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A review by coleridgegirl
The Stand by Stephen King
3.0
This is really a 2.5 for me. I didn’t like it very much at all. That said, it’s technically sound and although it’s absurdly long, there are only a few things that feel unnecessary (in particular, maybe we didn’t need 200 pages of town meetings?!).
I unfortunately disliked everyone except Glen. And the dog. And the excessive racism, misogyny, ableism, etc. was A LOT. I think that’s more of a product of its time and, to some degree, I just missed the boat on this. I’ve also read things like The Walking Dead that, for me, are more enjoyable versions (accepting that this was groundbreaking and set the stage for those).
The worst part, however, is how boring the villain is. I’m not disappointed that he’s pure evil. I think that can work. But he’s supposed to be this primordial, eldritch evil that is so terrifying. And yet he basically doesn’t do anything. We hear how much people are afraid of him and he grins, forces a woman to marry him, and threatens a lot. But he doesn’t DO much of anything. And for the master of horror, I feel like I should have gotten more HORROR from this villain. Not just a fairly generic “bad guy.” He’s less creepy than Ed Harris in Westworld, and that’s basically what I pictured. I needed more for 1200 pages of the cosmic battle between good and evil when basically good is some people having a meeting and evil is a guy in a boardroom in Vegas.
The best parts were the early parts as the virus took over. Especially reading about NYC following the virus now that we’ve survived COVID. I think the best part of the book was Starkey’s chapter in the cafeteria.
I unfortunately disliked everyone except Glen. And the dog. And the excessive racism, misogyny, ableism, etc. was A LOT. I think that’s more of a product of its time and, to some degree, I just missed the boat on this. I’ve also read things like The Walking Dead that, for me, are more enjoyable versions (accepting that this was groundbreaking and set the stage for those).
The worst part, however, is how boring the villain is. I’m not disappointed that he’s pure evil. I think that can work. But he’s supposed to be this primordial, eldritch evil that is so terrifying. And yet he basically doesn’t do anything. We hear how much people are afraid of him and he grins, forces a woman to marry him, and threatens a lot. But he doesn’t DO much of anything. And for the master of horror, I feel like I should have gotten more HORROR from this villain. Not just a fairly generic “bad guy.” He’s less creepy than Ed Harris in Westworld, and that’s basically what I pictured. I needed more for 1200 pages of the cosmic battle between good and evil when basically good is some people having a meeting and evil is a guy in a boardroom in Vegas.
The best parts were the early parts as the virus took over. Especially reading about NYC following the virus now that we’ve survived COVID. I think the best part of the book was Starkey’s chapter in the cafeteria.