Chris–Update/Dark Half wrap-up

So our internet service went down for a week or so, but then I went ahead and got started on The Dark Half anyway, cause I’m running out of year, and then when we got reconnected I was over halfway done so it seemed silly to post about starting it since I was almost done and I thought “Well, why not just wait until you’re finished and THEN post?’ and I said “Yep, that’s a good idea” so I went ahead and finished the book but then got super lazy and never posted about it and so now I’m already into Four Past Midnight and figured that I’d better get caught up.

So here I am.  Onward!

So, The Dark Half.  In my opinion, this is King’s most autobiographical work.  He’s a writer, Beaumont’s a writer.  The both had pen names.  They both went to weird lengths to keep their secret identities secret.  They both had said secret identities outed by some guy who had a little bit of luck and a lot of research.

However, as far as I know–Richard Bachman never killed anyone.

This is another Castle Rock book, so many of the locations are familiar, and there are the inevitable references–Sheriff Bannerman, Frank Dodd, Cujo–but really that’s it.  This is focused on writers, and writing, and their processes, and how sometimes they become different people when they are writing.  And it’s scary.  King often talks about how he’s compelled to write, and that he’d be doing it even if he didn’t get paid, simply because HE HAS TO.  Much like Thad Beaumont at the end of this one.

Speaking of George Bannerman, I was honestly surprised when Cujo ate him way back when.  Even though I had read that one before, I was thinking that Bannerman was the Sheriff in a great many books.  But I like Alan Pangborn.  And I hope to see more of him.

We will see Richard Bachman again… unlike Beaumont and George Stark, Stephen and Richard are still at least on speaking terms.

 

Chris–Skeleton Crew wrap up!

King really is a terrific short-story writer.  I don’t think that all novelists are really able to craft great short stories, and maybe it’s a surprise that King is so good at it, given how long some of his books are, and how much build-up he tends to put in them.  However, his shorts don’t really lose anything in their size.  What he is maybe forced to leave out adds rather than subtracts.  Now we have to wonder a bit more.  We have to think about things, and what’s happening, and why it’s happening.  Which makes for a great reading experience.

For the most part.  There are a few stories in Skeleton Crew that, for me, really fall short.  So let’s discuss!

THE GOOD:

“The Mist”  OK, maybe this has been done before, and often.  Strange mist, weird creatures, certain death!  But King doesn’t just give you monsters–he gives you characters.  You get to know David, and Steff, and Billy, and Norton, and really, the whole town.  You get their history, their hopes, and now, their fears.  These aren’t strangers trapped in a supermarket.  These are your friends and neighbors.  And you want them to get out.

This got movied not too long ago, but they RUINED the ending.  Absolutely ruined it.

“The Monkey”  I am now on a quest to find a cymbal monkey.  There are a ton listed on eBay, but I’m scouring local antique shops.  Hopefully it’s not the same one from the story…

“The Jaunt”  King ventures into SF territory with this one.  And even though he never really gets into the science part, he manages to build a very realistic version of teleportation.  This one is awesome, and really makes you wonder–would you hold your breath as well?

“The Raft”  ALWAYS, always tell someone where you are going!!

“The Man Who Would Not Shake Hands”  A return to that strange men’s club from Different Seasons.  I’m pretty sure that I had mentioned that I would love to see some other stories set there–apparently I had forgotten about this one.  “It is the tale, not he who tells it.”

“Beachworld”  ANOTHER SF story!  And seriously cool and tense.  The name pretty much gives you an idea…

“The Reaper’s Image”  A haunted mirror story–and like I said in the intro, often with King’s shorts, it’s what he leave out that really makes the story.  This is one of the scariest in the book.

“Survivor Type”  Oh man.  Two questions–how badly do you want to live?  And–how much trauma can you take?  It’s like SAW, only solo!

“Gramma”  Hands-down, the scariest story in the collection.  Oh jeez.  This one seriously creeped me out.  And I’ve read this book before, and really had no memory of this one.  As you are reading, you really aren’t sure which direction it’s going, what kind of story it is.  And then BAM! at the end…

THE BAD:

“Here There By Tygers”  I honestly just don’t get this one.  From the whole “I have to go to the basement” to the fact that there is a tiger in the bathroom, this just does not work for me.

