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Leaving the bullshit self-insertion Dark Tower stuff aside, I think the worst King novels I've read were the Dark Half and the Dead Zone. I just couldn't get into them at all. If I ever get around to forcing my way through Lisey's Story I'll probably feel the same way about it. I tried reading it a few months ago and just found it boring as gently caress.
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Sep 7, 2011 15:15
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If you're looking for the most boring King novel, give Rose Madder a try. At least the ones you mentioned made a certain kind of sense and the characters seemed free of plot positioning for the most part. Rose Madder is just awful and I don't mean that in a so bad it's actually interesting; the book has no redeeming qualities at all and it read like something Paul Sheldon shat out while having a blowtorch held to his feet. In fact the only thing that could have made that book interesting is if King went really meta and published it under Paul Sheldons name and somehow built in Annie Wilkes return and recapture of Paul as subtext.
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Sep 7, 2011 20:01
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Mad Hamish posted:Leaving the bullshit self-insertion Dark Tower stuff aside, I think the worst King novels I've read were the Dark Half and the Dead Zone. I just couldn't get into them at all. I actually really like The Dead Zone, although I do think it has a problem at the end where he just constantly skips forward in time.
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Sep 7, 2011 23:29
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Mad Hamish posted:Leaving the bullshit self-insertion Dark Tower stuff aside, I think the worst King novels I've read were the Dark Half and the Dead Zone. I just couldn't get into them at all. I'm so-so on Dark Half, but it did give me one of the best laughs of my life. It turns out no matter how good King can be at scaring the bejayzus out of me--and at times he's very, very good--he cannot make sparrows terrifying, and when he tries it is hilarious.
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Sep 7, 2011 23:43
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Local Group Bus posted:If you're looking for the most boring King novel, give Rose Madder a try. At least the ones you mentioned made a certain kind of sense and the characters seemed free of plot positioning for the most part. I still like that better than Gerald's Game, and I read them back to back so it was a direct comparison.
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Sep 8, 2011 14:47
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The best bit of Dark Half is when the sheriff takes the time to notice just how hot Thad Beaumont's wife is. At least twice. And at least one of those times occurs when he's busy trying to save both their lives. I guess she must really be hot. V V
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Sep 9, 2011 02:22
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Darko posted:I still like that better than Gerald's Game, and I read them back to back so it was a direct comparison. Holy poo poo, how bad is Gerald's Game? It's the only King novel I haven't read but it'd have to be loving horrid to be worse than Rose Madder.
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Sep 9, 2011 18:53
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Ugly In The Morning posted:Holy poo poo, how bad is Gerald's Game? It's the only King novel I haven't read but it'd have to be loving horrid to be worse than Rose Madder. It's bad. If King had stayed with the psychological horror aspect ( husband and wife go to remote cabin for a tryst; wife handcuffed to bed for kinky sex, husband corks off from a heart attack and she's left cuffed), and hadn't tacked on a ridiculous subplot ay the very end(magical 'tard/cannibal/necrophile visits handcuffed wife, she thinks she's hallucinating, but it turns out he's real, it might have been OK.
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Sep 9, 2011 19:12
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I'm really surprised that Rose Madder is so universally reviled - I've only read it once, and it was when I was much younger, but I enjoyed it. I remember it having a neat premise, a pretty good antagonist, and it tied very loosely in with Dark Tower. What is so bad about it that I'm forgetting?
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Sep 11, 2011 05:41
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PonchtheJedi posted:I'm really surprised that Rose Madder is so universally reviled - I've only read it once, and it was when I was much younger, but I enjoyed it. I remember it having a neat premise, a pretty good antagonist, and it tied very loosely in with Dark Tower. What is so bad about it that I'm forgetting? The bull. I haven't read it in 10-12 years and I only read it once, but that's what sticks out.
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Sep 11, 2011 07:34
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PonchtheJedi posted:I'm really surprised that Rose Madder is so universally reviled - I've only read it once, and it was when I was much younger, but I enjoyed it. I remember it having a neat premise, a pretty good antagonist, and it tied very loosely in with Dark Tower. What is so bad about it that I'm forgetting? I've only read a couple pages so far but in the beginning she was reading Misery's Journey.
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Sep 11, 2011 12:34
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juliuspringle posted:I've only read a couple pages so far but in the beginning she was reading Misery's Journey. Why is that bad?
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Sep 11, 2011 14:37
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PonchtheJedi posted:I'm really surprised that Rose Madder is so universally reviled - I've only read it once, and it was when I was much younger, but I enjoyed it. I remember it having a neat premise, a pretty good antagonist, and it tied very loosely in with Dark Tower. What is so bad about it that I'm forgetting? I wasn't going to say anything, but since you did I thought I would just pip in to agree. I actually really enjoyed Rose Madder, but as well it's been quite some time since I've read it. I really liked the premise of the main character escaping into the painting and everything that entailed, and felt that it sort-of stepped away from King's traditional magical retard story.
