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"We blew it." -Easy Rider I think, if I'm not misremembering, that quote is the first line in the book, and it essentially sums up the whole thing. This book is Stephen King's most depressing book I think he's ever published, because the mood, tone, and hell, even the theme of the book is centered around his own disgust and bitterness toward his own generation, the Baby Boomer generation, for selling out and failing to change the world for the better in the aftermath of the flower child hippie movement, the Civil Rights movement, the student protests, and Vietnam. This book has been haunting me since my high school years, where it was nestled between The Talisman and The Regulators in the Stephen King section at my school library. Despite the gentle nudging and encouragement of the head librarian, who was both friend and mentor in those days, I never picked it off the shelf and read it. It flat out looked boring and uninteresting, because I still hadn't internalized the idea of never judging a book by its cover, and the size of the book was intimidating. But over the years the book would keep turning up, upon a dusty rack in a used bookstore, tucked away in the middle of the Stephen King section at Barnes and Nobles, lying flat with other discarded books at a friend's place, etc. So I was browsing my local library yesterday, and I saw it once again, sitting high upon its shelf, and I finally took it down and read it. I'll admit, I haven't read a lot of King since the end of the Dark Tower series disappointment, but for a book that came out in 1999, it is probably the best book he's written since...well, it's the best book he's written in a long time. It's honestly really good, I downed it all in one long sitting, spending the entire library hours poring through it. I remember I used to be a faster reader, but I still felt some pride in being able to finish the book in one go within library hours. And now, thinking about the book, I think it's ultimately for the best my high school self never read it. I don't think I would have understood it back then the way I do now. It's a book about both nostalgia and regret, and until you've hit a point in your life where you can look back on something forever lost and say "gently caress, maybe I really did peak back in school" you won't be able to feel it as strongly. The first story is admittedly a little...dull, to be honest, very Stephen King-y, but it's necessary to establish the rest of the book and the rest of the stories are better, and the ending only really works in conjunction with the beginning, which you can say about any book but especially one like this where it is essentially vignettes told in chronological order. The whole book reminds me a lot of songs like “The Promise” by Bruce Springsteen or “A Change is Gonna Come” by Sam Cooke or “Talkin’ Bout a Revolution” by Tracy Chapman, or movies like, I dunno, Stand by Me, which isn’t a story about regret but carries the same nostalgic wistfulness of days gone by that the first story has. I don’t expect this thread to go places, because it will probably eventually turn into how much Stephen King sucks; I just wanted to post that I enjoyed this book a lot, but it made me very sad.
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Jan 16, 2020 23:32
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Farts in Mypantus
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Jan 16, 2020 23:34
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van thread
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Jan 16, 2020 23:42
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Gologle posted:"We blew it." -Easy Rider Is this the one with the vivid description of addictive card gambling? That was well done
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Jan 16, 2020 23:47
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Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Farts in Mypantus
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Jan 16, 2020 23:48
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Checks out that "the best book he's written in a long time" is still something he wrote over two decades ago, a long time by most reasonable standards. Still, I always liked the King stuff where he's actually trying to write about things much better than the average hacked out "I dunno, maybe there are evil aliens or something scary under the bed" dreck that fills his bibliography, so maybe I'll go back to it one day.
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Jan 16, 2020 23:48
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Spinz posted:Is this the one with the vivid description of addictive card gambling? Yep!
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Jan 16, 2020 23:54
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Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Farts in Mypantus
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Jan 17, 2020 00:07
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I like this book
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Jan 17, 2020 02:06
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Did you see the movie? If so, how does it compare?
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Jan 17, 2020 02:39
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Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Farts in Mypantus
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Jan 17, 2020 03:44
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I've given up on the boomers and would rather hide away enjoying jokes like Lil Swamp Booger Baby's reply until they've all died off.
