This is one of those HORROR stories, and the horror starts pretty much from the beginning. It's relatively fast-paced; it does slow down towards the middle but it picks up speed again.

With King, specially his longer novels, you usually get the world building and character development before the real horrors of the story begin - or the s••• hits the fan, as they say; which is something I love. I love when it feels like I'm just living in a little town, getting to know the people, even making friends, feeling like a part of friend groups and then BAM! things start to go downhill for real. (There's always foreshadowing or small bits of creepy stuff of course, but if you're a constant reader, you know what I mean)

But this one is different. A good chunk of the characterization in this novel is done through flashbacks or anecdotes. Most of the characters were very well-developed and fleshed out.
Johnny's development and character arc was amazing, I went from hating him, being sure he was gonna mess everything up, and then rooting for him.
David is also an interesting character, his arc was compelling, specially as a child.
The rest were side characters but I was still rooting for Mary, Cynthia, and Steve so hard.

Entragien was such a scary "villain", and Tak...was Tak. Tak actually reminded me so much of [b:The Outsider|36124936|The Outsider|Stephen King|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1524596540l/36124936._SY75_.jpg|57566471], specially because it was referred to as an outsider multiple times (yes, I know, it's the other way around, but I read The Outsider first). Generally though, Tak is just another entity from the Todash Space like a few other entities throughout King's multiverse. It's still an interesting being though, with a different method than of IT or the Outsider.

The storyline was mostly unpredictable, I constantly felt like none of the characters were safe from harm as is the King way. The setting was pretty limited but still mysterious enough. The plot twists were really good and plausible, there were signs for them that I only saw after the twists had already happened.