BOOM! So Stephen King is a MASTER!

See, I would never ever want to say, "I told you so."  Or suggest I was ahead of the curve.  But. . . now that Revival is out, people are starting to note that King makes a lot of connections to other masters of the craft.  In particular, H.P. Lovecraft.  Why does this matter to me?  Because I put a book out this Summer (before Revival came out) discussing King and the enduring nature of his work as serious literature.  I also discussed connections between King and Lovecraft.

Note this article posted at oregonlive.com.  Before diving in to King's use of Lovecraft in Revival, the writer says, "He seems to be trying to make sure his own pop fiction lasts by going even darker than he has before, into the realm of earlier horror masters Mary Shelley, Bram Stoker and H.P. Lovecraft."

What Douglas Perry (the author of the article) totally misses is that King didn't just wake up and decide to start shadowing some of these people.  He didn't just decide to get more serious with Revival.  King's work has been consistently serious literature; it's just the critics who have been reading him wrong.  It's time they gave the Stephen King library another read.

Perry nicely summarizes some recent reviews of Revival:

The New Statesman calls "Revival," King's 58th novel, a "serious book by a major writer," insisting that it "reads like a populist sequel to Sinclair Lewis's evangelical satire 'Elmer Gantry.'" 

The New York Times calls it "a well-built book that unfolds on a big canvas." The paper adds, teasingly, scarily, that the novel "winds up with the idea that to be human, you must know what it is to be inhuman." 

That sounds like Shelley's influence, but The Guardian says "it is Lovecraft, and the quote 'That is not dead which can eternal lie, / And with strange aeons, even death may die,' that reverberate throughout the book." 

King, 67, happily admits he's been influenced by "everything" Lovecraft has ever written.

In chapter 1 of Stephen King, A Face Among The Masters, I included a portion titled, "The eyes of H.P. Lovecraft."  I noted not only similarities in their writing, but biography as well.  I also looked at how the two are very different.  

  King’s Lovecraftian stories include such titles as Jerusalem’s Lot, I am the Doorway, Mrs. Todd’s Shortcut, N, and Crouch End. In the documentary, Fear of the Unknown, Peter Straub compared The Mist to Lovecraft. “Tentacle things break in from another dimension, that’s just pure Lovecraft.” 

Gardner, Brighton (2014-05-04). Stephen King A Face Among The Masters 

What I find in Revival  isn't a brand new Stephen King.  This King was with us in Full Dark, No Stars.  He was there in the pages of The Dark Half and especially Desperation.  The depressing tone of the book mirrors very much the narrative style of the novella 1922.  

So to put it simply, I'm excited.  I'm so glad that King's novel, Revival, is being taken as serious literature.  Because I think it will force some others to look back at the work of Stephen King.  All along King has been giving us serious literature; we were just having so much fun reading it, we didn't realize how great it was.  I believe someday, future generations will study Stephen King the way we study Lovecraft, Dickens, Poe, Twin and  Shelly.

WHAT IF ARNIE AND KING TEAMED UP?

Talking about Ghost Brothers, Stephen King recently said:

"I've taken calls from Arnold Schwarzenegger, who wanted me to write 'the scariest devil-worship movie ever made,'" Stephen King says with a chuckle. "And there was a call from David Bowie, who wanted about the same thing. What I'm trying to say is, a lot of times, very talented artists have very bad ideas."

www.npr.org

So, if Arnold had it his way, Stephen King and he would team on a scary devil worship movie.  See, the problem here is where the ideas are coming from.  By the way, as a Californian where Arnie was our Governator, I can say that particular very talented artist had more than one very bad idea!  What works best is when King is given  the freedom to develop good ideas and actors who fit the role dive into the part.

I think some of the King movies that have failed did  so because of either poor choices in casting or too many changes to the King storyline.  Of course, Arnold starred in The Running Man.  Was it good?  No.  But then, it didn't stay within a hundred  miles of the original story.

Makes me wonder what King work Arnold would fit well in.  What wouldn't work is for directors to try and convince us that Arnold is an author.  Perhaps that was the problem with Bag of Bones, it was hard to see Pierce Borsnan as an author -- he's better as, well -- James Bond!  Richard Thomas was convincing as an author in the mini-series IT.

