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exorcismemily's review against another edition
2.0
"At night your thoughts have an unpleasant way of slipping their collars and running free."
I read Bag of Bones with a group of reviewer friends, and I really struggled to get through this one. It starts off well enough. King does a good job at writing grief, and it's easy to feel for Mike in the beginning. It was slow-going, but it still held my interest.
Things started going downhill for me when Mattie came in. I feel like there was way too much effort putting into making the reader care about a one-dimensional character, and it just didn't work for me. There's one scene with Mattie in it, and then pages and pages of background about her to immediately follow up.
I may just be in a bad mood about it because I read another King book with a solid love story earlier this year. This one was just flat insta-love, and I had little to no interest in their story.
I know that this book was published in 1998, but it's hard to look past the shitty interactions with women in this novel. I don't think it would have frustrated me as much if Mike would have been written as a villain, but he's supposed to be the protagonist. He claims to care about Mattie, but always imagines her as not being poor. He constantly mentions her poverty, and makes jokes about her clothes & trailer. It was ridiculous.
**CW RAPE**
**POSSIBLE SPOILER**
A woman in this book is raped, and is made into a villain for having a desire for revenge. This was fucked up by itself, but she's also the only black woman in this book, so there's no representation. The old white guy saves everyone from the sexually abused angry black woman. This is infuriating, and people deserve better. I haven't seen things like this in any of King's recent books, but I hope he doesn't write this bullshit anymore. I already didn't care for the book, and then that flat-out ruined it for me. The repetitive racist language was also annoying - we got it the first time.
A couple other things about this book & then I'll stop. If you're interested in the small-town custody battle aspect of this book, pick up Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng instead. That book is intriguing & has a lot of heart. I cannot say the same for Bag of Bones.
I know that King can write interesting ghost stories, and this was not one of them. It just didn't have that creep factor. If you aren't afraid of magnetic letters being moved around on a fridge, don't look here for a horror novel.
I have more notes, but I'm just done talking about this book.
I read Bag of Bones with a group of reviewer friends, and I really struggled to get through this one. It starts off well enough. King does a good job at writing grief, and it's easy to feel for Mike in the beginning. It was slow-going, but it still held my interest.
Things started going downhill for me when Mattie came in. I feel like there was way too much effort putting into making the reader care about a one-dimensional character, and it just didn't work for me. There's one scene with Mattie in it, and then pages and pages of background about her to immediately follow up.
I may just be in a bad mood about it because I read another King book with a solid love story earlier this year. This one was just flat insta-love, and I had little to no interest in their story.
I know that this book was published in 1998, but it's hard to look past the shitty interactions with women in this novel. I don't think it would have frustrated me as much if Mike would have been written as a villain, but he's supposed to be the protagonist. He claims to care about Mattie, but always imagines her as not being poor. He constantly mentions her poverty, and makes jokes about her clothes & trailer. It was ridiculous.
**CW RAPE**
**POSSIBLE SPOILER**
A woman in this book is raped, and is made into a villain for having a desire for revenge. This was fucked up by itself, but she's also the only black woman in this book, so there's no representation. The old white guy saves everyone from the sexually abused angry black woman. This is infuriating, and people deserve better. I haven't seen things like this in any of King's recent books, but I hope he doesn't write this bullshit anymore. I already didn't care for the book, and then that flat-out ruined it for me. The repetitive racist language was also annoying - we got it the first time.
A couple other things about this book & then I'll stop. If you're interested in the small-town custody battle aspect of this book, pick up Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng instead. That book is intriguing & has a lot of heart. I cannot say the same for Bag of Bones.
I know that King can write interesting ghost stories, and this was not one of them. It just didn't have that creep factor. If you aren't afraid of magnetic letters being moved around on a fridge, don't look here for a horror novel.
I have more notes, but I'm just done talking about this book.
kfitzek's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
lighthearted
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.75
kathi_tomati's review against another edition
challenging
dark
mysterious
relaxing
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
4.0
gemronnoco's review against another edition
dark
mysterious
sad
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.5
As a fan of The Shining, this scratched a lot of the same pitches, but plot-wise that was not evident until the last quarter. Pretty slow-paced book. I’m glad I read it but it wasn’t a page turner for me until about page 400! Some of the violence is pretty disturbing.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Rape, Child death, Child abuse, Racism, and Death of parent
allielit's review against another edition
4.0
A little slow with the story building and probably the most disturbing revelation I've read in his books, but classic King.
connorreads_'s review against another edition
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
A middling novel by King, not bad, but not great. It had its moments, but the story never really got me hooked. You can definitely see King in Noonan and he has said as much. The parts dealing with grief were well done, but those weren't enough to make me really enjoy the book ad a whole. This one is a meh to me.
ineffable_bowtie's review against another edition
3.0
Took a few chapters to get into the story. It is a good read. Has your TYPICAL King vibe to it.
slathran's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
bradland's review against another edition
4.0
There does appear to be a distinct difference between Stephen King’s writing before and after the early 1990s. It’s kinda hard to pinpoint why, but it’s like he put the premise of the story front and centre in his early career. For example, you knew early into the novel that Carrie White had psychic powers, the Shining house was haunted, Christine was possessed, there was a plague in the Stand, etc. Yet later, King’s stories were about the building of the characters and the plot/theme becomes secondary because you're not quite sure what it is till well into the book. I felt this way with Hearts of Atlantis, Rose Madder, the later Dark Tower books and very much so with Colorado Kid. The Bag of Bones goes down this same path, the characters take centre stage with a ghost story tagging along for the ride. It almost falls into the same trap Rose Madder did where the story takes too much of a sharp turn, but fortunately doesn’t, so the ghost story doesn’t feel foreign to the characters and situations that have been built. I found this novel quite interesting in the fact that King’s stories typically involve normal people, living normal lower/middle class lives, yet here King’s main character is a reflection of himself, a successful well off writer able to earn a piece of crust doing what he loves. Despite this, King still keeps the story down to earth and fortunately tries to keep to this formula even today. The novel is quite enjoyable to read for the most part, everything from Mike Noonan’s torment with writer’s block and dealing with the death of his wife, to his befriending some of the town’s folk and lawyers, even down to the destination. The only things that weren’t great were Mike’s confrontation scenes near the end but King’s batting record on the home stretch wasn’t grand anyway.