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I've been on a bit of Steven King binge lately (Joyland, Blaze, Hearts in Atlantis and Doctor Sleep) over the last 8-12 weeks and just discovered this thread. I liked all four of the books I'm only on page 40. I just checked out Under the Dome from the library and plan on starting that one soon. I think that King, even at his worst, is such a good writer that even when the story hangs up or hits snags, the prose saves it most of the time, compared to people like Koontz and Kellerman who, even when they have good stories, the writing is so lovely that it drags me right out of the experience. Speaking of Koontz, I've never heard anyone mention Intensity which was the first book I read by him, I really enjoyed and suckered me into thinking the dude could write. I'm surprised already, 40 pages in, at the hate for some of King's stuff I really liked (Cujo, Gerald's Game, Rose Madder, Thinner, Deloroes Clairborne but agree about some of the other stuff being pretty bad like Desperation, The Regulators. My problems with the books of his I enjoy the least or that they just get too far out and unbelievable. Suspension of disbelief is absolutely HUGE when it comes to making me scared and way too often, King's poo poo just comes completely off the rails. I get the novella collections mixed up sometimes but love those because the great thing about them is that by the time the story turns out to suck, if it does, it's over. What was the one with the finger coming out of the sink? And the one with the porta-potty, because, good lord, those hosed me up. I think Everything's Eventual was the weakest of those, going by memory but, like I said, I get the short story ones mixed up For all the talk about his film adaptations, he's had a lot of really good ones (Stand By Me, Delores Clairborne, Misery, The Green Mile, The Shining, Salem's Lot, Shawshank, The Mist, Carrie...Christine, Secret Window and parts of Creepshow and Pet Cemetary were not bad either. Of course there's been a ton of poo poo too. I find myself coming back to King so often, especially when I'm stuck for something to read and, since he's so prolific and I read so much. There's always something new there for me that I always I feel I can trust. Even when he's not on top of his game, he's still good. In case we're still doing this: Worst: Cell by far. The first 50 pages or so were intense but it went off the rails really early. Hearts in Atlantis left me feeling weird and I wasn't sure what to make of it. I still don't. No idea they made a movie from of it or how that could even work. The Regulators was just ridiculous. Desperation started out great and then people were looking for rocks in caves and God knows what else. No. Never read Lisey's Story, or The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon based on the recommendations of this thread or any of the Dark Tower stuff because I'm not huge on Western Science Fiction.
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Jun 19, 2014 23:24
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You liked Gerald's Game but not Desperation? Clearly you'll bring some needed conflict to the thread as you explain how this is possible. Also who is dissing Cujo, Rose Madder, Thinner and Dolores Claiborne? The finger in the toilet was in Nightmares and Dreamscapes. And yeah, Cell was a terrible letdown. Lisey's Story I liked but unless you can get the pop-up book probably skip The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon.
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Jun 19, 2014 23:31
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syscall girl posted:You liked Gerald's Game but not Desperation? I liked Desperation until it turned into "everything is magic and mythical". Around the time they got out of the jail and went to the caves and the ancient mines and Tak and blah blah blah... syscall girl posted:Clearly you'll bring some needed conflict to the thread as you explain how this is possible. Glad to help. It's a cool thread. A lot of people seem to rag on the titles I mentioned, Cujo and Rose Madder in particular, but like I said, I'm only 40 pages or so in to the thread. syscall girl posted:The finger in the toilet was in Nightmares and Dreamscapes. Thanks. What was that loving outhouse/port-o-potty story from? Because Jesus Christ that was unsettling to read and almost made me nauseous. syscall girl posted:Lisey's Story I liked but unless you can get the pop-up book probably skip The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon. There you go. From what I can tell, Lisey's Story is up there with Cell as the worst of the worst but you liked it, so I dunno. I liked Gerald's Game because it was largely believable and a bit more grounded in reality for the most part than a lot of King's later work. It was just creepy and rooted and the supernatural took a back seat for once. Woman wakes up from a sex tryst in a BDSM situation and can't move. "How did I get here? How do I get out? Holy poo poo." That's the stuff that scares me and one of the reasons I enjoyed Cujo so much. It was just a book about coincidences, a child's natural fear of monsters and being in the wrong place at the wrong time. If King wrote Cujo now, the dog's collar would be a magic ghost talisman named "Tic" and the bat who bit him would be a vampire taking a shape while Tad would have psychic powers and telekinesis. Then a giant spider/crab would crawl out from under Joe's garage and eat the dog to become more powerful or something. I don't mind the ghosts/supernatural/psychic stuff but sometimes King jams it into where doesn't belong or fit thematically. Plus, I don't believe in ghosts, vampires or monsters so those stories he writes scare me less. I thought Rose Madder struck a nice balance between the two because the painting and the Minotaur were clearly metaphors for the the pastoral garden she wanted to escape to and the abusive husband who won't let her but most King fans seem to hate that loving book. Also, as much as I liked IT, it's a tad overrated for the same reasons.