So  what role would Arnold be convincing in?  Here's my pick, but tell me yours. . .
Wilfred James, 1922

Seven Reasons We Read Stephen King, #5 : He's A Scaredy Rat

Stephen King is scared of a lot of stuff.  Bats.  Rats.  Spiders.  Death.  Bambi.  The corpse in the bathtub opening its eyes -- revealing nothing but bulging whites -- in the 1955 film Diabolique.


King said in his introduction to Night Shift:

"At night, when I go to bed, I still am at pains to be sure that my legs are under the blankets after the lights go out. I'm not a child anymore but... I don't like to sleep with one leg sticking out. Because if a cool hand ever reached out from under the bed and grasped my ankle, I might scream. Yes, I might scream to wake the dead."

I think most people have a lot of fears.  The cool thing about Stephen King is that he writes about them!  Well, I haven't read a Stephen King book about Bambi yet, but most of his fears find a spot in his novels.  King has the courage to explore his fears!  We read him because he's willing to go there!

Aren't you scared to go down the cellar?  So is little George, because we know monsters are down there.

King once said he had to rely on Tabby to chase bats that get loose from the attic.  Seriously. . . who lives in a house with bats? 

Pet Sematary was an exploration of death; and in particular, the agony of the death of a child.  Stephenkingshop.com says,

According to King, Pet Sematary, a story about a man who brings his son back to life after he is killed by a speeding truck, was written after the same thing nearly happened to his own son. Likewise, King felt tremendous financial stress during the years prior to publishing Carrie, and The Shining was written as much about how financial and other stresses can tear apart a marriage as it was about a haunted hotel.

King's fears intensify -- refine -- his ability to scare all of us.  His fear of spiders crawls into Needful Things, IT, The Mist and The Dark Tower.

So what's your fear?  King has probably got something to make you squirm! 

• Are you scared of the dark?  King will tell you to hold his hand, then lead you down a long journey through the Lincoln Tunnel -- lights out! 
• Sacred of dogs?  Oh, there's a book for you! 
• Clowns?  Aliens?  Ghosts?  The devil?  Yep, King will give you the devil himself! 
• Anyone scared of a Gypsy curse or demon possessed law enforcement? 
• Scared of the hospital?  The doctor? 
• Anyone scared of Zombies?  How about cell phones?  And that's another thing, isn't it!?  King sometimes takes a fear, and combines it with other fears.  I didn't like my cellphone to begin with, now it might turn me into a zombie! 
• You scared of vampires?  King gives us a town full of vamps!  Or, in Night Flier, a vampire with a plane. 
• Does the haunted house around the corner scare you?  Check out Salem's Lot!
• Do airplanes creep you out?  The Langoliers is a lot of fun.

King is known to take other people's childhood fears and write about them.  It's not that he was scared of the Library Police. . . his poor son was! 

And let's talk rats for a moment. I don't even like little mice -- but rats are truly horrifying! I think the first exploration with rats came with Graveyard Shift. Trips down into the sub-sub-basement, only to discover ever growing rats. The journey is still scary! King gave us more rats in his recent novella 1922. 

I like this quote from 1922, "The rat twisted and flopped. its tail first lashed my calf, then wrapped around it like a grass snake.  Blood gushed from its mouth.  Its black eyes bulged like marbles."  That's nice, Mr. King. 

According to stephenkingwiki, The Rat is one of the twelve Guardians of the Beams that hold up the Dark Tower.

My dislike of rats didn't come from Stephen King, it came from George Orwell.  In his novel, 1984 -- which is scary in an "Under The Dome" sort of way -- the main character is scared of rats.  So, to punish him, Big Brother puts a face mask on him connected to a pipe full of rats.  The rats then attack his face!  Oh, and this book is required reading in some schools.


Let's be real honest, gang: One reason we read Stephen King is because we like being scared!  It's like a drug, though -- each time takes a higher dose. 

1978 The Stand Journal 12

I like this picture.  Photo credit: http://www.freakingnews.com/Stephen-King-Books-Pictures--69-2.asp

Grover and Me:
I just finished the last tape of The Stand.  Yes, I listened to it.  It was read by Grover Gardner, and was fantastic.  At first Gardner seemed stiff, even dry, I found that I really liked him as the book progressed.  We became fast friends!

Gardner reads with a certain reserved energy.  Though he does not overpower the story, he is very engaged in what he is reading.  As one blogger commented, Gardner doesn't get in the way of the book!  He doesn't try to outperform the story. 

