stephen king c/d?

Yes, I think it is.

As are "The Body" and "Apt Pupil". (The other story hasn't been filmed, afaik.)

The Shawshank novella is better than the movie, but then again I hate the movie.

An adaptation of the winter story could be one of the strangest, most beautiful films ever if done right.

Dreamcatcher II: The Poopening

"Apt Pupil" is probably my favorite of the King novellas - the movie was really disappointing though. The Long Walk ranks pretty high too.

I got way into Stephen King when I was pretty young, like fourth grade. My parents were always into me reading whatever, which is kind of funny when they would later freak out about dirty movies or music - I read way crazier stuff in King books when I was 10. I loved the Bachman books, Different Seasons, Skeleton Crew, and a lot of the early novels but stopped reading new ones probably around The Tommyknockers, which I tried a couple of times but never got into.

A lot of the short stories and the parts of The Stand and Needful Things about society falling apart and people turning on each other and utter chaos breaking out are some of my favorite things ever.

I love love love how pretty much everyone in the world dies in the first part of The Stand. I'm sure this means I'm a sociopath or something.

Also echoing the preference for the novella Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption over the film. And of the four novellas in Different Seasons, The Body has always been my favorite. I've always thought I was alone in that opinion.

I was in a hardcore band in junior high school called The Stand. I still have the tapes.

<i>So, I need some easy summer reading, and I thought I'd try some Stephen King for the first time -- any recommendations?

More specifically, I kinda fancy checking out "The Stand" because the Lost writers keep name-dropping it -- is it worth it (it's long!) and should I read the old/short or new/long version?

-- Chuck_Tatum, Wednesday, 9 May 2007 20:47 (9 months ago) Link</i>

Ha, I finally finished reading this today! It's only taken me, what, 8 months? (I did take several breaks.)

Thanks for the recommendation, though. What an awesome book.

So glad you enjoyed it!

this is kind of unrelated to the revious posts but you what's really weird about "It"? that scene towards the end where the kids are in the sewer, just about to fight It, and the girl suddenly asks all the boys to "stick their things" in her. WHA?

i guess it's because to fight the ultimate evil they have to kind of lose their innocence or something, but man does it come out of nowhere

I always interpreted that as being part of Stephen King's problem with winding stories up. The endings of his books just don't quite work a lot of the time.

So no, you're not the only person who thinks that part of It is kind of... off.

Although now that I think about it, isn't that scene AFTER they have fought It and they are lost in the sewers? And then suddenly after that scene, they realize where they are and are able to find their way back...?

I should go look at my copy of the book, but I think it's the one with the Stephen King Trying To Look Cool With His Guitar author photo, and I just can't look at that very often.

On the subject of sadism, there does seem a fair bit of it in The Stand -- all those loving descriptions of (often quite sympathetic) characters' heads being shot/torn to pieces. etc. I mean, when people die in the novel, they really die. (Although I assume that also be a horror novel convention -- this is the first horror novel I've read, if you exclude a forgotten James Herbert book I skimmed when I was 12.)

I ended up reading the unabridged version, which I'm quite happy about, although I did skim occasionally (cf. the Trashcan Man and Abigail chapters). But there's so much plot, and so many great set pieces, it more-or-less justifies the length.

So many creepy genuinely terrifying images in "It". Like when they're looking through an old photo book and the pictures come to life, grainy and choppy like an old movie... they see the clown in one and he suddenly runs across the street, and thrusts his face right into the camera, his nose pressed up against the cellophane covering the photo.

Ha, I think having read my first Stephen King novel, I think it's ruined fiction for me forever. I keep starting books and thinking, "Well, this is good, but it's no The Stand."

Anyway, I picked up Night Shift, Cell, Christine and Cujo for five bucks from my local store to compensate. Are Christine and Cujo really that bad? The first chapters are pretty engrossing. I'm also shopping for Pet Sematary. I'm gonna keep away from It and Misery based on the fact that I know their stories from the movie/mini-series already.

The ponderous John A Macdonald intro to Night Shift is hilarious:

"In another story he demonstrates his good ear, the ring of exactness and truth he can give dialogue... Nice. It looks so simple. Just like brain surgery.the knife has an edge. You hold it so. And cut."

night shift has good stories in it. never read cell, can't imagine it's that good. cujo was alright. IT is very good, at least the first 3/4. The Shining is excellent; Misery is good; all those early Bachman books are good.

A friend of mine is reading and reviewing all of King's novels in order:
http://stephenking-reviewed.blogspot.com/

Yeah, Chuck, you'll miss out on a LOT if you don't read IT and Misery, storywise. IT, in particular, has subplots and relationships that a two-part TV movie could not possibly have touched on or achieved.

the relationships and backstories were the best part of IT actually. it lost me when it got to the turtle and shit, I was like, what? but king worked best with characters, etc, those have always been the strongest parts of his books. I guess maybe he's written a lot of things like that in recent years but life is too short for me to take the chance on them.

Oh I really liked "the talisman". I think that's a good companion to the Stand.

