stephen king c/d?

yeah when i was a kid i read everything thru tommnyknockers and then stopped dead - part of it was i getting older/more pretentious (see above post) but alot of it was just that book. hadn't read anything since, still haven't read unabridged the stand for example, and then a few summers ago decided to reread IT. enjoyed it thoroughly, alot of it horrified me more now than it did then tbh (children dying somehow more brutal when you're an adult than when you're a kid), thought he did incredible job of writing the children, less so the adults. thought he did a much better job w/ adults in 11/22/63, maybe cuz he was older and sober or maybe it's just two different books. thinking about going on a stephen king kick also - any reccomendations from recent stuff (ie past 25 years) or should i just dive back into salem's lot, the shining, pet sematary, etc?

xpost - wait i did actually read 'on writing', totally forgot that. what i recall mainly is 'the way to be a writer is to write. alot.' kinda hilarious to remember him announcing his 'retirement...after 3 maybe 4 more books' - dude's an addict.

a stephen king poll

then a few summers ago decided to reread IT. enjoyed it thoroughly, alot of it horrified me more now than it did then tbh (children dying somehow more brutal when you're an adult than when you're a kid)

i totally had this reaction to 'lord of the flies' a few months ago -- liked it OK as a teen, found it almost too horrifying to read as an adult. apparently it's king's all-time favorite book.

i've never read more than a few king short stories -- all of which were v. good, but included a few details that messed with me for days. tho i'm sure they're pretty tame next to a lot of his stuff. i'm just a wuss about horror, really.

thinking about going on a stephen king kick also - any reccomendations from recent stuff (ie past 25 years) or should i just dive back into salem's lot, the shining, pet sematary, etc?

as is becoming apparent i could probably go into far-too-great-depth on this, but it's interesting how a more felt and more ambivalent humanism (occasionally so world-weary as to approach nihilistic) takes the place of the vague christian ethic of his early work (god i can't believe i just wrote that), also an interest in a sort of popular american realism that doesn't really exist anymore, also a tendency to do wacky shit

tldr but 'cell', 'tom gordon' and 'hearts in atlantis' (title story only), 'the colorado kid' to demonstrate those three things respectively, 'under the dome' for the three in combination

i wish under the dome had ended better, i was suuuuper into it and then it just fizzles out :(

Just FYI, y'all have infected me with your enthusiasm. Started re-reading Carrie last night and, knowing me, I'm likely to continue plowing through his stuff until things get dire.

just finished my reread of "the stand" and i think i'm actually gonna take a king break now. kinda wrung out after that one. in the good way.

(i do wish i still had my mom's copy of the "abridged" original version, though. i don't mind MORE MORE MORE when it comes to my fantastical epics, plot-wise. i just kept noticing all sorts of sloppy bit where he inserted "topical" references to the year of our lord 1990 that clanged hard with other bits [character's ages, song styles, atmosphere, car models, slang, etc etc] that were very obviously late 70s.)

Yeah, "The Stand" is an ordeal, in the best way.

Y'all inspiring me to get caught up on King.

i just kept noticing all sorts of sloppy bit where he inserted "topical" references to the year of our lord 1990 that clanged hard with other bits [character's ages, song styles, atmosphere, car models, slang, etc etc] that were very obviously late 70s. - thought about rereading the stand and this very aspect i'd heard about is what's prevented me.

yeah I prefer the OG stand than the expanded version

Sigh. I'm going to be the voice of slight dissent on 11/22/63. I finally finished it last night and it was okay. I was getting into it at the beginning but then it just draaaaaagged, and the whole plot was "He moves towards his goal... OH NO SETBACK! Will it ruin everything? No of course not. He achieves his goal, with ~consequences~" over and over and over again. Plus the consequences were telegraphed from ten miles away, despite being grown in a lab to be the perfect Stephen King combination of shocking but perfectly appropriate. I also got really tired of the main character calling the supporting woman character "hon" all the time. It just reads in print as weirdly condescending. And you know what? I get it. They have sex and enjoy it! I don't need to hear about every time they fuck.

