I think he should have edited out the card men, edited out Jimla, edited out the shot-in-the-spine girl, and yes, even edited out “ax-in-the-head family.” Then he would have had a neat, tidy, fast-moving 400-page book.
If he is *that *attached to the ax-in-the-head family, make 'em a short story.
If it was a 400-page book, it wouldn’t be Stephen King.
What I liked about the axe family is that it provided an immediate and gripping beginning for the book. The description of Hopalong Harry and his essay really drew me in, much moreso than a plan to save Kennedy would have.
Can anyone give the gist of the alternate ending? I am interested but not enough to read it 
Exactly.
The thing the card men added is that you immediately realized that something was not-quite-right about how he was going back in time, something about the rules he thought he knew was mistaken. I agree it wasn’t the most satisfying bit of the book as a whole, however.
I went to read it but it’s been taken off the website. Wikipedia mentions it but all it says is that his lady friend ended up having a large family.
Maybe he ended up dancing with Sadie’s daughter… 
ETA: I guess granddaughter would be more like it.
Here is the link to the alternate ending:
And, again, another misspelling of “Killeen.” :rolleyes:
Yeah, that ending sucks. The one in the book was far better, even if it wasn’t perfect.
Thank you. Read it. Thought there would be more to it. It has been a month or so since i finished the original book so my memory is a bit hazy but I take it the implication here is George Married Sadie and used his knowledge of the future to become rich?
I take it to mean this:
Jake heeded the Green Card Man’s warning about the possibility of destroying reality if he were to stay in the past - as he did in the book. So he came through the portal, left the diner, let the portal close (presumably, since he never did find out if the LL Bean went in at the diner’s location) and then moved on.
The last few sentences in this ending is Jake musing about what Sadie’s new husband probably thought, because it was what he thought when he was with her. It echoes the idea that the past harmonizes with itself. So in this version of the ending he never gets to see Sadie again. Or, at least not that we know about. She finds someone else at DCHS and they live the life that, had Jake/George stayed in the past, they would have had together.
I still think that the ending in the book is better. And who knows if King had stayed with this ending perhaps he would have added more?
In the books ending I’m not sure if they share more than just a dance at the end, but I like to think that they do, even given their age difference at that point. I think the idea that she still knew who he was and couldn’t pin point why or how she knew him, because of her dreams and/or something more unexplainable, lends more credit to the Green Card Man’s point that each trip isn’t necessarily a total reset.
I think that their souls still know what they shared together, even if it was outside of the strand of reality.
Up next… 11/22/63 the movie… I read that Jonathan Demme is supposed to direct it. I’ll be curious to see what comes of it.
Ya know what I mighta liked as a coda?
Jake Epping realizes he’s gone back and forth a few times now, lived in the past for 5 years or so… finds himself in a situation where he can’t really (honestly) discuss Sadie with anyone or the entire experience.
Going back to redlining GED essays would prove to be pretty anti-climactic. Jake realizes he’s basically a “man without a time” — so he realizes his only real option is to… BE a green / yellow card man. His path finds him to go be the guardian of a bubble/rabbit hole somewhere, sometime.
He goes to warn others and also because only someone else who is going through the same trip would understand anything he has to say. But he chooses to go in spite of (or perhaps because?) he’s going to slowly go mad doing this.
Even have an idea of the last line… some new befuddled traveler comes along and asks who he is, and he says, through confusion… “JimLa?”
There, I even wrapped a freaking bow on it.
Thoughts?
Not bad. I still prefer mine though:
Not a happy ending, but who says the ending has to be happy?
Oh, I didn’t have a particular problem with the earthquakes. The book kinda nods at the idea that maybe things like the Japan earthquake and Indonesia tsunami wouldn’t have happened if people weren’t fooling around with the time streams… which fits it in really nicely with the notions and themes in the story of Genesis. God told us not to mess with the tree of knowledge because he knew it wasn’t best for us to go that route, we directly (though ignorantly) disobeyed and got involved in something we shouldn’t have, and the punishment is a world gone all to crap.
Jake (and Al before him) keep biting at the apple, and the earthquakes are God very plainly saying messing around with time is too much for your little brains to process. You’ll only go nuts, like the card men always do. If you won’t stop doing it even after SEEING their example, I have to put barriers in place that show you to stop messing around time willy-nilly.
Or, more simply, the earthquakes could be God’s way of saying “There’s a plan. Stop trying to screw with the plan.”
Hopefully getting theological won’t lead to ranty ravey responses below. But a book like this (esp the part you’re talking about) does raise some interesting q’s.
I understood it to be that Jake didn’t want to kill an innocent man – even if he could reset the timeline and start over.
But if he reset the timeline, then Oswald would still be alive… therefore, no killing.
I thought it was The Beams letting go.
I had a huge problem with the earthquakes (and the ripping sounds, which were going to tear the Earth asunder by 2080) because it turned an alt-history thriller into a silly “Some Things Are Best Left To God” message, complete with mystical forces.
Just show that the alt-history sucked, giving Jake a moral quandary, and show how he resolves the issue. King actually had this, but could not help but bring up the mystical crap.