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Sep 11, 2011 15:04
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juliuspringle posted:I've only read a couple pages so far but in the beginning she was reading Misery's Journey. Plenty of other Stephen King stories have people reading books, watching movies etc that were created by characters in other King stories. It's really about the same as many of his stories referring to the towns of Derry, Castle Rock, etc. Or Christine cameoing in It.
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Sep 11, 2011 16:50
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trandorian posted:Plenty of other Stephen King stories have people reading books, watching movies etc that were created by characters in other King stories. It's really about the same as many of his stories referring to the towns of Derry, Castle Rock, etc. Or Christine cameoing in It. I don't remember the Christine cameo in It, and I thought I had caught everything. Care to tell me when and where it occurs?
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Sep 11, 2011 17:47
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I don't remember Christine, but I do remember Dick Hallorann making an appearance.
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Sep 11, 2011 18:08
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ConfusedUs posted:I don't remember the Christine cameo in It, and I thought I had caught everything. When Pennywise gets Henry Bowers out of Juniper Hill, she's implied to be his ride
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Sep 11, 2011 18:26
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Christine is also in The Stand, as I recall.
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Sep 11, 2011 18:53
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Ridonkulous posted:Why is that bad? Misery was the main character in the books Paul Sheldon wrote in Misery. It's some of that him linking his poo poo together and then telling us to ignore all the connections. His Kindle book UR alludes to the dark tower and things from it too.
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Sep 11, 2011 19:25
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juliuspringle posted:Misery was the main character in the books Paul Sheldon wrote in Misery. It's some of that him linking his poo poo together and then telling us to ignore all the connections. His Kindle book UR alludes to the dark tower and things from it too. I am aware of what you are talking about but I have never heard/read him saying "ignore all the connections", to my knowledge they are deliberate.
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Sep 11, 2011 20:41
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ZoDiAC_ posted:When Pennywise gets Henry Bowers out of Juniper Hill, she's implied to be his ride I never caught onto that. But it's been a very, very long time since I read Christine.
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Sep 11, 2011 21:31
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Ridonkulous posted:I am aware of what you are talking about but I have never heard/read him saying "ignore all the connections", to my knowledge they are deliberate. Should I even spoiler this? It relates to the Dark Tower series. (psst read the thread its awesome) In the last book, Roland goes to see someone who is away of all SK's books and all te connections between them. They have hired a group of people who do nothing but read his stuff and catalogue all the connections between the books. And basically, it is explained that "SK does this a lot, but a lot of it actually meaningless so dont get too excited about it." Yeah.
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Sep 12, 2011 01:10
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Thats only relevant to the Dark Tower series, though.
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Sep 12, 2011 01:17
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oldpainless posted:Should I even spoiler this? It relates to the Dark Tower series. (psst read the thread its awesome) Darko posted:Thats only relevant to the Dark Tower series, though. It is purposeful by Stephen King and when he has a Mike Noonan have a conversation with Ralph Roberts it is okay to assume that Insomnia and Bag of Bones takes place int he same universe. I think this is cool and in no way a bad thing. E: in fact Bag of Bones seems like the crux of King's universe (outside of a Dark Tower Book). It features references to Insomnia (Ralph Roberts), Gerald's Game (Dark Score Lake), It (Bill Denbrough), The Dark Half (Thad Beaumont), Needful Things (Norris Ridgewick). All of these are referenced throughout Bag of Bones, with a lot more subtle references. ass is hometown fucked around with this message at 18:17 on Sep 12, 2011 |
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Sep 12, 2011 18:12
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One of the things I actually enjoyed about "Rose Madder" was the nod towards the Towerverse. After all, didn't the servant woman talk about seeing heads on pikes in the city of Lud?
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Sep 12, 2011 18:36
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Ridonkulous posted:It is purposeful by Stephen King and when he has a Mike Noonan have a conversation with Ralph Roberts it is okay to assume that Insomnia and Bag of Bones takes place int he same universe. What I was saying is that, what oldpainless was saying was that DT7 essentially saying "all the connections to the Dark Tower King wrote about are worthless because he didn't know what he was talking about" only had any relevance to those books' connection to the main Dark Tower series. As far as his shared universe interconnections with themselves - ie. people in Tommyknockers wandering over to Derry and seeing Pennywise and stuff, it really has no bearing on that.