One of my favorite things about SK books is that they're compulsively readable, but all of the afore mentioned issues made reading this book a chore, which was really sad! Anyway, so last night I was like "fuck it I am FINISHING THIS BOOK" and then I got to this line, which was the literary equivalent of somebody sharting at the dinner table.

MAYBE SLIGHT SPOILER ALERT SO KEEP OUT THIS MEANS YOU!

Main character is on the bus and he is helping a large black woman (who is a maid and says "Lawsy!" btw) to her feet and writing of the difficulty of doing so, King writes, "That was three hundred pounds of female on the hoof." Maybe the only black woman character in the book and he compares her to chattel. Not only is that racist as HELL and fucking offensive if you happen to think, as I unsurprisingly do, that fat women are humans and not animals "on the hoof," but it's insanely uncreative. Wow, you compared a fat woman to a cow. WOW. Is there a chapter about metaphor in On Writing about metaphor? Maybe he should review that one.

OKAY YOU CAN COME BACK NOW SPOILER TIME IS OVER

Despite all that, I didn't hate the book, but it's going on the Tommyknockers side of my SK list rather than the Night Shift side, that's for damn sure.

I agree with you.

I thought that 11/22/63 was insanely too detailed. I also hate it when the main characters of books are ridiculously perfect like they are here. It was OK overall because the time travel conceit was cool, but book really should have been less than half the length that it is.

Yeah, Jake was a total Mary Sue.

A spoileriffic flowchart of connections between King's (non-Dark Tower stuff.

Also, how did I fail to hear that a show based on The Colorado Kid has been airing for several years?

Yeah 'Haven'

It's kind of like a weird cross between a supernatural verison of Eureka and American Gothic or something. Not in a good way? I have tried to enjoy it but I alwasy find it kind of boring

on the other hand WWE's Edge is a character now :D

"Haven is a supernatural drama television series loosely based on the Stephen King novel The Colorado Kid."

must be pretty loosely, i have to say

"When FBI Special Agent Audrey Parker (Emily Rose) arrives in the small town of Haven, Maine, on a routine case, she soon finds herself increasingly involved in the return of The Troubles, a plague of supernatural afflictions that occurred in the town at least twice before. With an openness to the possibility of the paranormal, she also finds a more personal link in Haven that may lead her to the mother she has never known."

...

All four stories in Different Seasons will have film adaptations soon.

Speaking of Different Seasons, that reminds me: I heard about this story from my niece on the weekend. This girl is awesome. Good on her for standing up:

http://www.sacbee.com/2012/10/16/4914560/rocklin-high-student-fights-to.html

Rocklin High student fights to keep Stephen King book in library
By Melody Gutierrez
Published: Tuesday, Oct. 16, 2012 - 12:00 am | Page 2B

Rocklin High School senior Amanda Wong had never read a Stephen King novel until she joined a committee reviewing whether one of his books should be banned from the school's library.

Now, Wong is fighting to ensure "Different Seasons," a collection of King's short stories, remains on the shelves after a parent complained about a graphic rape scene in the short story "Apt Pupil."

"This opens a door to censoring other materials," Wong, 17, said Monday.

Wong was a student representative on a Rocklin High committee that voted to ban "Different Seasons."

Wong was the lone person to vote against banning King's book. She said, at the time of the vote, she was also the only person who had read the entire collection, which includes "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption," "The Body" and "A Winter's Tale." Three stories were adapted into the movies: "The Shawshank Redemption," "Stand By Me" ("The Body") and "Apt Pupil."

"It's such an important decision; you have to read the entire book," Wong said.

The decision to ban the book came on the heels of the 30th annual Banned Books Week, an effort by the American Library Association, along with publishers, teachers and readers, aimed at "liberating literature."

After the Rocklin High committee voted to ban the book, Wong spoke against the decision at a school district board meeting on Oct. 3. After listening to Wong, Rocklin Unified Superintendent Kevin Brown said he overturned the Rocklin High committee's decision.