“Paranoid: A Chant”  This one’s a poem, and I will admit, poetry is not really my deal, with very few exceptions.

“For Owen”  Again, a poem, and one that seems very personal (to King’s son).  Nice, but just not my thing.

The Milkman stories–I just don’t get them.  How could a pyscho milkman keep his route?  And it’s obvious that people are suspicious, since Rocky knows that Spike kills people…  how was this guy not fired?

“The Reach”  A ghost story?  Sort of?  This one just plain lost me as a reader, and I could not get into it.

THE REST:

“Cain Rose Up”, “Nona”  These are sort of similar, in that they end with young men going on killing sprees.  “Nona” seems like it might be a ghost story, but I get the feeling that it’s really more mental illness–schizophrenia.  And same goes for “Cain Rose Up”.  It’s easy to think that these kids were just killers, but I think that there is much more going on.

“Mrs Todd’s Shortcut”, “The Wedding Gig”, “Word Processor of the Gods”, “Uncle Otto’s Truck” These were all good stories, but for me, that was just what they were–good stories.  Nothing wrong with that, but these didn’t impact me like the ones above.

There are a couple of Castle Rock stories in here, where we learn that Joe Camber and his dog are still the talk of the town, and we get to see an older Vern Tessio, as well as Ace Merrill.  So we’ve got a few King connections.  And even though there are a handful of stories in here that I don’t particularly care for, the others more than make up for it.

 

Chris–Pet Semetary wrap up!!!!11!!!

FINALLY!  This one was tough–not because of the quality of the book, but like I said in the last post, real life got in the way.  Really, bottom line:  This book is horrifying.  HORRIFYING.  And not just because of the supernatural spookables that are in here (although those do get pretty damn creepy).

What really, really makes Pet Semetary truly frightening is the fact that it is entirely plausible.  Well, except for those spookables.  But EVERYTHING else in here could really happen.

What would you do to keep your child from having to face what death is and what it means, even for a little while longer?  Louis Creed knows that his daughter Ellie is having a difficult time coming to grips, even before anyone dies.  That rant about Church…  that’s painful to hear as a parent.  You want to keep your kids from having to learn about the darker side of living, but you know that it’s going to have to happen some time.  BUT what if you could bury her cat somewhere where he would come back, even as a shadow of himself?  Just to give her some time to figure things out?  And maybe grow up a little?  Would you do it?

And what about your child?  Could you simply agree with Jud, and state that “sometimes dead is better”?  Or would you go to any length to get even just a few precious minutes back, even if your child wasn’t quite your child anymore?  THAT’s what makes this book so scary.  Throughout it, King makes it known that the burial ground is influencing everything–from Louis, to Jud, to Rachel’s rental car.  But he didn’t need to.  Louis could just as easily tripped down the rabbit hole all on his own, and no one would have blamed him.  And the scariest part is that it isn’t difficult for me to trade places with Louis.  I could see myself doing the same things.  For me, that’s the only weakness here.  The fact that there was a burial ground was enough supernatural.  Everything else could have just progressed naturally.  Still, that’s a pretty weak weakness.  This book is fantastic.

There is a great example of how King really can get his hooks in, and how he can really give you the chills.  When Louis is having his last happy day, Kind describes everything in such detail–the field, the wind, the kite, Gage’s laughter–that you find yourself right there with Louis, fully involved in this day of all days.  And it is awesome.  But how does King end the day?  With such a feeling of unease and dread, and thoughts of Orinco trucks speeding down the road in front of the house that the joy and happiness of that most excellent day is completely, and totally, wiped away.  Most times King just comes right out and says what’s going to happen.  This time he lets the feeling creep up on us, and then hammers us in the next chapter.

Connections….

Jud Crandall reminds me so much of Dick Holloran.  Jud knows that there is something off here, and he does his very best to try and protect Louis and his family.  Unfortunately it didn’t work out too well this time.

Cujo makes another cameo, as Jud tells Louis about a “big old Saint Bernard went rabid downstate a couple of years ago and killed four people.”  And this is another Maine book, so Castle Rock, and Derry, and even Jerusalem’s Lot are mentioned–The Lot on an interstate sign, which Rachel thinks doesn’t sound like a very nice place to go…

Oh, and The Ramones are in here, quite a bit.  Which is nice, since they did the title track for the movie!