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Jun 20, 2014 00:29
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Something to note about the first bunch of pages of this thread is that the original thread title was "What's your least favorite Stephen King book?" or something close to that.
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Jun 20, 2014 01:32
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BiggerBoat posted:Thanks. What was that loving outhouse/port-o-potty story from? Because Jesus Christ that was unsettling to read and almost made me nauseous. A Very Tight Place, from Just After Sunset.
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Jun 20, 2014 02:29
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Doltos posted:Take The Stand for instance. Billions of people died in that book and only a handful died due to the supernatural poo poo. Almost all the deaths were examples of people going nutso when there's no governmental authority around and no society to judge you. The billions died because god caused a virus to be released. And actively hosed with any attempt at containment.
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Jun 20, 2014 11:00
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Chupe Raho Aurat posted:The billions died because god caused a virus to be released. And actively hosed with any attempt at containment. Either you're trying to be funny or you don't really remember how that book went. Which is understandable, it's what, 1200 pages and only 800 of them are any good.
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Jun 20, 2014 13:48
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Chupe Raho Aurat posted:The billions died because god caused a virus to be released. And actively hosed with any attempt at containment. Wasn't it a security breach and a massive gently caress up that released the virus?
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Jun 20, 2014 15:09
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Doltos posted:Wasn't it a security breach and a massive gently caress up that released the virus? There was a deadman switch in the virus laboratory that was supposed to trigger a complete facility lockdown the moment containment on any of the samples was breached, but thanks to a one-in-a-million machine error, what was supposed to be a split-second reaction turned out closer to two minutes or something. In a one-in-a-million chance on top of that last one-in-a-million chance, one of the technicians noticed the clocks freezing to mark the time of breach and got out of there before the lockdown triggered, taking the contamination with him. It's silly to think of any of that as divine intervention, and especially with the attempts at "containment" consisting of "murder everything and everyone that coughs louder than a flea's fart."
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Jun 20, 2014 16:31
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Greggy posted:Something to note about the first bunch of pages of this thread is that the original thread title was "What's your least favorite Stephen King book?" or something close to that. 
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Jun 20, 2014 17:11
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Oxxidation posted:There was a deadman switch in the virus laboratory that was supposed to trigger a complete facility lockdown the moment containment on any of the samples was breached, but thanks to a one-in-a-million machine error, what was supposed to be a split-second reaction turned out closer to two minutes or something. In a one-in-a-million chance on top of that last one-in-a-million chance, one of the technicians noticed the clocks freezing to mark the time of breach and got out of there before the lockdown triggered, taking the contamination with him. Yeah I always thought the virus being released was King's way of saying that a world catastrophe can come about as simply as the world getting unlucky. But even if someone thought God released the virus most of the book was devoted to how the survivors/infected reacted to the catastrophe, not Captain Trips itself. Sure all the survivors kept finding dead bodies because of the virus, but most of the 'on screen' deaths were due to people being terrible to each other.
