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3.98 AVERAGE
3.98 AVERAGE
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
N/A
Loveable characters:
N/A
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
N/A
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
medium-paced
dark
medium-paced
This book is a collection of the first four novels stephen king wrote under the richard bachman pen name: rage, the long walk, roadwork and the running man. They were written in the 70s and 80s and they really bring you back to the culture of that time. If Stephen King is one of of your fav writers and you want to get to know his work a little better, this is a good way to do it. He really has no peers, but the closest approximation I can think of is along came a spider by james patterson.
Wow, "Rage" is most certainly the piece de resistance here, but perhaps that is because King let it fall out of print after it seemingly inspired a 14 year old to enact a similar crime. It reminded me of a dark dark spin of "The Breakfast Club". That aside, this story and those that follow do what King novellas do best, they show the awful horror of daily life. Even when it seems less than likely as in the "Running Man" and "The Long Walk", it still speaks to a culture of horror. Powerful and unnerving.
This is my first of the Richard Bachman novels by Stephen King.
Charlie is a high school student who held onto a story he'd heard his father tell around a bonfire during an all men camping trip. He held onto it and other harsh memories of his father's temper so closely that they seemed to define him by his high school years. It is clear from the first chapter that Charlie is a disturbed young man and not even his principle can can knock sense into him. When he leaves the office, he starts his locker on fire and rushes back to his classroom to kill two teachers and take the students hostage. By the end of the novel, each student, except for a boy named Ted Jones, shares a dark memory. One in which each person held in the pit of their stomach and never spoke about until Charlie held them at gunpoint.
When Ted still refuses to share any secrets with a murderer and his "crazy" classmates, the students turn on him as though he'd been the insane one all along who had shot their teachers. The story ends with Charlie locked away in an insane asylum where he receives a letter from his best friend Joe who mentions that all the students he'd held hostage at school will never forget what he'd done for them.
Stephen King made Ted Jones the only hostage in this story by keeping him the only sane person in the room. The other students hadn't gone crazy but they seemed to have understood Charlie's intentions and silently agreed to follow him. For example, one of the girls begged to use the bathroom and Charlie finally let her; when she finished, she came back and sat down as though their teacher wasn't shot dead at her own desk and Charlie wasn't sitting in her place with a gun in his hand.
Some of the examples in this story, such as the situations with the teachers that Charlie harmed or threatened to harm over the years, weren't very believable. Had any student in today's society beat their teachers with a crowbar, that student would have been expelled, but instead Charlie was allowed back in the classroom. However, the hostages' stories made it an intriguing story, especially as I was trying to figure out why all the students seemed to be careless about what Charlie was doing to their school. When his best friend writes to him and says they will never forget what he's done for them, I realized it meant that he'd gotten them to admit their own biggest flaws or what stories defined them for being the human beings they became. Why the whore is a whore. Why the jock is a jock. Why the nerd is a nerd. As I was reading this story, I felt like I was reading a horror version of The Breakfast Club.
Charlie is a high school student who held onto a story he'd heard his father tell around a bonfire during an all men camping trip. He held onto it and other harsh memories of his father's temper so closely that they seemed to define him by his high school years. It is clear from the first chapter that Charlie is a disturbed young man and not even his principle can can knock sense into him. When he leaves the office, he starts his locker on fire and rushes back to his classroom to kill two teachers and take the students hostage. By the end of the novel, each student, except for a boy named Ted Jones, shares a dark memory. One in which each person held in the pit of their stomach and never spoke about until Charlie held them at gunpoint.
When Ted still refuses to share any secrets with a murderer and his "crazy" classmates, the students turn on him as though he'd been the insane one all along who had shot their teachers. The story ends with Charlie locked away in an insane asylum where he receives a letter from his best friend Joe who mentions that all the students he'd held hostage at school will never forget what he'd done for them.
Stephen King made Ted Jones the only hostage in this story by keeping him the only sane person in the room. The other students hadn't gone crazy but they seemed to have understood Charlie's intentions and silently agreed to follow him. For example, one of the girls begged to use the bathroom and Charlie finally let her; when she finished, she came back and sat down as though their teacher wasn't shot dead at her own desk and Charlie wasn't sitting in her place with a gun in his hand.
Some of the examples in this story, such as the situations with the teachers that Charlie harmed or threatened to harm over the years, weren't very believable. Had any student in today's society beat their teachers with a crowbar, that student would have been expelled, but instead Charlie was allowed back in the classroom. However, the hostages' stories made it an intriguing story, especially as I was trying to figure out why all the students seemed to be careless about what Charlie was doing to their school. When his best friend writes to him and says they will never forget what he's done for them, I realized it meant that he'd gotten them to admit their own biggest flaws or what stories defined them for being the human beings they became. Why the whore is a whore. Why the jock is a jock. Why the nerd is a nerd. As I was reading this story, I felt like I was reading a horror version of The Breakfast Club.
Ratings for each book:
The Long Wall 5/5
RoadWork 4/5
The Running Man 4.5/5
Overall rating: 4.5/5 (rounded up to 5/5).
The Long Walk was definitely the most engaging of the three books, my only dislike was the lack of world building which The Running Man had done really well.
I wasn't the biggest fan of the endings of The Long Walk and The Running Man but I can understand them if that makes sense. I liked that RoadWork kind of gave a 'what happened after' to soften the blow a little bit.
The Long Wall 5/5
RoadWork 4/5
The Running Man 4.5/5
Overall rating: 4.5/5 (rounded up to 5/5).
The Long Walk was definitely the most engaging of the three books, my only dislike was the lack of world building which The Running Man had done really well.
I wasn't the biggest fan of the endings of The Long Walk and The Running Man but I can understand them if that makes sense. I liked that RoadWork kind of gave a 'what happened after' to soften the blow a little bit.
The first two stories (The Rage & The Long Walk) I love. They have unique premises, sympathetic characters, and satisfying endings. The Running Man is ok; and Roadwork I didn't care for at all.
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes