In 1985 Dean Koontz saw the release of his novel, The Door To December, under the pseudonym of Richard Paige. Now the book is out under the Dean Koontz brand in paperback.

Description: A call in the middle of the night summoned psychiatrist Laura McCaffrey out into the rain-swept streets of Los Angeles. The police had found her husband-beaten to death. But what of her daughter, Melanie, whom he had kidnapped six years earlier? At the brutal murder scene, the police lead Laura into her husband’s makeshift lab-and open the door to a rising tide of terror that has trapped Melanie in its midst…

Check it out: Koontz Answers

Frankenstein Lost Souls is now available as a mass market paperback. This is the fourth installment in Dean’s bestselling series, published by Bantam.

Description: The war against humanity has begun. Only now things will be different. Victor Leben, once Frankenstein, has not only seen the future — he’s ready to populate it. Using stem cells, “organic” silicon circuitry, and nanotechnology, he will engender a race of superhumans — the perfect melding of flesh and machine. With a powerful, enigmatic backer eager to see his dream come to fruition and a secret location where the enemies of progress can’t find him, Victor is certain that this time, nothing and no one can stop him.

It is up to five people to prove him wrong. In their hands rests nothing less than the survival of humanity itself.

They are drawn together in different ways, by omens sinister and wondrous, to the same shattering conclusion: Two years after they saw him die, the man they knew as Victor Helios lives on. Detectives Carson O’Connor and Michael Maddison; Victor’s engineered wife, Erika 5, and her companion Jocko; and the original Victor’s first creation, the tormented Deucalion, have all arrived at a small Montana town where their old alliance will be renewed — and tested — by forces from within and without, and where the dangers they face will eclipse any they have yet encountered. Yet in the midst of their peril, love will blossom, and joy, and they will discover sources of strength and perseverance they could not have imagined.

They will need all these resources, and more. For a monumental battle is about to commence that will require all their ingenuity and courage, as it defines what we are to be … and if we are to be at all.

The book trailer:

You can order directly from Amazon here: Lost Souls

Darkness Under the Sun is a companion novella for Dean Koontz’s What the Night Knows. It’s been released solely as an ebook, in a variety of formats.

Description: The chilling account of a pivotal encounter between innocence and ultimate malice, Darkness Under the Sun is the perfect read for Halloween–or for any haunted night–and reveals a secret, fateful turning point in the career of Alton Turner Blackwood, the killer at the dark heart of What the Night Knows, the recently released novel by Dean Koontz.

There once was a killer who knew the night, its secrets and rhythms. How to hide within its shadows. When to hunt.

He roamed from town to town, city to city, choosing his prey for their beauty and innocence. His cruelties were infinite, his humanity long since forfeit. But still … he had not yet discovered how to make his special mark among monsters, how to come fully alive as Death.

This is the story of how he learned those things, and of what we might do to insure that he does not visit us.

Don’t have an eReader device?

You can still download a free application for your PC, Mac, or mobile phone that allows you to purchase and read eBooks, including:

• Barnes & Noble Nook eReader applications
• Amazon Kindle eReader applications
• Borders/Kobo eReader applications
• Sony eReader applications
• Stanza eReader applications
• eReader Pro applications

Dynamite Entertainment has released Fear Nothing by Dean Koontz in a graphic novel edition.

Description: Fear Nothing tells the story of 28-year-old oddball hero Christopher Snow, who lives in the city of Moonlight Bay, California, along with his hyper-intelligent dog Orson, his best surfing buddy Bobby and his late-night deejay girlfriend Sasha. Snow has XP-xeroderma pigmentosum – a very rare genetic affliction that forces him to avoid light at all costs, and will likely give him cancer later in life. His parents died under mysterious circumstances and he’s now being stalked by the shadowy characters who want Snow to stop trying to find out how they died – or else they’ll bump off his remaining loved ones. Fear Nothing features all the pulse pounding thriller action and great character development Koontz fans have come to expect from his work, as well as a bit of comedy, and yes, even an army of evil mutant rhesus monkeys!

A little sidebar because horror material of any kind has been sparse over the holidays. Here’s Koontz talking about writing his characters’ dialogue:

“I give my characters free will,” says Koontz. “The story is never outlined. They go where they want — and surprise me. When they speak, I don’t force them to feed information to the reader and advance the story. If they want to digress, I let them. If each is a vivid individual, his or her dialogue will be unique. And often in the digressions, we learn about them and discover new dimensions in the story. When a character says something funny, I laugh out loud because it’s as if I’m hearing it, not writing it.”

You can read an excerpt of the graphic novel here: Fear Nothing