Finished reading The Talisman this weekend. Its a book that never clicked with me when I was a teenager and devouring all things King. Still quite a slog this time around. Not sure if its an effect of the collaboration with Straub, or maybe I'm just not into the fantasy side of King's stuff. I'm not crazy about The Dark Tower either, though parts of it are pretty great.
― sofatruck, Monday, 8 May 2017 14:09 (seven years ago) link
opposite of that for me
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 14:13 (seven years ago) link
Talisman for me alternated between parts that totally scratched my Dark Tower creepy adventure itch (kid on the road on a quest, the terror of the bar gig in Oatley, the whole Sunlight juvenile prison thing) and parts where I wanted to throw the book across the room. Need for an editor really starts to come in around that time, there are just so many straight up redundant passages where you can't imagine either author really read back over it, or they'd have realized "oh wait I think we've established enough that he misses his mom" or "I think we've established enough that he's approaching the big bad evil fortress place" or "I think we've established enough that he was traumatized by his encounter with the dude who looks like Randolph Scott" etc. etc. And god, his two worthless sidekicks!
― ✓ (Doctor Casino), Monday, 8 May 2017 15:02 (seven years ago) link
have ye read black house
its great imo. maybe...... maybe his best idk
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 15:09 (seven years ago) link
big fuckin train big fuckin train
― gimmesomehawnz (Jon not Jon), Monday, 8 May 2017 15:33 (seven years ago) link
Yeah Oatley and Sunlight Home were the definite highlights for me.
― sofatruck, Monday, 8 May 2017 15:50 (seven years ago) link
yeah black house was great
I've heard rumours they're working on a third book? Maybe that's an old rumor tho, idk
― Yoni Loves Chocha (VegemiteGrrl), Monday, 8 May 2017 16:38 (seven years ago) link
Catching up:
Zelda in the Pet Sematary movie -- SO SCARYRed dye puke in Cujo -- TRAUMATICCreepshow -- AN ACTUAL GREAT MOVIE THAT 100% NAILS WHAT IT SET OUT TO DO
― The Thnig, Monday, 8 May 2017 16:53 (seven years ago) link
I think, if I'm being really honest with myself, Creepshow is probably one of my all-time top five movies. Because, yes, in terms of the realization of its intentions, it is perfect.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Monday, 8 May 2017 17:16 (seven years ago) link
how many of y'all have read The Eyes of the Dragon? just remembered I have a sweet looking paperback of that sitting in the basement - worth reading? i'm up to my neck in SK books but I've never read any of his fantasy stuff.
― flappy bird, Monday, 8 May 2017 17:16 (seven years ago) link
Yeah, it's good stuff. The straightest fantasy thing he's written, a little fluffy but a quick read.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Monday, 8 May 2017 17:18 (seven years ago) link
And yet another book featuring our favorite Walkin' Dude as the antagonist.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Monday, 8 May 2017 17:19 (seven years ago) link
It's crazy no one ever made EYES OF THE DRAGON into a movie. Seems like money in the bank.
― The Thnig, Monday, 8 May 2017 17:48 (seven years ago) link
oh is there a tie-in to The Dark Tower in there? I tried reading the first one as a kid and couldn't get through more than 20 pages, boring af at the time.
― flappy bird, Monday, 8 May 2017 17:48 (seven years ago) link
Dude, there's probably 15 non-Dark Tower SK books that tie into the Dark Tower.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Monday, 8 May 2017 17:50 (seven years ago) link
minimum
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 17:58 (seven years ago) link
xp all things serve the Beam
― Old Lynch's Sex Paragraph (Phil D.), Monday, 8 May 2017 17:59 (seven years ago) link
i know, but i thought for some reason that all came later post car accident.
― flappy bird, Monday, 8 May 2017 18:01 (seven years ago) link
one of the best things about king is the thread running through pretty much all of his work no matter how old, new, fantasy, contemporary and shite.
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 18:11 (seven years ago) link
The later Dark Tower books are really aggressive at retroactively turning earlier books into Dark Tower tie-ins - I think it's in VI that the priest from Salem's Lot that was defeated by the vampires in a moment of lapsed faith (awesome scene) suddenly turns up as like, a bartender in a ghost town in another dimension or something. In hindsight, I'm shocked only that he didn't pull up to our heroes in a certain eerily familiar 1958 Plymouth Fury...
― ✓ (Doctor Casino), Monday, 8 May 2017 18:16 (seven years ago) link
Although to be fair he then has his characters notice that the bad guys are ripping everything off of popular genre fiction, with Doctor Doom robots wielding tricked-out Golden Snitches as deadly weapons (IIRC), so maybe he was aware of just how fanficcy it was all getting.
― ✓ (Doctor Casino), Monday, 8 May 2017 18:17 (seven years ago) link
i like to charitably imagine that he wasnt aware of fuck all for books five onwards tbph
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 18:19 (seven years ago) link
I think Eyes of the Dragon was where he began the shared universe thing in earnest - as opposed to retconning characters into the narrative as in the case of Salem's Lot and The Stand (although both The Gunslinger and The Stand stemmed from his desire to create an American version of Lord of The Rings, so he may already have been mulling over the connection)
― Number None, Monday, 8 May 2017 18:37 (seven years ago) link
i get a post-vancian kinda wolfe-y vibe from the first Dark Tower book but I don't suppose those were actual influences (did book of the new sun come out after the first dark tower anyway...?)