"They failed to recognize that there are other high schools in our district, and we need input from all sectors of our district," Brown said.

A districtwide committee will meet today to begin reviewing "Different Seasons." That committee has 30 days to make a decision on whether the book can be offered to high school students.

Brown said in his nearly two decades with the district, Rocklin Unified has never banned a library book or classroom reading material.

"I've read it," Brown said. "I think the book has merit. The committee will be charged with making the final decision."

That decision is being watched by the American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom, said the group's assistant director, Angela Maycock.

"Our office has been keeping track of challenges since the 1980s," Maycock said. "It's something we are very concerned about."

Maycock said the stories contained in "Different Seasons" have been publicly challenged a handful of times since it was released in 1982. King's other work, however, has been routinely challenged, Maycock said.

"When there is public attention drawn to these situations, the outpouring of support for individuals to read and think for themselves is very powerful," she said.

Herbert Foerstel, author of a reference guide of banned books in American schools, called the Rocklin's brief decision to ban King's book "absolutely outrageous."

"If a book is assigned and a student is obliged to read it, at least one could make a religious freedom argument and ask for an alternative book to be assigned," Foerstel said. "But remove a book from a library where reading it is voluntary? No one should allow that under any circumstances."

Wong said she is drafting a letter asking that those on the committee reviewing "Different Seasons" read the stories in their entirety.

"Even if the book gets banned, I hope that the process is more carefully done and more public," Wong said. "My biggest concern is that issues like this aren't transparent."

Wong said she recently checked the Rocklin High library shelves for "Different Seasons."

"Someone checked it out," she said

I'm still aghast that that stupid committe would try to remove the book from the LIBRARY. Assholes.

Kinda surprised it's in a HS library at all, tbh.

Really? All the Stephen Kings were in my high school library.

I guess I really can't generalize HS library standards based on my own HS library. I had to smuggle all of my King in.

Although I guess I did the bulk of my King reading in late elementary through jr. high. Pretty sure administrators would frown on a 7th-grader reading Rage in the back of the classroom in this day and age.

my first SK was Skeleton Crew, I think I was 11 when I read it, so 7th grade. The library teacher was like, 'make sure your parents know you're reading this' and tried to convince me to read something else, bless his heart.

Eventually he stopped raising his eyebrow at me, lol

wait 12 not 11

P.S. I am now two weeks and change into (re-)reading King's stuff from the beginning. I'm about 20% of the way through The Stand (complete and uncut) now. And my interest isn't flagging at all. Yet. Brief notes:

Carrie was pretty faithfully adapted until the end of the book, when things went a little more bugshit. 'Salem's Lot might be my new go-to recommendation for newbies. Nicely creepy and interestingly-paced (the 'v' word isn't mentioned until halfway through). I'd never read The Shining before and was kinda surprised at how different it is from the film. I mean, they're the same basic story in broad strokes, but the novel is more about the trauma of externalized psychological damage. It's probably okay that King has let Rage go out of print. It's actually not all that good. Night Shift, still as great as ever. Surprising to realize what a debt King owes to Lovecraft (now that I've read Lovecraft). I appreciated some of the more subdued stories much more than I did as a kid (and realize now just how much of King's stuff went completely over my head at the time).

Night Shift is the bomb. That has the one with the guy's dad who's the beer-slug-thing in the basement, right? Grey Matter?

I love Salem's Lot. Also Dead Zone was another favorite upon rereading later in life.

Yeah, "Grey Matter"! I really think I must've re-read Night Shift ten times or more over the years because most of those stories seem permanently lodged in my memory. This is at least the 3rd time I've read The Stand.

I'm looking forward to The Dead Zone. It was the first one I read (in fifth grade) and I haven't read it since.

Just recently found this (from when I was prolly in like 6th grade and drawing comics of pretty much everything):

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8326/8095308885_93139cd1d1_c.jpg

awesome

that is sssssoooooooooo great!

