Finders Keepers

A Novel

By: Stephen King

Narrated by: Will Patton

Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins

Publisher's Summary

2016 Audie Award Finalist for Best Male Narrator

A masterful, intensely suspenseful novel about a reader whose obsession with a reclusive writer goes far too far - a book about the power of storytelling, starring the same trio of unlikely and winning heroes King introduced in Mr. Mercedes. 

"Wake up, genius." So begins King's instantly riveting story about a vengeful reader. The genius is John Rothstein, an iconic author who created a famous character, Jimmy Gold, but who hasn't published a book for decades. Morris Bellamy is livid, not just because Rothstein has stopped providing books but because the nonconformist Jimmy Gold has sold out for a career in advertising. Morris kills Rothstein and empties his safe of cash, yes, but the real treasure is a trove of notebooks containing at least one more Gold novel. 

Morris hides the money and the notebooks, and then he is locked away for another crime. Decades later a boy named Pete Saubers finds the treasure, and now it is Pete and his family that Bill Hodges, Holly Gibney, and Jerome Robinson must rescue from the ever-more deranged and vengeful Morris when he's released from prison after 35 years. 

Not since Misery has King played with the notion of a reader whose obsession with a writer gets dangerous. Finders Keepers is spectacular, heart-pounding suspense, but it is also King writing about how literature shapes a life - for good, for bad, forever. 

©2015 Stephen King (P)2015 Simon & Schuster

Critic Reviews

"Narrator Will Patton takes the best Stephen King novel in years and turns it into an audio masterpiece.... Listeners may double check to see how many narrators are performing this work. But it's just Patton, and he's more than enough." (AudioFile)

Glad I found and kept this book!

So you know how they say the sequel is never as good as the original story?!

That’s true, but this second entry in the Bill Hodges saga does a pretty damn good job of holding up against Mr. Mercedes.

Although Brady Hartsfield is currently in the Traumatic Brain Injury unit, his choice to mow down a bunch of people at City Center greatly influences this story. We learn more about some of the other victims - specifically the Saubers family - and in meeting them, we find ourselves engrossed in another story of murder that reminds us that in life, there is no such thing as consequence.

Holly, Jerome (and his sister) are back with Hodges - and we meet a new array of characters - and can’t help but be intrigued to learn how their lives will intertwine. And as the story moves swiftly between time periods, we soon learn that actions in the past have definitive impacts on our futures.

Again, I listened to this on audiobook - so Will Patton elevated the story in some prices, detracted in others. For example, his interpretation of Holly makes her sound like a more juvenile version of Rainman rather than a woman with an ASD.


I often said that this isn’t traditional King, as this story (and its predecessor) is grounded in reality and deals with human villains....but the ending leads me to believe we are moving into creepy classic King territory - and I can’t wait to listen to the next entry.

5 Stars for Will Patton reading Stephen King

What a great trilogy, Stephen King's 3 Bill Hodges' books are..and WOW, Will Patton -there couldn't be a better narrator for these books!

King has written something different here, in the first," Mr Mercedes", police detective 'Kermit' Bill Hodges and partner searches for the horrific murderer who barreled a stolen Metcedes Benz into a before dawn group of people, lined up tfor entrance to a job fair. "Mr Mercedes" is something very different for King..a suspense murder mystery.....

In Book 2, "Finders Keepers", retired police detective AKA the 'Ret Det' falls in love and finds an unusual business partner. Again, Patton nails Holly "Berry", the OCD, slightly psychotic woman who is the daughter of the sister of the...well you have to read the story..imagine, King writing a real love story. Even side characters in the book, the Robinson family, are written so well and narrated so beautifully that we really get to know them.

In "End of Watch", 6 years after the massacre at the City Center job fair, we find Bill Hodges still striving to bring closure for the people who were injured or killed. The murderer, however, has other ideas and continues to kill, again and again. He's still after Hodges and the Robinson family -a real page turner!. The final novel is more typical of Kings work with the addition of suspense and psychic computer programs.

It's difficult to write a review and not insert spoilers...Harshfield is a crazy bad person and though we think he has gotten his just reward, he has something else going on. Hodges is the basic good person but has his own issues. All 3 novels were exciting but the third one is the best IMO.

Thru more than 30 hours of narrative, Will Patton keeps up his exciting and spot on reading..he truly brings the characters to life and we get to know them, with all their problems. I haven't really searched for Pattons work but will from now on. He goes on my list, along with the likes of George Guidell, Luke Daniels and Davina Porter . Patton reads with real heart!

If you haven't been a fan of Stephen King's writing in the past, this trilogy may turn you around. It's not a scary book like "It" or "The Stand", it's so unlike other work and I hope he tries again in the suspense genre.

The trilogy cheap at 3 credits-and so worth the time and money. Really..give it a try!!

Full of cliche

Any additional comments?

This book is a story strung together by cliche and literary references. I thought it was a lazy way to get enough words for a novel. This is the first of King's books I didn't really like, not because of the story but because of the writing. I'm going to try the last book in the trilogy but if it proves to have the same fault, I won't finish it.

The Fat Lady Hasn't Sung Yet

Finders Keepers could be a decent stand alone read (in which case the background you'd miss would be insignificant and the foreshadowing would be irrelevant); the plot is okay and the writing never drags, BUT it is the middle of a trilogy which makes it difficult to evaluate. What a-ha moments are tucked into this mid-section; what brilliant tie-ins that might have us looking back from the final act? Without retrospection, FK is a bridge, and a rating is a bit of a hedged bet.