This is the conventional wisdom, and it's probably been said more than once upthread, but there was a time when SK was both insanely prolific and reliably good. But that was a long time ago, and the quality of his work has been declining ever since. His eak years were the mid to late 70s: Carrie, Salem's Lot, The Shining, The Stand, Dead Zone, The Long Walk and the stories collected in Night Shift. All good to great.

Over the 80s (the peak of his popularity and productivity), he became much more inconsistent and defined by his most well-known stylistic tics. There's excellent stuff here: Cujo, The Gunslinger, The Running Man, Pet Sematary, It, Misery, Needful Things, The Dark Half, many of the stories in Different Seasons, Skeleton Crew and Four Past Midnight. But there's also a lot of filler: Firestarter, Christine, Eyes of the Dragon, The Tommyknockers, the contunuation of the Dark Tower series, collaborations and cash-ins of every imaginable sort.

Since then, little of any real interest. He's always been readable and engaging, even at his worst, but his writing seems to have lost its focus and its animating spark. Haven't made it more than halfway through a King book in ages, and that's a shame. On the other hand, maybe it says more about me than it does about his writing. I dunno.

"eak years" hee

I heard Dolores Claiborne was also good.

Needful Things is so unrelentingly grim and awesome!

I might have said this upthread, but I re-read Misery a couple of years ago and I was literally on the edge of my seat. And I pretty much knew what was going to happen. So don't miss that one.

i do think king's prolificness (prolificity? prolificoshiousness?) has damaged his reputation in the long run; imagine if he'd stopped after Misery or IT.

therelationships and backstorieschaos and destruction at the end were the best part of IT actually

: )

Actually, my favorite parts are the historical digressions, which sure-as-shit aren't portrayed in the movie. Very much worth reading.

Prolificity FTW.

Over the 80s (the peak of his popularity and productivity drinking and coke use), he became much more inconsistent and defined by his most well-known stylistic tics

Christine is great, though, so I don't think I'd have it on your "bad" list. And I don't think you can include The Running Man or The Gunslinger into his good 80's output, at least in terms of crediting it against his stylistic behavior. The former was first published in 1982 but I believe he had had it in the can for some years; and the earliest parts of the The Gunslinger were written in 1978-1979.

I've still read all his output, but to me the last really good one, aside from a couple of the latter Dark Tower entries, was Insomnia, although the Deperation/The Regulators pair had its merits, as did From A Buick 8. Oh, and The Colorado Kid, that little novella he did for that pulp crime imprint.

I've meant to back and finish up Desperation/Regulators, which I read a good chunk of some years back, before I got distracted by something shiny over there. Seemed promising.

And yeah, I know and agree, re: The first Dark Tower book (The Gunslinger) and The Running Man. Was just going by publication date. The Gunslinger was, I think, written earlier than any of the other books I mentioned -- while he was still in college, though likely significantly revised later -- and the style is unique. Much sparer and simpler than the prose he became known for, even a bit arty. I remember liking it quite a lot, though it's been years.

http://twitter.com/VegasWalkinDude

There's a pre-teen gangbang at the end of It?!?!?!

haha yes there is

well not literally the end, the end has one of the main characters riding down a hill with his driven-insane wife on the handlebars

This is still going for all you King fans out there:
http://stephenking-reviewed.blogspot.com/

"We then follow Halleck as he begins to lose weight at a steady rate, journeying from 251 pounds to a skeletal 127 pounds. "

127 pounds, skeletal? Come on now.

There's a pre-teen gangbang at the end of It?!?!?!

It's right before they go to battle IT. I guess it's supposed to be like a weird giving-up-your-innocence-in-order-to-battle-ultimate-evil ritual.

it's pretty O_o, obviously

Hard to imagine someone getting away with writing that these days.

oh man I forgot all about Cycle of the Werewolf

That one sounds fun. The author of that blog is a friend of mine, I've never had much time for King before but a few of his posts are making me consider giving him a go. Oh, and he gave me a copy of It recently!

It is a ton of fun and a really quick read.

I think he's a little too harsh on Thinner but it's been more than 2 decades since I read that book.

Will definitely be giving it a read soon, thanks.

I've always wanted to read the Stand, but the size is a bit intimidating (one 1400 page novel equals 3.5 400 page novels, how to choose). OTOH, I'm tired of Serious Stuff right now.

whats the one where the chick is tied to a bed with handcuffs for most of it? that was the scariest one, i think

Gerald's Game

misery

It's right before they go to battle IT. I guess it's supposed to be like a weird giving-up-your-innocence-in-order-to-battle-ultimate-evil ritual.

Dude, I'm pretty sure it's after they think they've killed It. They get lost in one of the tunnels after and Bev instinctually decides to let them run a train so they could regain their bearings. Didn't bother me when I first read the book in middle school but now, YOW.

Has King ever been forced to discuss/defend this in an interview?

It's been a while since I've read the book, obviously. So maybe it's a way of bonding them all together? Or just King during one of his coked-up pervy moments?