his dangerous orbit.

At first her sole aim is to get out alive. But when she learns the identity of the killer's next intended victim and when circumstances ensure that only she can save that precious life, she must face the fact that a moral life requires the acceptance of unwanted responsibilities. She discovers depths of courage that she didn't know she possessed-and takes risks beyond any that she ever imagined she could endure.

Dean Koontz is one of my favorite authors and this book IS intense. It's quite the page-turner.


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