His voice is crisp, every word pronounced correctly, and well paced.  His inflections are always appropriate, but again, not distracting.  I think Gardner is quickly becoming one of my favorite readers!   

Pacing The Conclusion:
The Stand ends with a bang. . . and then it keeps going.  I really like the way King ended the Stand.  He didn't simply tie things up with the bad guys demise -- he spent time (considerable time) letting us see the world after Flagg.  The conclusion (a good hundred pages, I think) includes Stu and Tom meeting back up, and Tom's nursing Stu back to health.  It is touching, and again, not rushed.  Even in the chopped version I was reading, King gives this section room to breath.  He doesn't feel in a hurry to end the book -- and the reader isn't anxious for it to end, either.

The long journey home for Tom and Stu is the highlight of the last chapters of The Stand.  But there is more even after they reach the Free Zone.  Will Stu and Fran stay?  What about Larry's child?  On that note, what about Fran's?  Will the super-flu knock out the next generation?  These are things King deals with nicely in the last pages of The Stand.

I have read many reviews of The Stand, and no one ever mentions how much space King gives his characters at the end of the novel.  Usually King spends considerable time building characters at the beginning of a book; but here he lets us live with them a little bit longer.  Further, I have heard many people say they do not like the way King ends his books.  Try the Stand!  I think it is brilliant.  Though the "plot" has been carried out, King still sees more story ahead.  And the reader can imagine a million stories that could come out of The Stand.  It is surprising no one has thought to do a TV series based on the world of The Stand. 

Nukes And Our Children
Stu and Fran discuss the issue of bringing children into this new world.  But it's not really a "new" world!  In fact, the "toys" (kings word) are left behind -- nukes.  Two things need to be destroyed: The nukes, and the plant that created the super-flu. 

Now it's interesting that nukes are seen as the problem, since the essentially saved the Free Zone's hide.  There is a hint of anti-war sentiment that flows throughout The Stand.  Not that good should roll over and refuse to fight, but simply a fear that by over-building our military complex, we might be forcing our children's hands.

God:
God turned out to be a pretty important character in The Stand.  When The Bomb actually goes off, it is unclear for a moment if God did it, or Flagg did it!  Flag was playing with a blue ball of fire when Trashy showed up with his toy.  It is that same ball of fire that strikes the bomb.  But later dialogue makes it clear that it was the work of God.

What kind of God do we encounter in The Stand?  At the mid point, Fran paints the picture of an evil God who would destroy so much of His creation.  But as the Stand progresses, we begin to see a purpose unfolding.

God's will is a major theme of The Stand.  God is portrayed as Sovereign; beyond our understanding, and able to tell the future.  God is shown as active in the affairs of men (he is not far off, unconcerned with us).  Now here's an interesting theological note: In the Stand, God is willing and ready to act.  He is completely capable of stopping evil.  He is not threatened by Flagg.  But before he will act, he requires that men also take their Stand.  He desires to use humans as much as possible in order to carry out His will.  Glen Bateman puts it together for us, saying "If there's a God, and I now believe these must be -- that's his will.  We're going to die and somehow all of this will end as a result of our dying."

God is not only presented as all powerful, but as Just.  Tom Cullen puts it pretty succinctly when he says, "It was the bad man killed Nick.  Tom knows.  But God fixed that bad man.  I saw it.  The hand of God came down out of the sky."  Now why did God kill the "bad man"?  Tom tells us!  "Fixed him for what he did to Nick and to the poor judge.  Laws yes."

Nods in other King works:

• Freemantle: Mother Abigail's last name is Freemantle.  In Duma Key the main character is named Edgar Freemantle.
• Hemmingford Home is also the setting for 1922.  It is the hometown of Ben from IT.  Hemmingford Home is also seen in The Last Rung Of The Ladder.
• In Wizard and Glass, Blane The Mono stops in the world of The Stand. 
• Night Surf sort of serves as a prologue to The Stand.
• The evil character Flagg appears in The Eyes of the Dragon and The Dark Tower.  If he is the Devil himself, then he is also in Needful Things.
• Wikipedia notes something really cool: "In the denouement, Stu and Tom happen upon an abandoned Plymouth Fury with the initials 'A.C.' engraved on the keychain. Arnie Cunningham was the owner of the 1958 Plymouth Fury in Christine. The car is found empty with no apparent driver."
• Wikipedia points out that radio signals from Arnette, Texas, are also heard in The Tommyknockers.
• And. . . "Charles Decker's teacher in Rage, Mrs. Jean Underwood, is said to be a relative of Larry Underwood."
• Finally, Wikipedia says that "Stuart Redman has a dream of a corn field with a creature with red eyes staring at him, this is a reference to "Children of the Corn".