 

Chris–Different Seasons wrap-up

Sorry that this has taken so long–I finished this book a couple of weeks ago.  Unfortunately, real life reared it’s ugly face into our fun little book excursion.  More on that later.  But now, on to Different Seasons.

King has a pretty lengthy afterword in this book where he discusses the trouble with novellas.  You can’t sell them to magazines as short stories, because they’re too long.  You can’t sell them to publishers as novels, because they’re too short.  So what do you do with them?  Of course, these days, you just sell them on an e-reader.  Problem solved.  However, then you don’t end up with a wonderful collection like Different Seasons.

Even though these stories are very dissimilar, there is a common thread–more so than the usual King connections, which we’ll get to.  Each of the four stories represents a different season (hence the name!) and we the readers get moved on in a year.  Each of the stories has it’s own… category?  This corresponds to the particular season.

First up, HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL with “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption”.  Here we find Andy Dufrense, wrongly convicted of murdering his wife and her lover, he’s sent to Shawshank prison for a very, very long time.  He’s subjected to the stereotypical prison experience–rape, beatings, solitary confinement, corrupt officials–and yet, he knows that he is innocent.  And he has a plan to get out.  And despite the length of time that it takes to pull everything together, he never loses hope.  HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL is seriously on point for this story.  I’m sure just about everyone knows the story–who hasn’t seen that movie?  And there really are a lot of similarities between the two; which is probably why the movie was so good.

The send falls under the SUMMER OF CORRUPTION, “Apt Pupil”.  The quick and dirty–an impressionable kid discovers a Nazi war criminal living right there in his neighborhood and blackmails him into telling stories about the war.  Stories probably isn’t the right word.  Todd wants details.  He wants to know what it was really like, what really happened.  He wants the “gushy stuff”.  And that’s what he gets.

When I first read this, I felt that Dussander was the one behind the “corruption”, but this time around, I’m not sure.  The old man was done.  He was out.  He was content to let it go and try to forget about it and live a lonely life and die a lonely death.  Until Todd came along.  Todd did all of the pushing.  Todd brought everything back into the light.  And Todd had no idea what he was in for.  Oh, he thought he did.  He came in there full of confidence, stating this is how it’s going to be.  And he thought this was what he wanted.  King shows us exactly when he realizes that he’s in way over his head, and now has no way out.

This one was also given the movie treatment.  Sir Ian McKellan played Dussander, and I can’t remember who played the kid. This is a seriously depressing and disturbing story, and I’m sure it made for an equally depressing and disturbing movie, or I would probably remember it…

FALL FROM INNOCENCE…  “The Body” is the best of the lot, here.  Also known by the film name, “Stand By Me”, it’s a story of four friends who head off an an adventure… to find a dead kid.  And at first, that’s all it is.  An adventure.  “Hey, we all lied to our parents, and now we’re sneaking out and hiking halfway across Maine and ISN’T THIS AWESOME!!!!”  But as they go on, it because less and less a fun time, and more of a quest.  These four boys grow up on that trip, and we get to go along with them.  If you haven’t read this, read this one.  Even if you skip the rest of the stories–read this one.

The shortest of the four is “The Breathing Method”, under A WINTER’S TALE.  This is the story that really falls more into what you’d expect from Stephen King.  A mysterious club where men gather to tell tales, and where secrets are hidden behind secrets.  This is really a story about a man telling a story, one to chill us with horror.  Overall, it’s less about the tales that are told and more about the location, which we never learn much about at all.  The story-within-the-story is about a young woman, pregnant, who meets a very tragic end–as you would expect from Winter.

However, at the end, there is birth… which leads us right back into Spring.

This is a fantastic collection of stories, and unlike Night Shift, there is no junk food here.  These are all serious, and enjoyable.  Well, “Apt Pupil” isn’t very enjoyable.  And honestly, it’s more horrifying than the actual horror story.  Horror is really only fun when you know, deep deep down, that it can’t actually happen.  “Apt Pupil” happens all too often.

