So what's your opinion of Stephen King?

Cafe Society
101

I have never thought all of an author’s works were good. Ever. Even my two most adored writers, Douglas Adams and Terry Pratchett, have written books I don’t enjoy.

King is no different. The Stand was marvelous until the end, and now I don’t even like to read it because I hate Harold with a passion. But the best chapter in terms of writing was the chapter in which he details many of the other deaths that took place in the background, silently. Also the one where Larry has to go through the tunnel.

The Shining is amazing. I read a quote which summed up the difference between the movie and the book. Paraphrased: King wrote a book in which a sane man becomes crazy. Kubrick made a movie in which a crazy man becomes psychotic.

Cujo was good, but not terrifying. The more interesting story to me has always been the dynamic between Todd’s parents, and I lay a good heaping of the blame for the affair on Todd’s dad. His mom, too, but it wasn’t her idea to move to the ass end of nowhere - though she could have protested a bit more. Also, Cujo’s owner - Brad, is it? was also interesting to me. In a way Cujo did him a blessing. Sure, he loved his dad, but his dad was not good for him.

Duma Key was all right.

I hated Lisey’s Storey and did not get past the first 25 pages. I forget what it was, but the woman uses a specific swear word which I hated to the point of throwing the book. It’s like “frakking” in BSG - fucking annoying.

His short stories are his best, definitely. The one with the astronaut and the eyes in the hands still creeps me out.

It was great with a few flaws. The biggest one being the ending, but I didn’t particularly like Bill cheating on his supposedly much-loved wife, either. I never like condoned adultery much in books.

Hated Tommyknockers, Dreamcatcher, and the Talisman. Dreamcatcher especially was low-class and disgusting.

Pet Sematary has always been one of my favorites. “DADDY!”

Oh, I liked Bag of Bones a lot. Depressing ending, though.

What King has for me is the visual. There are some things that stay by me forever. For example, in the Stand, when Danny goes into the room 203 (I think?) and sees the woman laying in the tub, when she opens her eyes, they are silver. Sometimes I still dream of a dead woman with silver eyes. The pom-pom puffs on It as the werewolf when it was going after Richie and Bill. And of course, the golden eyes on the astronaut.

Creepy little things like that.

102

Well, I liked Tommyknockers. I think the first 1/4 of it is one of the best examples of a drunk spiralling out of control that I’ve read. The rest of the story is m-kay, but I can understand people not liking it.

It’s Cujo he doesn’t remember writing - I know 'cause I just read the passage in On Writing last night where he describes not remembering it. Which is bizarre, because in Danse Macarbe he talks about writing Cujo and how he was surprised when, at the end,

the little boy dies. King says (paraphrased) “I didn’t plan on him dying, but as I was writing it, he died. And I was as surprised as any of you.”

Smucking! Gah, I hated that word too!

103

Nobosy has mentioned Faithful, diehard Boston Red Sox fans Stewart O’Nan & King’s book about the 2004 season, where the Sox won the World Series for the first time since 1916.

104

I voted “very good read.”

There was a time in the Eighties when I would read just about any SK I could get my hands on; I’ll admit I’ve fallen 'way behind on his more recent writing. My reading time is limited enough that I just won’t even bother picking up books of his when I hear from trusted fellow readers that they’re crap. But The Stand, 'Salem’s Lot, Misery and The Dead Zone are terrific books in virtually every way, with characters, scenes and images which are still memorable. I remember liking Firestarter at the time, but don’t know how well it would hold up to a rereading now.

105

Just recalled that I read From a Buick 8 this year and love love loved it…

106

Minor nitpick: arachnid-inspired ending.

Insects have six legs. Giant child-eating spiders have eight. :wink:

107

This! I totally forgot about this one. I like this one because you never really find out what happened, and to be honest, it seems very real to me. If an interdimensional portal really opened, this is about how much we would understand it - not at all. It, and everything out of it, would be incomprehensible to us.

108

Disagree,
The chapter where he introduces The Dark Man, walking south on US highway X in his dusty cowboy boots that are comfortably sprung in all the right places is the best chapter in The Stand.

109

I always understood that as being a bit lost in translation between universes. That’ll happen when you have all these similar worlds on different levels of the tower, do ye ken it?

110

Agreed.

111

I totally understand that. In Desperation he created a complete visual world for me. In thinking back on reading that book I feel almost like I saw a movie instead. I have specific visual memories caused only by words on the page. That happens for me when I read other authors too but usually it is just a flash of this or that, like a sweater or a puppy or something that I’ve conjured up in my brain but the rest of the story continues to be words to me. Stephen King consistently creates text movies in my brain in a way most authors simply can’t.

112

I guess Ima have to arm-wrestle you for Stu. Gary Sinise was dead-on perfect casting for him; Molly Ringwald as Fran, however, was not.

The giant spider from space at the end of It showed up in another book - was it Under the Dome? They’re apparently a race of extremely nasty beasts.

113

The casting for The Stand was atrocious! The only good thing was the casting of the hot rich guy from* Mystic Pizz*a as Larry Underwood.

He was terrible for the role, mind you, but I’ve loved that guy for 20 years :slight_smile:

114

I must respectfully disagree - beyond Molly Ringwald and Laura San Giacomo as Nadine, I thought the rest of the casting was great.

115

The Bachman Books. I read the copy pictured in the link when I was younger and I also thought it was four short stories.

116

Agreed. LSG apparently didn’t bother reading the source material as there wasn’t a damned thing virginal about her character. When I think of “Actors who totally missed the point of the source material”, her job in The Stand is number 1 with a bullet.

Fran was just whiny, but I think that was more bad writing than bad acting on Ringwald’s part.

117

The story was included in The Bachman Books, as two others have already noted. AFAIK, it has never been collected in any other anthology.
Wow – that Stephen King is even better than I thought. His prose flows so smoothly that you thought a collection of FOUR novels was a collection of short stories!

118

Dogzilla, you really need to read Duma Key. It will restore your faith in SK.

His dialogue (real or in character imagination) is the best part of any SK book. For me, the best scene in The Stand is where Fran gradually comes to realize she needs to bury her Dad before he rots in the summer heat!

119

I never thought the Bachman Books were short stories, but if you’d asked I would totally have told you they were novellas, and estimated them at about a hundred pages or so apiece. The page counts listed for them really rather shocked me, though upon measured reflection it really is too thick a book to only be 400 pages or so. Wild.

As others have said, King is sublime. And shitty. And every point in between. Sometimes all within the same work.

120

Actually, the book was Different Seasons, which was a collection of four novellas; they were (iirc) Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption, Apt Pupil, Breathing Lessons and The Body (later turned into the delightful Rob Reiner film Stand By Me).