I love it!

The Mangler! Yes!

Omg

omg my 12-year-old self is so feeling that drawing right now

At least six of those doodles made into movies.

Also featured in the same notebook: a much less faithful It illustration, a poem entitled 'What Is Peace?', a comic adaptation of the first five minutes of UHF, several drawings of In Living Color sketches, and the lyrics to half of the songs on the Sir Mix-A-Lot album Swass.

oh man, if you have a "men on film" comic, plz share

I'm actually 99% sure that I do (I drew a lot of one-panel gags based on In Living Color and SNL and Kids In The Hall sketches, for some reason)! I just have no idea where it would be, unfortch.

But if I ever find it, I'll try to remember to post it in the 'stephen king c/d?' thread.

I just finished Night Shift; my favorites by a long shot were "Quitters Inc" and "The Last Rung of the Ladder". I am not surprised that a 6th grader would not find them interesting enough to draw.

Yeah, "Last Rung" and "Woman In The Room" resonated much more strongly this time 'round than they did when I was all "wtf this boring crap isn't horror" and hadn't had any first-hand experience with death & decline in the family. I also found "I Know What You Need" much creepier (like PUA taken to its logical and mildly supernatural extreme).

Starting to encounter the pointless ca. 1990 references in the uncut Stand (e.g. Freddy Krueger and Spuds MacKenzie). It's mildly irksome now that it was pointed out itt.

Well, then.

Stephen King is coming back to broadcast TV. CBS is giving the author’s Under the Dome a 13-episode series order.
Based on King’s bestselling novel, Under the Dome is the story of a small New England town that’s suddenly and inexplicably sealed off from the rest of the world by an enormous transparent dome. The town’s residents need to survive the deteriorating post-apocalyptic conditions while searching for answers to what this barrier is, where it came from, and how to make it go away.

“This is a great novel coming to the television screen with outstanding auspices and in-season production values to create a summer programming event,” said Nina Tassler, President of CBS Entertainment. “We’re excited to transport audiences Under the Dome and into the extraordinary world that Stephen King has imagined.”

The series version was originally developed at Showtime. But in an unusual move, the ambitious project jumped from a cable network’s slate to the major broadcaster (more on that below). It’s also a rather unique title for CBS, since the network has been traditionally more wary about betting on serialized dramas than its rivals. But with AMC’s The Walking Dead and NBC’s Revolution, apocalyptic serialized dramas have been delivering large numbers lately.

Fans of the novel shouldn’t expect an exact retelling of the same story. Last we heard, writer Brian K. Vaughan’s (Lost) script for Dome was wisely using the novel’s setup as a launch pad for its own TV-format-friendly version of the story and might even lay the groundwork for a different outcome than the novel’s ending. Also, the CBS version is definitely a series, not a mini-series, with a season finale episode that will leave the story open for more seasons.

Dome‘s development is an example of synergy at work. The project was developed at Showtime, owned by CBS Corp., but the network’s president David Nevins decided it wasn’t really right for the cable channel. He recommended it to Tassler, who was looking for summer programming and loved the concept. Also, Dome is based on the novel published by Simon & Schuster, which is a CBS company too. The development swap is a reverse of what happened with The Tudors, which was shepherded at CBS before moving to Showtime.

Under the Dome will air this summer. CBS Television Studios will produce the series in association with Amblin Television. There’s no cast in place yet, but Neal Baer, Stephen King, Justin Falvey, Darryl Frank, Stacey Snider will serve as executive producers along with Vaughan.

bryan k. vaughan! that makes a lot of sense, actually

well, cool! for now. I'll be interested to see how this develops.

My only off-the-bat concern is that, in the book, the eventual lack of air due to the dome was a real concern for the town and the characters. If they're making this more open-ended, it'll have to be addressed. I don't want it to be dumb like "Revolution" is.

i hope they write a better ending

http://friday87central.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/tommy_westphall.jpg

already 100% better