Reviews - The Running Man | The StoryGraph

2.21k reviews for:

The Running Man

David Hájek, Stephen King, Richard Bachman

3.7 AVERAGE

thedragon66's review against another edition

4.0

dark emotional tense slow-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Complicated

kgauthier1's review against another edition

4.0

adventurous dark emotional tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

cmattei's review against another edition

3.75

adventurous dark sad tense fast-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

dejaelizabeth's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Complicated

Flaws of characters a main focus: No

This one was tough to get through, honestly. Between the racism, sexism, and homophobia, I almost dnfed it a few times. We follow Ben Richards in a dystopian future as he tries to win money for his sick daughter in a dangerous game show that has him running as a fugitive. We get some quick glimpses of this futuristic world, but mostly the world building is lack luster. The premise is interesting and the stakes seem high for Ben as the whole country is supposedly hunting him. But he gets very lucky running into many people who want to help him. (He's more than willing to take help from Black people while making racial insults in his narration.) He ends up taking a hostage which slows the plot down way more than it should. He starts making crazy demands which are met to save the life of one person, instead of just letting him kill her to make himself look worse. Then, he's told the bombshell twist -

his wife and daughter are already dead. We don't know for sure if this is true, but either way it sucks. He all too easily believes this was just a random incident even though it would perfectly motivate him to do what they want. And if it IS random that makes the whole book feel pointless and futile. I thought we might get a second twist and find out they were alive and Ben was tricked, but nope.

The ending was slightly satisfying, with Ben making good on his previous threats. Overall, this was pretty boring, had lots of uncomfortable content, and just didn't do the interesting premise any justice.