(Found) Rat Man - Sand Creature - Slows time

Hello,

I read a book in 2008 and i do not believe it was very old, soft back. I cannot remember a lot of details but what i do remember is:

The main evil character was a man that could slow time down so much that it appeared to be stopped.. he would materialize as a sand creature in town and torment people, and was known as the Rat Man i believe. I remember a scene where the Rat Man was chasing the person trying to catch him, they enter a warehouse where a rave is going on. As the Rat Man goes through the time-frozen crowd he rips an arm of a inanimate person. I think i also remember the guy being young, very OCD and metro sexual and living in a very nice house near the beach. That is how they tracked him down. He would have to regenerate after using his powers, and the sand led the searchers to the beach where they suspected he was creating the Rat-Man from.

Any help would be great. I've tried Google searches for Rat man, sand creature, slows time, and every alternate i could think of between. No luck.

Thank you!

Ahah!
Sorry, can't help (yet!) But I've read this myself a few years ago.
As soon as you mentioned the rave and ripping the time frozen arm off I thought "yeah, I read it too"
Now it's hard think time to dredge it up from the scrapyard I call my memory

Dean Koontz keeps popping up in my head.
Gonna have to check through the plots of all his books now...

Dean koontz Dragon tears is probably what your thinking of Danny there's a rat man in it but I don't think that's it going by the plot

monkeypooper said:

Dean koontz Dragon tears is probably what your thinking of Danny there's a rat man in it but I don't think that's it going by the plot

Click to expand...

Yeah, think you're right. Sent myself down wrong path.
Oh well, back to the dredge through memories.

If I remember it right, they were closing in and noticed lots of cars and vans parked in industrial area, they realised there was a rave going on in a warehouse and neared it.

No sooner did they enter than a panicked mob stampeded them cos some teen was screaming with blood spraying everywhere from ripped out arm socket.

Think it was maybe a bit earlier than 2008 that I read it but there's been a couple thousand books since then

Damn! I've read this and it was definitely Dean Koontz, but I can't remember the title either. Will have a look when I have more time, though someone else will probably have got it by then!

Just checked 'Dragon Tears' - yes, that's the one I was thinking of. Not sure why monkeypooper thinks that isn't it, but I'm sure that scene was in it, plus the slowing down time.

Extract from the eBook, Dragons Tears..
## He stopped in front of a raven-haired girl of twenty, whose slender arms were raised above her head in one of those rapturous expressions of the joy that rhythmic movement and primitive driving music could sometimes bring to a dancer even without the assistance of drugs. He loomed over her for a moment, studying her, as if taken with her beauty. Then he grabbed one of her arms in both his monstrous hands, wrenched with shocking violence, and tore it out of her shoulder socket. A low, wet laugh escaped him as he threw the arm behind him, where it hung in the air between two other dancers. The mutilation was as bloodless as if he had merely disconnected the arm of a mannequin, but of course blood would not begin to flow until time itself flowed again. Then the madness of the act and its consequences would be all too apparent. Connie squeezed her eyes shut, unable to watch what he might do next. As a homicide cop, she had seen countless acts of mindless barbarity—or the consequences of such##

That's it! You guys are awesome... i was thinking it may have been Koontz but i couldn't find anything for some reason. I had a few of the details wrong but then again, the memory melon don't juice like it used to lol. Thanks again, i read the first 14 chapters last night!

Yesssss! Two in one day!! (does victory dance)

It was an excerpt from the book one page reference