Mr. Mercedes was a difficult novel to read; difficult in a sense that I found it hard to find any reason to enjoy it. This is mainly owed to the protagonist, Bill Hodges. When he repeatedly blamed a character named Olivia Trelawney for owning the car that was used to kill and injure people, I instantly lost my respect for him. That's a hell of a way to open a story: making your main character detestable. 
 "She wasn't the doer--no way was she--but it would be good to stick her with some of the blame. Give her something to think about besides veggie dinners from B'hai." 
 Jesus Christ. She gets blamed for the murders and injuries just because she owns the fucking car that was used? How about blame the sicko who did them, asshole? It's not like she put a sign over her car that says, "Use this car for murder for free" and went home and slept soundly. And when Billy our protagonist dished out the citizen responsibility card, I wanted to scream at him, "How about your responsibility to protect the people in your city? Did you do something to prevent the murders?" Christ. This guy nearly had me on the verge of not finishing this book. 
 I finished it, though, and discovered more things to roll my eyes over than things to be happy about. This book is filled with terrible tropes in the crime fiction. Old, retired cop and his young protege. Old, retired cop and his female love interest. Ugh. Come on. Bill Hodges even made references to the ever popular Philip Marlowe, who by the way is a ridiculous fictional detective. Yep, read The Big Sleep and thought it was infuriatingly horrible. 
 Anyway, I'm going to move on to the next installment, Finders Keepers, hoping it gets better there. But for now, 3 stars.