I almost bought King’s latest collection of short stories today, but the price was just a little too high for me considering the low opinion I have of one or two of his most recent works. Of the several stories in this anthology that I’ve read elsewhere, I have mixed feelings. The autopsy story (whose title I forget) was good, as was LT’s Theory About Pets, and Road Virus Heads North would have kicked ass except for the really atrocious ending. So what about the other ten or eleven stories? I know somebody here must have already started reading this book (how long’s it been out, anyway–not very long, surely). Any opinions, good or bad? Can you compare any of the stories to anything else he’s written? Should I snatch this collection up, or would it be a waste of hard-earned cash (sort of like Hearts In Atlantis was–blech!)?
I was confused by an ad I saw for this book because it said “including some stories never printed before.” I would have thought none of them would have been published before (I’ve never seen any of his stories printed outside of his books except for an exerpt from " Hearts…" a magazine and a couple of reprintings in anthologies) he published them in his own books. Where the the rest of the stories printed before, then? Other anthologies with muliple authors, journals, magazines?
At least one story was published on the net; you could pay money to download it. A story called “LT’s Theory About Pets” or something was published in an anthology that was called, IIRC, Crimes and Misdemeanors. “Road Virus Heads North” is in a horror anthology called 999: Horror Stories For the New Millenium, or something like that. One story, I think, was published in the New Yorker. The autopsy story I mentioned was published in another horror anthology, the name of which I can’t recall at the moment. I’m uncertain on the others–smaller magazines and/or anthologies I guess.
I’m on the 4th story of fourteen. So far, I’m enjoying them. The story “Autopsy Room 402” was the first story and I really enjoyed/hated it. I had a surgery/not enough anesthesia experience and King’s descriptions of the guy trying to get the doctors attention really unnerved me.
The other three have been OK. You might wanna wait for the paperback if you’re that worried.
Riding the Bullet was the e-book, and it looks like all the stories from “Blood and Smoke” are in print in this book.
If I find any really great stories, I’ll let ya know.
King is the only author that can sell me a short collection. Even so, I still am becoming more and more disappointed with him as time goes by. * Bag of Bones* was the last book I truly enjoyed. Dreamcatcher was horrible. I still haven’t even finished it.
If there had been another author that was selling a new hardcover right next to it, I might not have bought * Everything’s Eventual*. I haven’t had a new hardcover from any of my favorites for a few months now.
Some of the stories were great – like the others I enjoyed the title story - but it does feel cheap to have the * Blood and Smoke* audio books reproduced this way.
3 stars out of 5, and that’s a gift.
The alluded-to next-Dark-Tower book had better be a home run, or I’m off the hardcovers for King.
I haven’t gotten my copy yet, but apparently I have already read half of the book already! FTR, the autopsy story is in Psychos, which I own, and “The Road Virus Heads North” is in 999, which I own.
Of course, this is the woman who has read The Stand at least 4 times, and even read Insomnia twice. All the way through, even! Both times! 
Insomnia put me to sleep.
Hardy, har, har. Here’s another old and tired and oh so predictable reaction: Hie thee to a library and place thyself on the waiting list…
I have literally read every single King book (working on Everything’s Eventual right now. My dear Hubby bought it for me today as a gift) and I can honestly say that I have liked them all with only one exception–The Tommyknockers.
Maybe I’m just not that particular…who knows.
But I absolutely love his collections of short stories. I am so excited about this one. I just finished the 4th story as well, and so far I have no complaints.
I wouldn’t say that you’re not particular, pepperlandgirl. It’s just that, well, you’ve read everything he’s written. I think King is still writing well (except, as his popularity waxes once more he’s suffering from underedited author syndrome* again), but he’s increasingly wrapped up in the “ain’t this cool” of his overarching structure. I just finished Insomnia and there are parts that would have made NO sense whatsoever if I hadn’t read other books that mention Roland and the Crimson King and other concepts of the greater King mythos. There are parts of Insomnia I didn’t understand anyway - the green man is assumably understandable if you’ve read the Dark Tower, which I have not read- and if I had known just a little less, I would have been utterly lost and hated it, which is how my girlfriend felt about it.
Black House suffered pretty heavily from that. It was explained pretty well, I’ll admit that, but it seemed clunky. It was cumbersome on an already overburdened story. Black House also seemed to me to suffered from the above mentioned UAS. I actually edited the damn thing myself as I went along. Among other things, in the climactic action scene, a certain pivotal piece of jewelry appears from out of damned nowhere. It hadn’t been mentioned in the book before that I’d noticed.
That and the damn twee, “Oh, this is a book and we know it is so that makes up for sloppy writing,” tone, like the “well, I bet you expected a minor character to die, but he didn’t! haha, fooled you!” passage. Yes, very clever. Of course, that means that the character who was hauled around like luggage all book never develops and doesn’t even serve the purpose of dying. Bravo, you created a character who’s indistinguishable from 5 others who contributes nothing to the narrative. I like King better when he’s not postmodern.
Ok, that got out of hand.
–John
*OAS affects all popular authors, some more than others. Editors fear their might and stop doing more than the most perfunctory jobs which is why the books get longer and suckier. King already went through this once but his bottoming out and subsequent renaissance put him back in form again.
When King put Riding the Bullet on the net for download, I didn’t even bother, because I knew it would be put in a collection sometime. There was no way I was going to pay twice for a story.
Doug Clegg has published a couple novels for free through email, so I don’t understand why King didn’t do that for one lousy story. I also didn’t download The Plant because I was worried he’d flake out on it - and he did. I would’ve been pissed to pay for each installment, only to never find out the end.
Sounds like I’ve read quite a few of the stories in this new collection, too. I have Psychos and 999, also, and I read the New Yorker story.
I usually buy King’s books in hardback, but for the first time, I think I’ll wait for the paperback for this one.
Sheri