Morality

This is a great short story! Or novelette... or whatever you call this, it's good. I am becoming a big fan of King's shorter work; something I previously avoided. I am startled by just how strong King's writing is when developing a shorter work. See, I think I would be tempted to save my really good prose for the big novels. But King never holds out on the reader!
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More than simply a good read, Morality has two facets that are worth mentioning.
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First, it is tense -- really tense. I'm listening to it, and find that I sit in the car alone listening because I just have to know what's next. This story tightens with suspense that would make Hitchcock grin with approval.
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The story is also theologically engaging. King deals with subjects here that I thought only preachers really thought about. The idea of double sin -- the worst kind of sin -- is solid Bible. That is: The worst kind of sin is the kind that says: I know this is wrong, but I'll simply ask God to forgive me.
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King explores a subject that has become a common thread in his work -- the impact of sin on the individual. In that sense, Morality is very much like 1922. The real strength of the story is what Nora is asked to do in order to collect a very considerable payment. No, I won't tell you what it is. But, it's really not a big thing. Not murder. Not adultery. Not even on the list of the seven deadlies. It's just one small act. But that one small act changes Nora.
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The story is not about getting caught, it is about living with yourself after you've deliberately brought harm on another human. A justice system might not catch up, but a persons own happiness, pleasure, relationships and sanity are at stake just the same.
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There is a weakness in the story. The evil priest. Old men don't suddenly turn wicked, do they? In fact, men who have strived all their lives to please God tend to run harder that direction as they approach the judgement seat. Men who have run from God often continue in that direction; but the sudden turn toward evil seemed pressed to me. It was necessary to advancing the story.
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I found the story theologically deep. Like many of King's stories, I did not know at any point what was going to happen next. I made my drives to work extra long in order to listen to a little more of the story.

Full Dark Journal 5: A Good Marriage

I am sure there are spoilers here. I try not to give too much away... but I also think you should not read reviews and essays on books if you haven't read them. If you need a review to tell you to go read this book, then I'll put it right here at the beginning. . . go read this book. There. Now we shall proceed.

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A Good Marriage is a good story.

This is my favorite novella of the four in Full Dark No Stars. I found it genuinely scary. The story often moved in directions I did not expect.

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Darcy Anderson is in a genuine predicament. King masterfully explains why she chooses not to call the police. Not so much an issue of her love for her husband, but her own need for stability. But justice ultimately trumps her own needs.

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Edgar's Ghost

King cites Edgar Allan Poe's short story (weren't they all short?) "The Cask of Amontillado." That's cool, since 1922 had hints of the Tell Tale Heart. In Poe's 1846 story, The Cask of Amontillado, Montresor uses wine to trap his "friend." Montresor literally builds a wall, while Darcy walls her victim in by incapacitating him. In each case, the victim is betrayed by someone they trust.

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Mirrors and Coins:

Both mirrors and coin collecting play important minor chords in this novella. They not only move the plot, but are the kind of details that enrich the story as a whole.

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BTK:

The story is based on BTK . The documentary BTK Killer Next Door starts with this intro: "Known to his neighbors as a Boy Scout leader, a church goer, a family man. . . but a murderer?" That is exactly the angle King takes.

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Blading and pudgy, Bob Anderson even looks like Dennis Raider. Also, Like Raider, Anderson managed to stop for a period of time.

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King picks up on a serial killers inability to feel guilt over their crimes. "Hollow" is how Darcy describes it. He is just a hollow, empty shell of a man. Anderson claims that two men live inside him. After observation, that is not Darcy's conclusion. In essence, she decides that the good man doesn't really exist. It's not Jekyll and Hyde -- it's just Hyde.

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The mystery of marriage was explored more tenderly in Lisey's Story.