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Jun 20, 2014 17:38
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Isn't it brought up again and again that the virus being released was part bad luck, but also almost inevitable, given the number of dangerous poo poo the government was maybe probably doing? (See also: the Mist)
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Jun 20, 2014 17:52
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Oxxidation posted:There was a deadman switch in the virus laboratory that was supposed to trigger a complete facility lockdown the moment containment on any of the samples was breached, but thanks to a one-in-a-million machine error, what was supposed to be a split-second reaction turned out closer to two minutes or something. In a one-in-a-million chance on top of that last one-in-a-million chance, one of the technicians noticed the clocks freezing to mark the time of breach and got out of there before the lockdown triggered, taking the contamination with him. In addition, this also seems to be in part kings lack of technical knowledge.
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Jun 20, 2014 17:55
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Re-reading The Tommyknockers for the first time since middle-school. I'm having a hard time plowing through it because every character is just a huge, unlikable piece of poo poo (except for Pete  ). Gardner is a snotty, rear end in a top hat drunk, Bobbi is a woods-dwelling nutjob, and everyone else is either an idiot or a psychotic. Does this get better? Or did middle-school me just slop down any old book and call it good?
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Jun 20, 2014 20:10
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Zeroisanumber posted:Re-reading The Tommyknockers for the first time since middle-school. I'm having a hard time plowing through it because every character is just a huge, unlikable piece of poo poo (except for Pete Tommyknockers' cast ranges from deeply flawed but well-meaning (Gard, Ev) to the physical embodiment of bitchy emotional abuse (Anne Anderson). People who live in insular small towns tend to be d-bags even when they're not possessed by psychopathic alien ghosts.
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Jun 20, 2014 20:24
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Zeroisanumber posted:Re-reading The Tommyknockers for the first time since middle-school. I'm having a hard time plowing through it because every character is just a huge, unlikable piece of poo poo (except for Pete The characters in Tommyknockers are a lot easier to understand if you grew up in a small town. I did, and I could put a familiar face on just about anyone in the book. Ev was totally this old coot in my neighborhood named Bill, who was my best friend's grandpa.
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Jun 20, 2014 21:08
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How does The Stand graphic novel (series?) stack up to the actual book? I've never been able to get through the book so I borrowed the entire graphic novel from the library today and I've been wondering what goon opinion on it is.
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Jun 20, 2014 21:41
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juliuspringle posted:How does The Stand graphic novel (series?) stack up to the actual book? I've never been able to get through the book so I borrowed the entire graphic novel from the library today and I've been wondering what goon opinion on it is. I can't answer this but have similar questions about the Dark Tower graphic novels.
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Jun 21, 2014 03:18
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The Stand graphic novel I really didn't get in to. I tried to like it, but it just didn't capture me like the book did. It was a mix of not liking the art style and the whole thing just feeling wooden and stiff to me. On the other hand, I have all the Dark Tower graphic novels (and I plan on getting the rest when The Drawing of the Three begins). Again, I'm not terribly fond of the art style. It's a little too overly shadowed/contrasted and almost over-dramatic. But it reads way better than The Stand GN does to me. It just flows better. I think it helps too, that most of the issues area dealing with new story lines as well. It ranges from Roland's coming of age, then leads into WaG territory, and then deals with his wanders between that and The Gunslinger. It even covers Jericho Hill before covering all of The Gunslinger novel itself. It looks like The Drawing of the Three is going to be doing a similar thing with Eddie - covering his life from childhood up until and through the novel. I'm actually pretty excited for that, Eddie was one of my favorite characters.
