Darkly Dreaming Dexter

Darkly Dreaming Dexter : I’ve been wanting to read this book for a while since I am such a huge fan of the TV Show.  I’ve heard others speak about this book, saying it was different than the show, so of course I had to pick it up and read it.

The book was a quick read, even though I spent about 9 days on it.  I just don’t have as much time to read these days as I would like to.  But I did find it to be an easy and fast read, and again, like so many books that are popular right now, it is written from the First Person perspective.

I found the character of Dexter in this book to be much more indecisive than the one in the TV Show.  He just wasn’t as well put-together.  He would act on a whim, make rash decisions, and he went about his life like he didn’t really care about anything or anyone at all.  And yes, that is the point of Dexter, that he has no feelings, and no emotions, but at least in the TV Show he is well thought-out, meticulous, and calculating.  The written Dexter didn’t show much of any of these traits.

Maybe I shouldn’t compare the book to the show.  The book was obviously written first, so it is the TV Show that deviates from the actual story.  But I think the TV Show is done so well, that I almost have to compare them.  Having said that, I did find this book very interesting and suspenseful.  No scary suspense, but suspense that holds your attention and makes you want to keep turning pages and not put the book down, especially towards the end.

The story also takes a different direction than the show does.  Without giving away too many spoilers, let me just say that one of the popular detectives from the show dies in this book, Deborah learns about Dexter’s secret (which I think most people who follow the show already know about) and Brian, Dexter’s brother, doesn’t die at the end of this book.  I’ll be interested to see if he returns in one of the later novels.

I do plan to read the rest of Mr Lindsay’s books about Dexter.  I am a fan, I am just not as much of a fan as I expected to be, but I believe that to be the fault of my own presumptions of this story.