Whats everyone reading?

[JayzusB.Christ]

Think I read the space turtle one about 20 years ago - absolute excellence until the space turtle arrives. And the underage orgy, for that matter 

[Barrington Boots]

Agree on early Stephen King and especially The Stand which is awesome up to a point, but I think its virtually a given now that Stephen King books are going to descend into bizarre nonsense at the end. Many of his books are what I'd call proper page-turners though, you really don't want to stop reading them sometimes.

I re-read The Stand during the pandemic and that was a joyous experience.

And the underage orgy, for that matter

I'd forgotten about this! Pretty messed up stuff and not in the slightest bit relevent to the plot (before or after the turtle)

[JayzusB.Christ]

Funnily enough, it didn't really occur to me at the time how fucked up it was, presented as it was as an impromptu magical ritual for... I can't remember, but for something. But yeah, it was fucked up, and clearly the product of King's coke addict phase.

King dicked around with The Stand, then?  Hopefully not in a George Lucas way.

[JohnW]

King dicked around with The Stand, then?  Hopefully not in a George Lucas way.

He released a sort of author's cut which included all the bits that the original editor wisely deleted. I only read the start of it, but it was bloated even by Stephen King standards.
(In the proper edition, for instance, the action begins with a bunch of good ol' boys watching a car steering towards some petrol pumps. In the self-indulgent text, it starts with the driver bundling his wife and kids into the car a few days before, thus removing the tense 'Who? How? What the fuck?' of the proper opening.)

Then I gather he produced a version updated from the seventies to the nineties or two-thousands for no good reason at all. I for one like my Stephen Kings to be rooted in a minutely observed 1970s America. Indeed, I often think that most of what I know about the US comes from Sesame Street and early Stephen King.
Anyway, I hear this revision was unnecessarily awful.

Always listen to your editor, children, and just say no to drugs.

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

King dicked around with The Stand, then?  Hopefully not in a George Lucas way.

He released a sort of author's cut which included all the bits that the original editor wisely deleted. I only read the start of it, but it was bloated even by Stephen King standards.
(In the proper edition, for instance, the action begins with a bunch of good ol' boys watching a car steering towards some petrol pumps. In the self-indulgent text, it starts with the driver bundling his wife and kids into the car a few days before, thus removing the tense 'Who? How? What the fuck?' of the proper opening.)

Then I gather he produced a version updated from the seventies to the nineties or two-thousands for no good reason at all. I for one like my Stephen Kings to be rooted in a minutely observed 1970s America. Indeed, I often think that most of what I know about the US comes from Sesame Street and early Stephen King.
Anyway, I hear this revision was unnecessarily awful.

Always listen to your editor, children, and just say no to drugs.

Totally disagree. My view is that The Stand (and as an aside, also Raymond E Feist's Magician) really benefitted from having excised text added. The edits were due to uncertainty that the public would buy a book of such size from an unknown author, as opposed to edits for the flow of the text.

Your mileage may vary. You say tomato, I say tomato. Etc. But I like the extras. I like directors' cuts.

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

I'm reading Stephen King's The Stand for the first time.  I've really lost my reading habit and tried to get back into it

When it comes to getting back into reading, early King is always a good route, and The Stand (at least before he dicked around with it) is a grand satisfying wodge of a read.
There's a lot about the man's style I don't have much time for these days, but that's offset by the sheer amount of content he delivers. My habit now is to read one of his books until things start drifting towards absurdity and then I chuck it. As soon as he introduces stuff like space turtles I know I probably won't like how the story ends. But that doesn't matter because the book has already served up several hundred pages of human interest with spooky stuff added.

PS I agree that his more recent stuff drifts into absurdity and falls apart. The exception that proves the rule being Revival. Brrrr. Absurd and chilling. And very Phantasm

[Barrington Boots]

I've read both editions, and the expanded one just includes around 400 extra pages of stuff. It doesn't really expand or improve on the story - I wouldn't say it detracts from it really, but it's mostly just bloat - like when you watch the deleted scenes on a dvd and they're kinda interesting, but also you can usually see why they didn't make it into the finished product. I like the book so I was excited to read the expanded version, but the original text has a leaner, sharper feel to it. If you're a metal fan, it's like a modern Iron Maiden album compared to a classic one.

It does introduce a new character called The Kid, who is a seriously nasty bit of work but ultimately he adds nothing to the story with his over the top sociopath antics.

I haven't read an updated non-70s version of it though, I can't see how the book would work in the 90s or how he'd do it. Just describe people as wearing plaid shirts? Get a POGS reference in there somewhere?

[JohnW]

The edits were due to uncertainty that the public would buy a book of such size from an unknown author, as opposed to edits for the flow of the text.

I stand corrected, Doc.

You say tomato, I say tomato.

Actually, I think you'll find it's 'tomato'.

[JayzusB.Christ]

My one starts with the guy trying to save his wife and kid. Now you say it, the beginning where Stu and Co are drinking beers at the petrol station may have been the better beginning, as I'd already forgotten the first bit.

My one is also set in 1991. Ah well.   And it has The Kid, who for some reason looks more like a 50s thug than a 90s one, or even a 70s one.

[JohnW]

The exception that proves the rule being Revival. Brrrr.

OK, I've read Revival now.
Our Stevie's still got it.

[JayzusB.Christ]

Good to know - might put that on the list.  Of the Stephen King books and stories I've read, I'd say my favourites are It (again, until the spider / turtle stuff), The Long Walk*, and possibly Carrie.  The Body is a classic story too - nobody writes kids like Stephen King, apart from maybe Trey Parker and Matt Stone.



*Which features a character I've just realised is probably Randall Flagg.  I tried the audiobook of The Dark Tower's first book but didn't like it.

[JohnW]

- nobody writes kids like Stephen King, apart from maybe Trey Parker and Matt Stone

Ha!
The comparison never occurred to me, but it's right on the money.
It's what Enid Blyton was missing: all that effing and blinding.

[Tjm86]

Been slowly working my way through much of King's work of late (along with quite a few other writers).  It's interesting how he has shifted in some respects but also remained quite consistent in others.  I sometimes wonder how much of his having been pigeonholed as a horror writer is down to struggling to find a category for his work.

Granted there are seriously disturbing aspects to his books at times but quite often the themes and ideas are actually more fantastical than horror, it seems to me.  You've got books like Carrie, the Dead Zone and Firestarter that are all about psychic powers.  Talisman and the Dark Tower could more accurately be classified as fantasy.  To an extent the same can be said for The Stand.

Cujo is an absolutely fascinating piece of work for me.  The focus on the dog by so many folks ignores the plethora of monsters that inhabit the novel.  It's almost like a psychological thriller.

In defence of the Dark Tower I would say that the first novel is probably the weakest (at least of those I've got through so far).  Once the Gunslinger picks up with his fellow travellers it becomes far more interesting.  Of course it is going to be interesting to see whether this holds for the last few books ...

[The Enigmatic Dr X]

The Dark Tower starts well and descends into self-indulgent pap. Any book where the author is a character should be ignored.

[JayzusB.Christ]

The Dark Tower starts well and descends into self-indulgent pap. Any book where the author is a character should be ignored.

As I say, I didn't enjoy The Dark Tower much (though the fact that it was an audiobook probably didn't help), but I'm not quite on board with your second point. I consider Grant Morrision's Animal Man run and Paul Auster's New York Trilogy absolute classics, for example.  Not to mention Psmith's Farewell...