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Sep 12, 2011 22:01
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Darko posted:What I was saying is that, what oldpainless was saying was that DT7 essentially saying "all the connections to the Dark Tower King wrote about are worthless because he didn't know what he was talking about" only had any relevance to those books' connection to the main Dark Tower series. As far as his shared universe interconnections with themselves - ie. people in Tommyknockers wandering over to Derry and seeing Pennywise and stuff, it really has no bearing on that. I know what you where saying. I was trying to use your quote to back up what I was saying against Oldpainless' opinion when he listed it as "a bad thing"
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Sep 13, 2011 02:44
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Ridonkulous posted:
Bag of Bones is wicked underrated. It took me a bit of time to get into but it's one of my favorite books of his. There was something about all the characters (especially the villains) that really clicked for me.
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Sep 13, 2011 03:15
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I've read 'Salem's Lot again recently and I discovered what might be a plot hole. When Barlow goes to kill the Petries, there was no indication that he was invited in any way by the parents. Yet he was able to enter the house with immunity. You're thinking of the wrong family. The Petries is the family of Mark Petrie, the really smart boy. VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV L-O-N fucked around with this message at 07:17 on Sep 13, 2011 |
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Sep 13, 2011 03:48
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I'm not gonna spoil this because it may not have happened, but I thought the baby turned the mother? In which case it could've been implied that she let him in? Or hell maybe vampire baby invited him, I dunno.
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Sep 13, 2011 05:39
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L-O-N posted:I've read 'Salem's Lot again recently and I discovered what might be a plot hole. When Barlow goes to kill the Petries, there was no indication that he was invited in any way by the parents. Yet he was able to enter the house with immunity. Isn't this because he's a Real Powerful Old Vampire who can also walk in the sun free and clear? I mean King takes care to separate the lowly vampires and the powerful old ones in the book, and the lowly ones seem most bound to traditional rules.
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Sep 13, 2011 07:25
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I don't remember any indication that Barlow can walk in the sunlight or that he's not bound by the same rules that govern other vampires.
L-O-N fucked around with this message at 07:37 on Sep 13, 2011 |
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Sep 13, 2011 07:32
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L-O-N posted:I don't remember any indication that Barlow can walk in the sunlight or that he's not bound by the same rules that govern other vampires. The lesser vampires aren't even capable of real thoughts. Wikipedia actually has an article on Stephen King vampires: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vampire_(Stephen_King)#Classification The Type Twos that most of the Lot gets changed into are the ones who die easily to sunlight. Barlow is a Type One and thus quite powerful.
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Sep 13, 2011 08:26
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trandorian posted:The lesser vampires aren't even capable of real thoughts. This is true and also largely a Dark Tower-centered retcon. L-O-N is correct in that there's nothing spelled out in Lot that Barlow isn't subject to the rules that govern all the other vampires, at least prior to that point. I remember my very first read-through when the events in question happened, I set the book aside, and just thought about how King had very deliberately kicked over the supernatural chessboard. In terms of the book itself, yeah, it's basically a plot hole. (This does not stop the rest of the book from being pretty much awesome, though.)
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Sep 13, 2011 13:59
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H.P. Shivcraft posted:This is true and also largely a Dark Tower-centered retcon. L-O-N is correct in that there's nothing spelled out in Lot that Barlow isn't subject to the rules that govern all the other vampires, at least prior to that point. I remember my very first read-through when the events in question happened, I set the book aside, and just thought about how King had very deliberately kicked over the supernatural chessboard. In terms of the book itself, yeah, it's basically a plot hole. I don't know, I just thought it was pretty obvious from the way the character conducts himself. Like how the mindless drone vampires in the book, IIRC, are easy to drive away with any given cross, but to drive Barlow away with a cross you have to "really believe". Barlow is presented as being a Really Powerful Vampire versus the lovely vampires the townsfolk become. I do agree that for reasons of dramatic tension, King doesn't tell us that he's less subject to the rules that govern the other vampires until that one scene happens. It wouldn't have been as surprising and effective if one of the characters somehow knew he could do that.
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Sep 13, 2011 17:09
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What shall I re-read next for good old scary 70s/80s King? Just done with the Shining Salem's Lot? Pet Semetary?
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Sep 14, 2011 23:26
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ZoDiAC_ posted:What shall I re-read next for good old scary 70s/80s King? Just done with the Shining Lot is a better book. semetary just has the WTF factor.
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Sep 14, 2011 23:47
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ZoDiAC_ posted:What shall I re-read next for good old scary 70s/80s King? Just done with the Shining 'Tommyknockers' is one of of my favourites.
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Sep 15, 2011 03:36
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Tommyknockers was my first SK novel. It'll probably always be my deep-down favorite.
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Sep 15, 2011 04:25
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Rose Madder is, in my opinion at least, better than Gerald's game. What a smucking piece of crap that book was.
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Sep 15, 2011 12:15
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