― gimmesomehawnz (Jon not Jon), Monday, 8 May 2017 19:05 (seven years ago) link
I'm sure I've read King talking about Vance before (and I'd be surprised if he wasn't a fan tbh)
Wolfe idk
― Number None, Monday, 8 May 2017 19:17 (seven years ago) link
not necessarily wolfe imo but certainly that dried out twilight seventies dusty scifi/fantasy feel
i have been thinking recently about the character and feel of US fantasy vs UK fantasy and that feel, the difference between mesa and countryside, between technology/concept focus and adventure/story focus looms large-ish imo
mostly the covers on the us stuff is angular and has horrible colours like yellow and purple and the uk stuff is loamy and leafy or whatever
king may have set out for lotr but he never got there, i dont think, nor even close. wizard of oz maybe.
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 22:34 (seven years ago) link
Still a worthy progenitor to be compared against imo.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Monday, 8 May 2017 22:46 (seven years ago) link
yeah not a criticism at all just a comment on the feel of it
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 22:50 (seven years ago) link
also... idk... louis l'amour wrote some bad fantasy western stuff that i cant help but bring to mind in some parts of tdt, again not the 'bad' that im paralleling but rather the vibe of the books, western, airport novel, american seventies pulp fantasy.... whatnot
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Monday, 8 May 2017 22:53 (seven years ago) link
I really noticed the Dark Tower 'connections' in The Talisman. The Territories is the big one. But there's also the train Jack and Richard take through the blasted (waste) lands, the wolves, etc. King really mined it for later Dark Tower elements.
― sofatruck, Tuesday, 9 May 2017 16:55 (seven years ago) link
SPOILER FOR INSOMNIA:
Slogging through Insomnia when it came out, and finding the whole point of it was to rescue some random character that had something to do with the Dark Tower (I think?) put me off SK for ten years, I was so disgusted. I've come back big to SK, but jesus that was lame.
― The Thnig, Tuesday, 9 May 2017 20:28 (seven years ago) link
http://www.cracked.com/blog/the-creepiest-thing-about-stephen-king-his-acting-career/
― Old Lynch's Sex Paragraph (Phil D.), Wednesday, 10 May 2017 12:48 (seven years ago) link
i liked insomnia and i even liked heart in atlantis there i said it
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Wednesday, 10 May 2017 15:41 (seven years ago) link
insomnia really just IT for senior citizens tho tbrr
Wrong thread, but maybe Trump's the Man in Black after all.
― Ned Raggett, Wednesday, 10 May 2017 16:46 (seven years ago) link
Just because the kid actor from Stranger Things is in the movie adaptation, my 12 year old daughter keeps asking me if she could read It. I keep telling her it is not really appropriate for her or her age, but
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 12 May 2017 01:37 (seven years ago) link
Weird. Anyway, I ultimately told her it was like beer. She is physically capable of drinking it, but she is not ready for it. She seemed to understand the analogy.
― Josh in Chicago, Friday, 12 May 2017 01:38 (seven years ago) link
I guess it depends on the kid, but I'd read my fair share of King by that age (although, tbf, I probably didn't tackle It until the ripe old age of 13).
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Friday, 12 May 2017 03:19 (seven years ago) link
Guess that doesn't necessarily mean I was ready for it. I like to think of the attendant trauma as character building.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Friday, 12 May 2017 03:20 (seven years ago) link
He writes about sex like someone who can clearly recollect a number of sexual encounters just shy of the number of children he has.
― Jigsaw Pizzle (Old Lunch), Thursday, May 4, 2017 2:22 PM (one week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
I feel like like im reading a 12 y/os pretend diary about their pretend sex life. Its where the true horror shines imo.
― It's always (sunny successor), Tuesday, 16 May 2017 16:41 (seven years ago) link
their sweaty bellies, still slim in those days, slapped together while her teeth clamped around ger cigarette in ecstasy
i mean thats a composite but i definitely remember something something
― spud called maris (darraghmac), Tuesday, 16 May 2017 18:44 (seven years ago) link
Yeah, that quote is from IT. Good memory.
― The Thnig, Tuesday, 16 May 2017 19:09 (seven years ago) link
the descriptions of the sex always have a sad-motel/dive bar flavor to them
like even when it's supposed to be attractive people it sounds like a divorced dad & a retired waitress
― Yoni Loves Chocha (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 16 May 2017 19:35 (seven years ago) link
^^^^exactly
― It's always (sunny successor), Tuesday, 16 May 2017 19:45 (seven years ago) link
lol. perfect description.
― how's life, Tuesday, 16 May 2017 19:55 (seven years ago) link
Thirded
― Robert Adam Gilmour, Tuesday, 16 May 2017 20:22 (seven years ago) link
I am not really very into fiction in general but was suprised at how sophmoric his writing seemed to me - good ideas but he needs STanley Kubrick to eralie trghem
― Violet Jynx, Tuesday, 16 May 2017 20:24 (seven years ago) link
the last part of that sentence took a Lovecraftian turn
― Number None, Tuesday, 16 May 2017 20:27 (seven years ago) link
lol
― in a soylent whey (wins), Tuesday, 16 May 2017 20:41 (seven years ago) link
r'lyeh!
― Yoni Loves Chocha (VegemiteGrrl), Tuesday, 16 May 2017 20:42 (seven years ago) link