Mile 81 by Stephen King

Mile 81 is a novella that plays to all of King’s strengths and trademarks.  Pete Simmons is a foul mouthed kid living in Maine who stumbles across an unpleasant supernatural creature.  The cast builds and shrinks pretty quickly and this may be one of King’s highest per page body counts as a plethora of well thought out and developed characters quickly become fodder for the dark creature.  

This novella reminded me a great deal of IT with the kid’s investigative nature, trumping the evil.  Though much like IT I found the final climax to be very disappointing.  In the end there is much to like in Mile 81, yet a few glaring weaknesses.