Stephen King's Reading Corner

[pitbullmomma]

"The Stand" (uncut version), of COURSE, is my all-time favorite King novel. I, too, read it at least once a year. However, I do love-love-love "The Dark Tower" series (the film sucked beyond compare). Intriguingly enough--having read others' comments before posting--my favorite "Bachman Book" of King's is "The Long Walk"; I've read it many, many times & even wrote a thesis on it in college.
I am not a fan of King's work post-accident. He changed; major brain trauma will do that to a person, & so can debilitating, chronic pain. The combination of the two has made King an angry, cynical, rather hateful individual. Where previously his work centered on themes of neighbor-helping-neighbor (Americans helping America) to overcome horror(s) of every unimaginable sort, & the reader could generally hold-out hope for at least a partial 'happy' ending, his work after his tragic accident became much much darker & decidedly ANTI-American. It seemed as if King maimed & killed characters simply to satisfy some personal vendetta rather than to push the plot forward. Even his main characters feel angry & disillusioned; they aren't so much protagonists anymore as they seem to be antagonists in King's mis-wired mental universe... And I find it incredibly interesting at how many of you have said that you prefer his older works over his new stuff. That tells me that you have seen/felt the change in him as well, but perhaps haven't been able to put your finger on exactly what bothered you about his more recent writing.
Thoughts?

Carlene

I love me some King. Always have (since Carrie first came out), always will.

But for the life of me, I could never understand what he has against dogs. No lie, he always kills off at least one dog in a story. It always made me cry (I love dogs), much like every episode of This Is Us.

Stephen King: For the love of god. Lose your anger. And stop killing the dogs.

Thank you,
Cindi (a Loyal Reader)

 

[pitbullmomma]

That is very deep and profound. I will have to say, my bookshelf has all of his older stuff.... I believe pre accident. Other than The Dark Tower series, I think I lost all interest in reading King's work. It was painful, to say the least.

About TDT movie, I refused to see it. Once they cast Idris Elba as Roland, I knew the movie was phucked. Add the Texas TRex as TMIB and I knew it was all about big names to make an action movie... not about the storyline. It saddened me.



I agree about TLW.... it was a LONG book for something that would've been better as a SHORT story. I think a LOT of his short stories would make good movies, but he keeps letting the most *loved* books be turned into horrific movies.

I'm sorry, But Molly Ringwald as Frannie was a complete misfire..... and I grew up wishing I was Molly Ringwald... so that tells ya something there.

MOLLY RINGWALD IS FRANNIE??! O.M.G.

 

[pitbullmomma]

And that's exactly how I feel about his new stuff. Especially about Tommyknockers, when he admits (or pretends?) not to remember writing the book due to being under the influence of drugs...

However I am going to read Sleeping beauty.

Tommyknockers=Worst. King. Book. Ever.

And I do believe, the one where he killed off the most dogs.

 

[pitbullmomma]

OK. This is totally messed up.

But...did anybody else think "Stranger Things" is based off a SK book?! Cuz my husband (who is not a SK fan, or even reads for fun, sad as it is) informed me tonight that it is totally NOT King. And I just assumed it is, because, well, it's so exactly like a SK series-made-from-a-novel, except a good one, lol. And I am halfway through the second season and all along I thought it was one of his (and I have to Google this to make sure it's true, so, bye for now).

 

[Clucking-in-StLoo]

oh big King fan! hard to nail down one particular.... would probably have to say the Shining

 

[Wolfgang B.]

OK. This is totally messed up.

But...did anybody else think "Stranger Things" is based off a SK book?! Cuz my husband (who is not a SK fan, or even reads for fun, sad as it is) informed me tonight that it is totally NOT King. And I just assumed it is, because, well, it's so exactly like a SK series-made-from-a-novel, except a good one, lol. And I am halfway through the second season and all along I thought it was one of his (and I have to Google this to make sure it's true, so, bye for now).

When my wife suggested Stranger Things to me she said "Hey, it's just like a Stephen King story, you will like it". So we watched Season 1 but it didn't grab me. Probably because I rarely ever enjoy watching child actors especially obnoxious ones like the ones in Stranger Things.

 

[shawluvsbirds]

They are actually both short stories and combined in the book Different Seasons. I recommend it, it also includes Breathing Method which is another fantastic story!

I did not realize that! Probably why I never ran across them.

 

[shawluvsbirds]

Here's all my king books!

 

[shawluvsbirds]

There is a short story in everything's eventual called L.T. s theory of pets that is pretty hilarious!
I have not read Gerald s game. Anyone know if it's it any good?

 

[Teila]

There is a short story in everything's eventual called L.T. s theory of pets that is pretty hilarious!
I have not read Gerald s game. Anyone know if it's it any good?

I have read Gerald's Game and enjoyed it. So, yep, imo, it is good.