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Killers Among Us:

How can serial killers move among us seemingly unknown? I told this before, but it bears repeating. My Grandfather was a pastor. His church had a photo director. One morning I flipped through the photo directory and I stopped on the picture of Bill Suff. He was a serial killer in Riverside and Lake Elsinore, California. He also sang in the choir at Grandpa's church!

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Serial Killers and Stephen King:

My list will be no where near complete, but here is a list of Serial Killers in Stephen King's fiction. Please add to my list in the comments section, and I'll update this post. I'm not counting monsters as serial Killers (ie: Pennywise, Christine, Flagg) or animals (Cujo).

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Under The Dome, Junior Renny

IT, Henry Bowers

The Dark Half, George Stark

Gerald's Game, Raymond Andrew Joubert (The Space Cowboy)

The Dark Tower, The Pusher

The Green Mile, William Wharton ?

Big Driver, Big Driver and Little Driver

A Good Marriage, Bob Anderson

Frank Dodd, The Dead Zone (thanks Eva)

"Springheel Jack" - Strawberry Spring (Night Shift) (Thanks Eva)

The Man Who Loved Flowers (Night Shift) (thanks Eva.)

Lloyd Henreid and Andrew "Poke" Freeman - The Stand (Thanks Eva)

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Wikipedia says this about Annie Wilkes in a discussion about "angel's of mercy": "The character Annie Wilkes in the Stephen King novel Misery seems to be a serial killer of this type." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel_of_Mercy_(serial_killer)

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In IT, King showed a serial killer in league with the devil. Henry Bowers works under the influence of Pennywise. However in more recent works, King appears to be showing us the evil comes from within. It is not so much the work of the devil, as it is the heart itself. This was true of Big Driver, Junior Renny and Bob Anderson.

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However, in IT the serial killer was best portrayed by Pennywise himself. The monster was based on John Wayne Gacey

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Hell:

Holt Ramsey, a retired detective mentions that Anderson is now being punished in hell "according to the Old Testament." That struck me as a strange comment. I know, Ramsey is a detective, not a theologian. But it implies that Hell is an Old Testament doctrine as opposed to a New Testament teaching. However, hell in the Old Testament is simply Sheol, the shadowy underworld of the dead. It is simply not a developed doctrine. Hell is actually a New Testament teaching. It is particularly advanced by: Jesus (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John), 1 Peter, Jude and The Revelation.

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Uplifting:

I found this to be the most enjoyable of all of the novella's. It was, frankly, uplifting. An encouragement to peer in at Darcy as she deepens in her convictions and carries out revenge. It is a redemptive novel, from Darcy's end. She is able not only to rise above the monster within (the monster is passivity), but also able to crush the monster who lives with her.

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If 1922 and Fair Extension were truly FULL DARK with not even a hint of STARS, I would have to say that we at least get moonlight in A Good Marriage and Big Driver.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRPS0x66ncM

Full Dark Journal 2: 1922

I just finished reading 1922. I liked it a lot.

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1922 is the kind of story King would never write just for reviews. It's the kind of thing that gets written just to please one's self, and the constant reader. But it won't win you a lot of friends among the literary snobs. They might still see him as nothing more than the literary equivalent of a big mac. Of course, the constant reader has learned that the meat in a Stephen King big mac is rat meat.

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This story has a lot of rats. Note the picture above; you can't say you weren't clued in. Lots of them. Disgusting, nasty, horrible, biting, rats. Aggressive little devils. And the queen of the rats rules her minions to do her bidding. It's really quite brilliant, if not disgusting. I'm trying hard not to give away too much, except that this is truly the stuff King fans love; and have been wanting for quite a little while.

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The story plays out like a Shakespeare tragedy. Or, perhaps even more importantly, it is a longer version of Poe's Tell Tale Heart.

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I do not know why the book is titled Full Dark No Stars; but I will venture an opinion having read just one of the four novella's. The book is brutally dark. This is not just a dark story, it is so dark that there is not even starlight. Total blackness. Hopelessness. No redemption what so ever.

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Regarding the all important "hundred acres" (no, it's not a Winnie The Pooh reference), the story is very much about the little man verses big business. In that way it's like a Bachman novel. Roadwork and the Running Man.

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Anyway, here's the bottom line; if you get paid to review books, don't bother with this one. If you read books for the joy of a good story; and if you read King because you love his sick, twisted stories -- then you should rush out and read 1922.