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Jun 21, 2014 06:53
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The Berzerker posted:I can't answer this but have similar questions about the Dark Tower graphic novels. I've only read the first few Dark Tower graphic novels, which covered the Roland as a kid stuff from Wizard and Glass. In regards to the early stuff, it fits fairly well with the novels. The Jae Lee artwork was always really good and intersting. It tells the story, but it of course can't reach the depth that the novels. In some cases, new material was added in. Nothing major, nothing game changing by any means. If you really want to read The Dark Tower, you're probably best just sticking with the actual books. If you really, really loved the Dark Tower, and want to see the same story in a different perspective, I felt it was worth checking out. One of the nice things is that it seems to be tackling the story chronologically (leaving out the Wind through the Keyhole stuff) which should save some griping, should they get to Wizard and Glass.
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Jun 22, 2014 16:12
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While the forums were out I read Mr. Mercedes. I enjoyed the first 4/5 or so of the book. The character development was pretty good and I liked all the horrific stuff with Brady and his mom. But as for the ending, it was loving stupid. YAY WE SAVED THE DAY and no one dies except Janey. Oh come on. That did not feel like a King ending. It was way too happy-go-lucky for me. Although I have to say, I enjoyed reading a King book with no supernatural elements. Sometime people are scary, and he does a good job of portraying that.
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Jun 26, 2014 03:13
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I liked the Dark Tower graphic novels when Jae Lee did the art, but when he left, I lost interest completely. Didn't he leave as soon as the original Jericho Hill stuff was finished or something?
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Jun 26, 2014 17:04
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I'm on book 3 of the Stand graphic novel (its in 6 story arcs, 1 per book) and I think I'm gonna give the actual book another shot once I finish the other 3. I'll read the uncut version the way god I mean Stephen King intended though.
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Jun 26, 2014 18:46
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I liked Mr Mercedes well enough. I wouldn't say King is being racist for the way he's written Jerome though, that's just odd. He's by far the most level-headed and competant character in the book. I mean it's just an affectation. It's annoying, but I do like that everyone else in the book tells him to knock it off. I breezed through 'Full Dark, No Stars' afterwards and liked it a lot. '1922' is probably one of the bleakest things that King has written and his use of language in it is fantastic. The only one I don't like that much is 'Fair Extension' but only because the rest of the book is so strong.
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Jun 26, 2014 19:25
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I forgot how much I disliked the ending of Salem's Lot. That seems to be a major theme with King. Really amazing exposition, great rising action and conflict, and then just a boring ending that fizzles badly.
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Jun 26, 2014 21:26
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DrVenkman posted:I liked Mr Mercedes well enough. I wouldn't say King is being racist for the way he's written Jerome though, that's just odd. It's not that it's racist, it's that it's uncomfortably weird that King so often has black people talk in "massuh" talk, and shows that there's a bit of disconnect there. As I stated before, given the era in which King grew up, he possibly knew a black person that did that to be facetious/as a joke, but carries that on to the present day, where it makes no sense for a current teen to do, since that kind of talk is not even a frame of reference for them. My parents' generation would mock that kind of talk because -they- grew up with media in which every black person in TV/film talked like that until the explosion of blaxploitation in the 70s and people like Sydney Poitier that came out in the 60s. The current generation doesn't run into that in the same manner. It's just an extension of "King doesn't know how to write kids," in that he puts 60s slang and trends on to 2010s youth. Darko fucked around with this message at 17:23 on Jun 27, 2014 |
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Jun 27, 2014 17:19
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Doltos posted:I forgot how much I disliked the ending of Salem's Lot. That seems to be a major theme with King. Really amazing exposition, great rising action and conflict, and then just a boring ending that fizzles badly. I always felt that the climax was Callahan, everything else was just cleanup.
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Jun 27, 2014 17:20
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Darko posted:It's just an extension of "King doesn't know how to write kids," in that he puts 60s slang and trends on to 2010s youth.
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Jun 27, 2014 17:30
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Just call him Black Jerome.
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Jun 27, 2014 17:35
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Darko posted:I always felt that the climax was Callahan, everything else was just cleanup. That was really interesting with Callahan and might have been better if it was Ben instead. Or, if the main character was Callahan and not Ben.
