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Post by Scott on May 29, 2018 19:42:34 GMT -5
I am 25 or so chapters in. I'm enjoying it so far. The story pulls you along. The first section was pretty mundane crime material, but dark. Sometimes King can take you to very dark places. The weirdness starts creeping in at the beginning of the 2nd section. I'm about 2-3 chapters into the 2nd section. I am still a big fan of Salem's Lot, the Shining, etc., but with the last several books I've read I have been impressed by how much better of a writer he has become. He has always been a great story teller, but occasionally his early writing could come across as clunky, or forced. The Stories flow now.
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Post by GRWelsh on May 30, 2018 9:58:46 GMT -5
I've had similar thoughts about Stephen King's writing ability. He is a much better writer than he used to be. I've always thought he was great at developing character and inserting cultural references to make his worlds immersive, but now his use of language is much improved as well. While the last few books of his have impressed me with how well written they are, the ideas and stories aren't always as good as they were in the past. DOCTOR SLEEP was written more skillfully than THE SHINING, but THE SHINING was still a better story and way more memorable. REVIVAL was another one that was fun to read but kind of forgettable, except for the ending in the other world -- which I wanted to see more of. MR. MERCEDES is the best of his recent books, with an impressive opening scene, strong characters, and tight plot making for an overall memorable story. Its sequel, FINDERS KEEPERS was also kind of forgettable, but enjoyable enough for me to want to finish the trilogy.
With THE OUTSIDER I keep wondering if it is going to have some connection to THE DARK HALF, or perhaps even a shapeshifting monster similar to Pennywise from IT.
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Post by Scott on May 31, 2018 20:57:04 GMT -5
This one's starting to remind me of Revival. You know on a meta level that there's a supernatural or horror element to the book, but the story just keeps chugging along without it, or with the tiniest little hints.
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Post by GRWelsh on Jun 1, 2018 12:16:04 GMT -5
The same applies to the Bill Hodges trilogy. It mostly reads like crime fiction, but there is paranormal in the background.
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Post by Scott on Jun 6, 2018 20:48:02 GMT -5
I finished it yesterday. Very well written. Good story, not great, but it was an enjoyable book.
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Post by GRWelsh on Jun 7, 2018 8:28:45 GMT -5
I'm about halfway through END OF WATCH, the final book in the "Bill Hodges" trilogy. I was planning on starting THE OUTSIDER next. Any connections to the Lovecraft story by the same name?
I see there is a TV version of the Bill Hodges trilogy titled MR. MERCEDES, so I'd like to check that out. I like Brendan Gleeson, the actor who plays Hodges. Unfortunately, it seems to be on a network I don't have (Audience by AT&T/DirecTV). It's an odd time with so many good TV shows spread across different pay-per-view networks. I can't imagine most people get them all, or even most of them, so it must always a process of pick and choose, switching around, etc. I already have Netflix, so I tend to stick to that.
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Post by Scott on Jun 7, 2018 12:52:07 GMT -5
Nothing to do with the Lovecraft story, but inspired by the Poe story William Wilson.
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Post by GRWelsh on Jun 7, 2018 13:34:46 GMT -5
For some reason -- maybe because I've been listening to the audiobook again -- this also reminded me of the novel LOLITA, which has multiple doppelgängers. Clare Quilty is Humbert Humbert's doppelgänger, not in the sense of being a physical duplicate, but as a shadowy nemesis who thinks like him and can out-think him... Possibly being a version of Nabokov himself.
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Post by GRWelsh on Jun 10, 2018 8:46:55 GMT -5
I finished END OF WATCH. It was entertaining, not the best King story I've ever read, better than average. The strength of the trilogy was in the characters and their relationships, and King's willingness to go in different directions. SERIOUS SPOILERS... The first two books in this trilogy were crime fiction with no paranormal element at all, until the end of the second book in which it was hinted at to come in the third. In the third, it feels like King was bringing back some of his old beats like from CARRIE (telekinesis), THE SHINING (black guy shows up in the end on a Sno-Cat, which is a bit odd since that is from the Kubrick movie version), and once again, allusions to FRANKENSTEIN (mad doctor experiments on patient, turns him into a monster that gets out of his control). I respect King for tackling suicide as a theme (generally hard to think about for most of us) and trying to stay current by incorporating computer hacking, video games and social media into a paranormal crime thriller, since the combination of those elements made it feel fresh. King is at his best when describing the mundane horrors of real life... the antagonist's very human mental problems that are all too similar to the mass shooter/school shooter mentality ("I'd be remembered forever"), one character's autism and her struggle to make it through life and find people who value her, and another character aging and dealing with retirement and feelings of worthlessness and then getting diagnosed with pancreatic cancer ("For the first time in my life, I'm terrified of the future, where I see everything that I am or ever was first submerged, then erased. If the pain itself doesn't do it, the heavier drugs they give me to stifle it will"). That's scary stuff, because as we get older, we get that sense that in a way we're all terminally ill... Even if you don't have cancer, if you're seventy, how many more years do you have? How many good years?
I just started THE OUTSIDER.
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Post by Scott on Jun 10, 2018 10:17:40 GMT -5
Holly is one of the main characters in the final third of the Outsider.
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Post by GRWelsh on Jul 11, 2018 10:04:17 GMT -5
Very enjoyable. Just when I have a thought such as "Hey, this is reminding me a lot of Bram Stoker's DRACULA" King himself makes references to it. The group of adults who come to believe in an old world monster and set about hunting it down, the 'Renfield' and the ability to do some mesmerism, a monster needing to hibernate... all was very reminiscent of DRACULA. Interesting to see Holly in the 'Van Helsing' role. I kept thinking the outsider was basically an AD&D doppelganger with a 'psychic vampire' slant to it. This was a nice continuation of the "Bill Hodges" trilogy and I'm glad I read those first. I like seeing King get out of his comfort zone and write about other areas of the country and dig into foreign mythology a bit (Mexican).
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Post by davegibsongreyhawkdm on Oct 14, 2018 18:34:42 GMT -5
Started the Outsider on vacation in Mexico.,,
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Post by davegibsongreyhawkdm on Oct 22, 2018 8:03:00 GMT -5
Very enjoyable. Just when I have a thought such as "Hey, this is reminding me a lot of Bram Stoker's DRACULA" King himself makes references to it. The group of adults who come to believe in an old world monster and set about hunting it down, the 'Renfield' and the ability to do some mesmerism, a monster needing to hibernate... all was very reminiscent of DRACULA. Interesting to see Holly in the 'Van Helsing' role. I kept thinking the outsider was basically an AD&D doppelganger with a 'psychic vampire' slant to it. This was a nice continuation of the "Bill Hodges" trilogy and I'm glad I read those first. I like seeing King get out of his comfort zone and write about other areas of the country and dig into foreign mythology a bit (Mexican). Very much enjoyed The Outsider, and agree with your comments regarding monster as a blend of Dracula and doppelgänger...it is interesting to imagine blending different AD&D monsters, and I enjoyed the El Cuco/luchadores mythology...would be interesting to find horror exploring Mayan cultural mythology...
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