Connections–there are a bunch.  Castle Rock is featured prominently–the boys in “The Body” live there, and that’s where Shawshank is–and Cujo and Frank Bannerman get name-dropped.  Jerusalem’s Lot is here.  Andy Dufresne and Dussander have met before.  There are a few others (which I should have written down!  I finished this a while back now, and a few of them have slipped my mind!).

So, I’ll try to get us all back on track.  Up next is Pet Semetary, and I’ll tell you why this has taken me so long to get back to.

 

Chris–Cujo wrap-up

I’m just going to come right out and say it–I did not enjoy this book.  Now, I have read this one before, but honestly it was like 30 years ago, so there was a lot that I didn’t remember.  I had problems with so much stuff in here…  so let’s discuss!

One, there is a lot of stuff that just isn’t needed and doesn’t help the story at all.  As near I can figure, the only purpose of introducing the character of Aunt Evvie is so that she can foretell that it’s going to be a hot summer.  And that’s the extent of her importance, because she dies immediately afterwards.  Same goes for George Meara.  He gets one more scene than Aunt Evvie, and we do get to see his reasoning for not delivering the mail at a crucial point–but do we need to?  King could have just as easily said “Joe Camber left a note to hold the mail” and been done with it.  Message passed.

I get that the whole ad business with Vic and Roger is sort of integral to the plot–we need a reason for Vic to leave town and leave Donna and Tad behind–but do we really need to know what they are doing in detail?  And Steve Kemp.  Yes, he’s also sort of an important figure, but I felt that there were too many pages dedicated to what he was doing off on his own.

All of these things do have a place in the story, and they all do sorta kinda come together at the end, but for the most part it felt very piecemeal and broken for me.  This is supposed to be a terrifying experience, and yet it became somewhat boring.  We go from OH MY GOD WE’RE TRAPPED IN THIS CAR AND IT’S A 1000 DEGREES AND THIS DOG IS GOING TO KILL US to “hmmmm… how do we save this ad campaign for cereal?”  The story never finds a rhythm, and the tension and build up are constantly interrupted.

The worst of these interruptions for me was the bit with the girl and the cereal.  This seems like nothing more than a cheap scare.  Again, I see that knowing what happened is kind of important to the story, but do we really need to know this?  Does it really help the story along?  Or is it just filler thrown in to give us an easy shock?

The other big problem that I had with the book is that while there isn’t anything supernatural here, it’s almost like King couldn’t commit to it.  He puts a boogeyman in Tad’s closet.  Literally the Boogeyman.  From the short story in Nightshift.  And it’s not just that Tad THINKS that there’s a monster in the closet.  The door opens by itself.  Things get moved around.  There’s that terrible smell.  But it never serves a purpose.  It would have been better character building if Tad had just thought that there was a monster.  The results would have been the same.  And it wouldn’t have seemed so flip-floppy.

And I’ll admit–that kid’s name sort of gets me.  MY son’s name is Tad…  and while he’s much older than 4, it’s very difficult not to put him in this situation when you keep reading that name.

There are a ton of connections in here.  This is the 2nd Castle Rock book, so we are reintroduced to Sheriff Bannerman (and unintroduced, I suppose), and the John Smith/Frank Dodd incident is mentioned throughout.  Another odd connection–Herbert Tarreytons.  Those are King’s choice of cigarettes for his stories; we will see those again.  And there’s a quote from Huck Finn about “lighting out for the territory.”  THAT is going to become very important when we get to The Talisman.

Cujo is supposed to be a scary, frightening, terror experience, but really it’s just sad.  There is nothing fun here.  And it’s not just that bad things happen to good people–look at Charlie McGee, Johnny Smith, Danny Torrance.  But the weird and creepy elements in those stories offset the horror of what they went through.  In Cujo we just get a little boy who literally gets roasted alive due to a ton of stupid coincidences.

And the saddest part?

“It would perhaps not be amiss to point out that he had always tired to be a good dog.  He had tried to do all the things his MAN and his WOMAN, and most of all his BOY, had asked or expected of him.  He would have died for them, if that had been required.  He had never wanted to kill anybody.  He had been struck by something, possibly destiny, or fate, or only a degenerative nerve disease called rabies.  Free will was not a factor.”