The main character works at a government office, and some of the people he works for are either politicians or some other high ranking government officials, EXCEPT, they aren’t really people! I don’t remember if they’re aliens, but they’re not human and look scary. But the only humans, who can see them for what they are, are smokers. Something about the nicotine blocks whatever the creatures do to disguise themselves as humans. Smoking isn’t allowed in any public place. ( I read the story before this was actually true). The smokers have secret meetings.
I read a similar story a few years earlier, where this guy had special sunglasses that made it possible for him to see the creatures, but it was kind of silly.
The main character works at a large bank in Boston, not a government office.
The bat-men (as he and his fellow 10 O’Clock People call them) seek power, so they’re in positions of authority – VPs and CEOs of large companies, some politicians (if I recall, the vice-president of the country was a bat-man) and policemen. They’re not all government officials, but some are.
There’s no ban on public smoking in the story – it’s set in present-day America (or America in 2000 or so, whenever the book was published). Many buildings are no-smoking, but not all – at one point two of the characters go to a bar, and they sit in the smoking section.
It’s a good story, if you like King’s brand of horror.
I forgot about that one. This was a different one with sunglasses. The main character worked at a carnival. The creatures in this story were’nt as power hungry as in the Stephan King story. They were just taking over a small town. Their babies weren’t able to disguise themselves, so they were hidden away and kept in cages, because they were viscious. Now I’m curious about this story. I’m pretty sure it was book.
That was Dean Koontz and the novel was Twilight Eyes …the protaganist, a teenager, can sense “goblins”, monsters that take human form and live among us in disguise and who are eventually planning to take over all of mankind. He runs away to the carnival (where all of the quirky characters are at least real humans), falls in love, and commits to destroying the goblins. The goblins can shape shift from human to goblin, and I think they’re supposed to be from a prior ancient civilization. That’s about all I remember - don’t remember the sunglasses but it’s ringing a very vague bell. I remember the babies, though - they’re in a cage in the basement because their shape-shifting genes are broken and they keep cycling from goblin to human and can’t control themselves…thus they can’t go out in public.