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Jun 27, 2014 18:42
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About halfway into Under the Dome and I'm really liking it so far. Based on what I read here I was lead to believe the pacing was slow but far from it really. I thought the pacing in 11/22/63 was far worse but I liked that book also. Re-reading reviews of that one reminded me of how much I skimmed through it or skipped entirely. My biggest issue with Dome so far is that it's spread a little too thin - too many characters - and I find myself forgetting who this and that person are from time to time. Another thing I tend to do with King novels (and most novels really) is assign actors and celebrities to the characters as I read. Anyone else do that? Get a picture of a person in your head right off the bat and never shake it? For some reason I do it with King more often than i do with other books. Right now I've got James Dickey, author of Deliverance and who played the sheriff in the film, as Big Jim and Steve Zahn, who played Davis in Treme, as Dale Barbara.
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Jun 27, 2014 22:31
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Since I read the first three Dark Tower books when I was about 13, and I was playing Donkey Kong Country at the time, I've always envisioned Oy as this fella: http://www.mariowiki.com/Gnawty Rereading it now for the first time since book 7 came out in 2004, and I'm really loving it. It'll be interesting to see what I think of books 5-7 the second time through.
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Jun 28, 2014 05:21
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Just since someone mentioned Under the Dome, how do you folks feel about the show? I personally hate it and think it's garbage, just wasn't sure if this thread talked about it (admittedly, I only skimmed the past couple pages looking).
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Jul 1, 2014 03:08
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Total garbage, especially the "actors" who are playing all the teenagers.
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Jul 1, 2014 03:24
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I should mention I saw none of season one, don't have cable but I'm house sitting and the premier is on tonight. Something about an egg, and butterflies? Horrible CGI and my god, I didn't know what you meant about the "actors" playing the teens, yikes. I can't believe Dean Norris actually asked for Hank to be written out of Breaking Bad to be in this. I don't understand how a fan of the book could possibly enjoy this show. Is anything the same? I'm fine with tweaking and making some changes but..why. Why are they trying to make Junior sympathetic and not a horrible psycho. Okay that's my rant.
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Jul 1, 2014 03:35
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The teenage characters on Under the Dome are the worst. The skateboarding stoner one the worst offender of them all. I finished up Mr Mercedes and I wouldn't mind two other books in this world from King.
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Jul 1, 2014 03:43
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Toriori posted:Just since someone mentioned Under the Dome, how do you folks feel about the show? I personally hate it and think it's garbage, just wasn't sure if this thread talked about it (admittedly, I only skimmed the past couple pages looking). It's bad. It neuters the book, which may be a good thing, but I can't help thinking the girl Jr. locks up and beats and bullies on the show who is now trying to get him to get with the program is (in the book) murdered, raped and lying dead wherever he stashed her. So we get The Dome PG-13 as a fun fantasy romp and just ugh. Also, everything else about it is badly done covered up with some CG and that guy from Breaking Bad. And it's on CBS so the exposition is set up for the 60+ hard of thinking crowd. It's a dumbed down version of something I didn't much like in the first place, and I was okay with Brosnan in Bag of Bones, liked Ron Perlman as Collie Entragian in Desperation and loooved Nightmares and Dreamscapes. UtD the show sucks the big one.
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Jul 1, 2014 03:49
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Yeah, I had no problem with them changing anything about the book they needed to because Under the Dome had it's fair share of problems, but rather than fixing anything they just made it worse. Oh well, at least it isn't a great classic they're ruining.
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Jul 1, 2014 04:39
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Safe Driver posted:The teenage characters on Under the Dome are the worst. The skateboarding stoner one the worst offender of them all. The way the younger characters are written in the book is pretty on the nose too. The kids on the show are a very obnoxious kid-com brand of awful but so far Dome TV hasn't done anything as unpleasant as the "I see you like Stephanie Meyer. Why don't you read real books like Harry Potter. I'm going to rape you now. Nyuk, Nyuk, Nyuk" bit.
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Jul 1, 2014 06:04
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I did think Samantha Mathis was smoking hot.
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Jul 1, 2014 12:26
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