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Jan 17, 2020 04:05
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Don’t worry, theyve already given up on everyone else, too, even their own kids
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Jan 17, 2020 04:06
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Anthony Hopkins’ best role. gently caress you Silence of the Lambs!
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Jan 17, 2020 04:11
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I think the implicit argument the book makes, and he would know since not only is he a boomer but he was of the right age when it was all coming down, was that the boomers gave up on themselves a long, long time ago, back in the 70s. The hippies all became yuppies when it was no longer trendy, and stopped talking about peace when there was no war they could potentially get drafted for. There are some parts of the titular story where it feels like King hates not only his generation but himself as well.
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Jan 17, 2020 04:34
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Hi! Come join us in the Stephen King megathread! It's long, but I don't recall there being much discussion of Hearts in Atlantis. It's been a slow-moving thread of late so it would be nice to have something new to dissect.
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Jan 17, 2020 05:02
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I love books that keep turning up like "(read me)" ---> "Read Me" ---> "READ ME"
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Jan 17, 2020 05:09
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It's my favorite King work by far. He can do great character work when he's not going for horror.
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Jan 17, 2020 06:16
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Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Farts in Mypantus
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Jan 17, 2020 06:46
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Lil Swamp Booger Baby posted:Farts in Mypantus The horror...
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Jan 17, 2020 06:51
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i like the story about the car...that kills not the short story about the car who kills the one that was made into a movie herbie fully loaded
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Jan 17, 2020 07:02
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how about the story about the dog that kills people because hes possessed by a serial killer or rabies. iirc i think he didnt kill the kid, its more of a 210 page psa about locking your kids in the car for too long and why that makes you an unfit mother ScRoTo TuRbOtUrD fucked around with this message at 07:07 on Jan 17, 2020 |
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Jan 17, 2020 07:04
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how bout that one where a dome encompasses an entire town and things go awry and its film adaptation, "The Simpsons Movie"
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Jan 17, 2020 07:06
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Gologle posted:"We blew it." -Easy Rider nostalgia is garbage and we would be better off being incapable of feeling it and i say this this as a 33 yr old and i have my own nostalgia
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Jan 17, 2020 07:09
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you ever read that one where everyone dies of the flu and all the good people go to boulder and somehow make it more of a self-righteous hellscape than it currently is?
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Jan 17, 2020 07:16
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Maximum Oerdrive is the best Steohen King-based movie, fight me
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Jan 17, 2020 09:39
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I read it once and now it's in my bookcase untouched, since reading it once depressed the hell out of me. The story about students pissing away their time playing cards hit way too close to home.
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Jan 17, 2020 09:44
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This book is infamous in a way as it was just before he got hit by a van and nearly died. If you read the first story, the appreance of The low men in yellow coats was very trippy Lovecraftian experience. It was amazing. It also linked a direct tone of where King was going with the dark tower series initially. It was going to be amazing. Then he got hit by a van, panicked that he could die at any moment and rushed an ending to the Dark tower series . Not only rushed he retracted past books and rewrote them to fit the new direction he decided to take with the story. Most of the Tone and style he had set up for the Lowmen and Crimson King got retracted and taken away. it sucked. Still HIA is a good book, it totally nails how the boomers hosed it. Foul Ole Ron fucked around with this message at 10:17 on Jan 17, 2020 |
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Jan 17, 2020 09:53
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What the hell is that last chapter about? Sully John sneaks out of work everyday through a secret tunnel to play a famous blind beggar who then dies when objects start falling from the sky. I was still a teenager when I last read this though so maybe it makes sense now?
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Jan 17, 2020 10:12
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Breitbart Is Rightbart posted:What the hell is that last chapter about? Sully John sneaks out of work everyday through a secret tunnel to play a famous blind beggar who then dies when objects start falling from the sky. I was still a teenager when I last read this though so maybe it makes sense now? Nah they are two separate stories. The first is a squad mate of Sully's from back in Vietnam. The next is actually him.
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Jan 17, 2020 10:15
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