Steve Brandt has a neat review of Tommyknockers.
The Tommyknockers is often overlooked or disregarded as a failed novel. That is not at all Brandt's take! After giving the customary plot overview, Brant says, "On the surface, The Tommyknockers is a pretty good science fiction tale, and pretty creepy too."
Brant "gets" King! He understands that for Stephen King, it's always about the characters. He writes, "Dig a little deeper, however, and you'll find something that's a little more down to Earth, although no less terrifying. There are all kinds of horrors in the world; sometimes they lurk beneath the surface of the earth, and sometimes they lurk beneath the surface of a human being. Both of Stephen King's main characters, Bobbie and Gard, have terrors hidden within them. For Bobbie, it's an over-bearing sister who wants to run her life. For Gard, it's the bottle."
The Tommyknockers is a big story. One of the early works where an entire town is involved. Later we would have Needful Things and Under The Dome. Unlike The Stand, Tommyknockers has a closed enviroment -- meaning characters can't as easily just wander off stage. They have to be dealt with!
Brant gives this energetic endorsement: "Yes, Stephen King knows about personal demons, and I can see where The Tommyknockers might have been difficult for him to write, but I'm glad he did. This is one of my favorite King books."
Here is Brant's review: http://www.sfsite.com/07a/tk347.htm
Here is Brant's audiobook review site: http://www.audiobook-heaven.com/
Check out my post "The Tommyknockers Redeemed": http://talkstephenking.blogspot.com/2009/11/tommyknockers-redeemed.html
I have to respectfully disagree, at least in part. Tommyknockers feels like a disjointed novel - not quite a failed novel, but one poorly executed. Yes, King does indeed "get" characters. But Tommyknockers came out late, or at the end, of King's addiction phase and its shows in the quality of the work. Needful Things, the next novel and the first in his recovery period or beginning of sobriety, is a superior work.
ReplyDeleteSo glad that this novel finally seems to be getting some of the respect that it deserves IMO.Just as I commented last time we discussed this book, I've never understood the negativity that even the author's hardcore fans seem to feel toward it.
ReplyDeleteNot me though, as it's always been among the lower half of my personal top ten best King novels. The tragic love story of Bobbi & Gard has always touched me deeply & much of my distaste for the ABC-TV adaption was that it failed to "get" any of that. Plus Smits was ALL wrong for Gard IMO.
Jim
I like this book quite a lot and never understood why people hate it. Really I don't. Granted, Gard's section about drinking is pretty long but makes a lot more sense down the road. There are some great subplots/mini stories in this book.
ReplyDeleteI listened to the audio book this year and it was narrated very well.
If only they could "redeem" the audio version on Under the Dome and have some one else read it.
-mike
I liked the audio of Under The Dome. what was there not to like?
ReplyDeleteRaul Esparza.
ReplyDeleteTommyknockers had so much promise, it was a big let down in the end.
ReplyDeleteA female main character turned out to be a mistake, here. The main male character was a pompous self-important creep, someone who i wasn't identifying with at all, he was just annoying. And on the book droned interminaly until I just gave up, a third into the book.
I never do that with Step[hen King's writing, this was the first time I'd given up on one of his books. Its normally got me gripped long before this.
Theres been disappointing King books since, but none as big a let down as this.
Some I don't read because the subject doesn't appeal - Geralds Game for example, or Misery. But this DID and it was hugely disappointing.
Yup, still one of my favorites and probably always will be since King's more recent works lack that dark edge. I'm sorry that King had to struggle with addictions but through it he turned out some great fiction. --Steven Brandt
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