In Finders Keepers, King revisits the theme of Reading, Writing, and Fans, sans the horror element of the axe-wielding Annie Wilkes. The connections to Mr. Mercedes are whispers that at times portend some return to King's signature style of story telling with book number 3, and at other times seem little more than awkward paste-ins for the sake of connecting this bridge to a beginning and an end. What was missing for me in King's foray into the genre of crime thrillers, was the mystery and the thrill. The story was linear with some elements too coincidental to be reasonably acceptable. We know from the beginning the bad guy (Morris) wants the notebooks and the good guy (Pete) has them. The chase is on, and we know whom must survive to facilitate the finale.

King himself, in an interview you may have read in the NY Times, said about his Hodges trilogy: "The most difficult by far (at least for me) is the novel of mystery. “Mr. Mercedes,” “Finders Keepers” and the forthcoming “The Suicide Prince” — the Hodges trilogy — were extremely difficult. I just can’t fathom how people like Agatha Christie, Dorothy Sayers, Peter Robinson and Ruth Rendell are able to do this in book after book." I appreciate that King dares to venture outside the box we fans sometimes want to confine him to, and that he shares it with us. While many loved this installment, it wasn't the nail-biter that I had hoped would propel me into The Suicide Prince. I suppose FK is a respectable crime thriller. King can hardly do wrong with his mad skills, but the more I read, the more I yearned for the Master of Horror to return to his kingdom. I thought this mid-section of the Hodges trilogy was just a little flabby and unspectacular.

Will Patton is, as usual, fantastic. He captures the killers voice so well that he traps you in this madman's head, you are relieved when Patton lets you out and switches to the gentle voice of young Pete, or the scruffy Detective Hodges. He nails it with each character, both here and in other books I've listened to him narrate.

This No. 2 feels like a set-up guy for #3

I love most Stephen King stories/novels. While this book had an intriguing premise, was "adequate" for a 2d of the trilogy, and was peppered with Mr. Mercedes, the much more interesting momma's boy villain from the 1st book, it never connected me like the first book. While I did find certain parts suspenseful, I felt like King didn't give the protagonists from Mr. Mercedes the same kind of pizzazz in this one, nor did the villain feel as real.

Reading this did, however, make me reevaluate the excellence of Mr. Mercedes.

I fully expect Mr. King to make the return of Momma's Boy in part 3 one for the ages.

Loved Every Minute

The masterful reading by Will Patton made me want to start listening all over again after I finished. King's writing reminded me of his earlier novels--not horror, but sheer enjoyment all the way. The ending was the only time I got chills up my spine in this story--can't wait to see what happens in the next one.

Nobody does it better

Any additional comments?

King is still a brilliant storyteller. He has always been the master of engaging the reader in the lives of ordinary people who are eventually thrust into extraordinary circumstances that force them to become heroic. This is no exception, all edge of the seat narrative from start to finish.

Will Patton is the perfect reader for King's work, really invested in the drama without overacting - quite a trick. His voicing of the characters is really well defined, and I especially love his interpretation of Holly, the brilliant girl with Aspberger's who proves indispensable in many a tight spot. And can I say Wow, Stephen King doing a series? So glad!! I loved the trio in Mr Mercedes, and was happy to be back in their company. Looks like the door is wide open for another sequel too, yay!!!

Pedestrian

Will Patton got me through it. I bought it for Holly but she has too small a role in the story. I like the hero, he means well. I like the whole obsessive bibliophilia vibe but I didn't buy the dichotomy between the scared stupid teenager and the cool composed protagonist. The ending annoyed me. Well, on to the third novel in the trilogy.

Good, but Mr. Mercedes was better

Decent book and followed Mr. Mercedes with many of the same characters, but Mr. Mercedes was much better.

King is Masterful

In this trilogy, King is lending his voice to the crime drama genre. Make no mistake, that's what this book is. It can be compared to Lee Child or James Lee Burke in content, but of course, handled masterfully, and uniquely by King. Is it sinister? Maybe. Horror or scary, no, not at all. But it's great.

Finders Keepers grabbed me right away. I love that about King. You don't have to wait three chapters for the action to start. He has a way of developing the characters through action, creating a fast-paced, hold-on-to-your-hat story.

There were a lot of twists and turns throughout the story that surprised me, which was great.
The way he connected this story to the first book in the trilogy was one of the twists for me and was super creative, I just loved it. He wove the familiar (characters from book one) with the new in a way that I've never experienced before.

The main characters Bellamy (bad guy) and Saubers (good kid) were well developed and totally believable. Their relationships were real, their response to what was happening was natural and believable. I bought it all. The writing was so smooth and so well done, I never once was pulled out of the story--it was totally engrossing.

The one criticism I have is that I felt like there wasn't enough of Bill Hodges. He was super interesting in book one and his character development didn't continue enough in this book. I wanted to reconnect with him and know him, and that didn't happen. To me, there was a little too much detail about Bellamy (bad guy) where there could have been a lot more about Hodges.

With that said though, the way the book ended left me hanging to the point where I will stalk Audible waiting for book 3, so maybe King told me just enough about Hodges to keep me coming back.

The ending of the book was really great and worthy of the rest of the story. Everything was just so natural and smooth, I'm running out of words to describe this book, I'll say it again, King is masterful.

Yes, I have a voice-crush on Will Patton. He can do no wrong and he was perfect here. Just perfect. People who read Finders Keepers instead of listen to it are missing out. It's better with Patton.

I highly recommend this book.