Reviews tagging 'Death'

11/22/63 by Stephen King

87 reviews

adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

What a disappointing thing it is to spend almost 900 pages and weeks of time for a 2 star book. It may have been 3 stars if the ending wasn’t bad, but it was. This was my first Stephen King book, and I chose it because a time travel thriller sounded fun, and definitely more appealing than a 900 page horror like his more famous works. After this experience though, I’m doubtful I’ll ever read a King book again. Even if the others are objectively better (which I doubt, because this one had tons of 5 star reviews so I can’t trust the hype), he gives me creepy old man vibes from the way he wrote women. 

My main complaint is that this book could have been 500 pages shorter. For a book that is supposed to be a thriller, there was so much boring filler. We got a second life built by the main character in the late 1950s, complete with King's fantasies of being a cool English teacher beloved by all his students, having a beautiful, virginal (insert eye roll here) woman he gets to save who falls deeply in love with him, and more. There is so much that did not add anything to the story, and I kept wondering when we'd move on from this romanticization of the mid 1900s. He threw out a couple acknowledgements of the racism that existed but it seemed more perfunctory than real thought-provoking criticisms, espcially when he spent far more time talking about how much better the drinks tasted in that time.

Finally, the ending was awful. I don’t want to give any spoilers but it was not satisfying in the slightest bit. I think I could spitball five different better endings on the spot if I was asked to. Also, the time travel mechanics were lazy and introduced so late that it felt pointless. I’m trying to think of positives for this book, and all I have is that the concept is interesting and the writing style is engaging.

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

I feel so conflicted about this book! On one hand, I loved it overall, but on the other hand, I disliked much of it.

This book has an amazing, well-thought out, invigorating plot, for the most part. It's so interesting, and with the exception of the slower middle half of the book, it was a real page-turner. That middle part was kind of rough though. I'm not kidding when I say this took me a few years to get through. I wanted to persevere through this book because I liked the story, but the middle part just dragged on and on, and I put it down and then picked up several times the past few years. Once I got passed the middle part, however, I was back glued to the book.

I loved that this revolved around the trope of a historian-type figuring uncovering the truth about something that happened in the past, and I liked that it actually used time travel too. Stephen King, as he always does, successfully worked horror into the story as well, and I thought it was very well done in an understated kind of way. I didn't love the ending, but it was okay, and I was just happy to find out how it ended.

This book's romance was lacking, in my opinion. The book used the 'not like other girls' and 'man teaches woman what good sex is', and I really dislike those tropes. I feel like the romance could have written so much better than it was, but it wasn't the main plot that drew me in anyways.

Overall, I enjoyed it, felt 'meh' towards some aspects of the story, and will keep the book around in my personal library. Will I read it again? Not sure, but maybe someday.

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adventurous challenging emotional funny sad tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

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emotional inspiring reflective 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: Complicated

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slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Complicated

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adventurous emotional informative mysterious sad tense fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: N/A

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newswoman's review against another edition

DID NOT FINISH: 60%

from the introduction of the love interest onwards i felt a gradual decline in my enjoyment of the book as i am not a fan of how the romance is written at all. i really liked the beginning a lot but the the main character is very hard to like in my opinion, which gets worse and worse as the story progresses. 

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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challenging dark mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Complicated
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Expand filter menu Content Warnings
adventurous 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

Stephen King is most known for his horror writing and, like many readers, because I don't tend to gravitate to that genre so I have always automaticallg dismissed reading Stephen King. Which I now feel is a mistake because he am incrediblely good author. This was a good introduction for me to Stephen King as this is not a horror story, but more of a speculative fiction/time travel story. I really enjoyed it. I found the time travel mechanic quite confusing as reading it - it gets explained at the end, but maybe that's the point because time travel is theoretically confusing. If you like these types of themes then you may well enjoy this book. I do think it's a bit long and meandering sometimes though,  but never felt particularly like it dragged. I'd definitely consider reading more (non horror) Stephen King. 

I edited my rating to 5* a few months after finishing because I heard someone talk about it and remembered how great this book was, so I feel that is worthy of a 5* rating. Few books can evoke that kind of reaction from me.

Also check the content warnings  - there are a few.

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