“Thinner, the old Gypsy man with the rotting nose whispers to William Halleck as Haleck and his wife, Heidi, come out of the court house. Just that one word, sent on the wafting, cloying sweetness of his breath. “Thinner.” And before Halleck can jerk away, the old Gypsy reaches out and caresses his cheek with one twisted finger. His lips spread open like a wound, showing a few tombstone stumps poking out of his gums. They are black and green. His tongue squirms between them and then slides out to slick his grinning, bitter lips. Thinner.”
Steven King originally wrote this book under his pseudonym Richard Bachman. One of six books he wrote using that name.
Billy Halleck is a fat, obese, lawyer who has to defend himself for killing a women who jaywalked by running into her. He was driving with his wife and was distracted (go ahead, read it and find out why) and didn’t see the women in time. She was a Gypsy, daughter of Taduz Lemke, the head of the Gypsy clan in town at that time.
Billy knew the judge and he case is dismissed at a preliminary stage thanks to the judge. Taduz Lemke meets Billy on the courthouse steps and strokes Billy's cheek and whispers one word to him: "Thinner".
Billy begins to lose weight at a steadily accelerating pace, and he soon realizes that Lemke has cursed him as well as the judge who started to grow scales on his skin. Another helper in getting the case dismissed came from the police chief who soft-pedaled the charges and he was also cursed leading to a horrifying case of acne.
Just another good story that holds you interest from a master storyteller