A reporter from the Boston Globe just left the entire staff of The Weekly Islander, two old men and an apprentice, and headed back to the main land.  He wanted to get some unsolved mysteries out of them for a series of feature stories for his newspaper, but the two old men couldn't give him any he didn't already have.  Couldn't or wouldn't?  The apprentice, the young Stephanie McCann -Steffi- senses that "wouldn't" was the correct word, and she is determined to find out why not, and what the two men, Vince Teague and Dave Bowie, decided not to tell the Boston reporter.

So they tell her about a dead man found on a beach of the island, a quarter of a century ago.  The man had no identification, nobody knew him, and the police is not too keen on wasting too much energy since the man's death was not the result of a crime, he choked on a piece of meat.  The two newspapermen don't let go, and after a year of fitting pieces of the puzzle and with the help of a graduate student in forensics the man at least gets a name - and a wife finally has certainty that she's a widow.

But is the mystery solved with that?  Well, it only just started.  His presence there doesn't make sense, his absence at work doesn't make sense, the trip he must have made doesn't, even his clothing doesn't.  But will anyone ever find out?

Expect the unexpected.  For a Stephen King novel this one is on the short side, around 170 pages only.  Despite being published in the "Hard Case Crime" series, this is anything but crime (probably?), nor is it hardboiled.  And there is no link to the Dark Tower, nor is there any horror in sight.  And certainly don't expect an ending without any loose ends.

The Colorado Kid, nor his mistery, is really the subject of this book, despite its title, despite the unraveling of his mistery, as far as that is possible.  Telling his story is the story, but this book is about the two elderly man and their apprentice, taking their relationship with her to a next level.  She starts to wonder about being an islander, they constantly test her to see if she's "the right stuff".  Will she take a risk or go back home?  Would she consider becoming an islander?  Is she really made of the right stuff for the newspaper?  Questions like these have more chance of being answered than any of the Kid's questions.  Read the story of the sparks between the three people, and you're in for an enjoyable read.