Phantoms (novel)

Infobox Book |
name = Phantoms


image_caption = Cover of "Phantoms"
author = Dean Koontz
cover_artist =
country = United States
language = English
series =
genre = Thriller, Mystery novel
publisher = Berkley Publishing
release_date = March 1983
media_type = Print (Hardcover, Paperback)
pages = 448 pp
isbn = ISBN 0-425-18110-3
preceded_by =
followed_by =

Phantoms is a novel written by the best-selling author Dean Koontz, released in 1983.

Plot summary

Jenny and Lisa Paige, two sisters, return to Jenny's hometown of Snowfield, Colorado, a small ski resort village nestled in the Sierra Nevada where Jenny works as a doctor, and finds no one alive. The few bodies they find are either mutilated, or reveal some strange form of death. Finally, after growing more alarmed by the town's mysterious and alarming situation Jenny manages to call police in a neighboring town to come help.

Together, the girls and the police are able to request help from the military Biological Investigations Unit. The police managed to find only one clue as to what was causing the town's dissapearances and deaths. A victim of whatever was trying to kill him managed to write the name Timothy Flyte, on a mirror moments before he was killed. Flyte is a British academic and author of a book. "The Ancient Enemy." His book catalogs and describes various mass vanishings of people in different parts of the world over the centuries.

It is discovered that the town was built over the hibernating place of this creature, an amoeboid shapeshifter. The Ancient Enemy rarely feeds, but when it does, the effects are devastating. It was theorized that the Enemy either caused or aided in the extinction of the dinosaurs, as well as many of the great mysterious mass vanishings: Mayan civilization, Jamestown, Roanoke, ghost ships, etc.

The creature consumes other life forms to increase its mass and is able to perfectly mimic other creatures. It can create small "probes" or "phantoms" imitating consumed life forms to go forth and hunt more prey, obeying the orders of its "hive mind;" in addition the creature absorbs the mental capacity of those it consumes.

Its only vital organ is a nucleus located in the center of its main body. The creature's cells are similar in molecular structure to fossil fuels; upon discovering this the scientists use oil-eating bacteria to destroy the Enemy's core or brain. (The genetically-modified bacteria are the real-life creations of Ananda Mohan Chakrabarty)

The Ancient Enemy

The creature's abilities and form greatly resemble John Carpenter's version of The Thing, the movie monster The Blob, the creature in the short story "Slime" by Joseph Payne Brennan and the "shoggoths" envisioned in the works of H. P. Lovecraft.

The Snowfield survivors discover that the creature consumes other life forms as sustenance, and is able to perfectly mimic any creature it consumes. It can create small "probes" or "phantoms," imitating consumed life forms, to go forth and hunt more prey, obeying the orders of its "hive mind." In addition, the creature absorbs the mental capacity and memories of those it consumes, so its mind grows more powerful, intelligent and self-aware over time. (In fact, the creature initiates contact with the survivors and personally requests Flyte to come to Snowfield, referring to him as its "biographer.") Besides being able to mimic real animals and people, the creature can also form phantoms based on mental images from its victims; it takes sadistic delight in creating phantoms in the shape of religious demons and monsters to terrorize its victims before killing.

The shapeshifting Ancient Enemy can contort its body into the smallest of spaces (through keyholes, air ducts, etc.), which is how it managed to kill and eat people who locked themselves inside rooms and cars. It also possesses extremely keen sensory organs and extremely fast speed, which explains why even the animals around Snowfield didn't escape its predation. Conventional weapons and firearms cause no damage to its gelatinous body. It feeds by completely enveloping its victims (hence the universal bruising seen earlier) and then secreting a digestive enzyme, thus leaving no biotic traces of its victims. Toward the end of the novel the monster declares that it considers all other life forms, including humans, to be intellectually inferior to itself, nothing more than cattle to be consumed when it is hungry.

The creature discloses to Flyte and the other survivors that it has come to think of itself as Satan, due to thoughts acquired from the minds of past humans it consumed (notably a devil worshiper). The absorption of these thoughts changed the creature over time from merely predatory to overtly sadistic; it engages in a number of intentional, non-predatory evils, including torture, psychological warfare, blasphemy, profanity, bigotry, attempted rape, and overall cruelty.

Film adaptation

"Phantoms" was adapted into a movie in 1998 starring Peter O'Toole, Rose McGowan, Liev Schreiber, Ben Affleck, and Joanna Going. It was directed by Joe Chappelle, produced by Neo Art & Logic, and released by Dimension Films. It was filmed in Colorado.The film is referenced heavily (and highly) in "Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back", including once by Affleck himself.

The ending to the film is very similar to the ending in .

External links

* [http://www.allreaders.com/Topics/Info_694.asp Phantoms Book Review]