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blove0312 's review for:
Hearts in Atlantis
by Stephen King
adventurous
dark
emotional
reflective
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
Story 1: “Low Men in Yellow Coats” (5 stars)
You’ll have to forgive me, I didn’t write this when I finished it, but after I finished the second story. I think I was hoping Bobby would be part of it, so I just kept going. He isn’t though, not the second one; unsure about 3&4 yet.
Bobby is a young boy of maybe 11 or so in 1960, with a terrible fucking mother. She withholds love and affection as punishment, usually for something that wouldn’t even warrant a normal scolding. She works a lot but refuses to give him any money, I’m talking not even 50 cents to get an ice cream or go to the movies. For his birthday she doesn’t give him an actual present, but instead an “adult” library card. I went down the Reddit hole on her, and idgaf about what happened to her later in their story, that doesn’t excuse the shit mother she was. Anyway.
An older gentleman moves into the third floor of their building, and befriends Bobby. Bobby’s mother dislikes him from the start, probably because she wants Bobby to continue to be starved for affection and it’s quite clear that Ted has taken a liking to Bobby same as Bobby does for him. Ted soon enlists Bobby into “looking out” for the “low men,” men in yellow coats with flashy cars, men who communicate with “lost” posters and astronomical symbols in sidewalk chalk. Bobby figures Ted is a little kooky, but he really wants this bike and his shit mom won’t help him, so he agrees. And finds out Ted isn’t so kooky after all, and that there are more worlds than these.
I left out Carol and John, Bobby’s best friends, and perhaps they do have some bearing on the story - especially Carol and her attack - but the main of the story is about Bobby and Ted. And it’s a wonderful story; exciting, suspenseful, heartwarming, heartbreaking. Carol is featured in the second story though, and I think John will be in the third or fourth for sure.
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Story 2: “Hearts in Atlantis” (5 stars)
The trouble is, for the born smartass, the impulse has nine times out of ten been acted upon before the brain can even engage first gear.
- - - - -
Us class clowns aren’t wild about making friends - two or three are apt to do us for a lifetime - but we don’t take very well to the bum’s rush, either. Our goal is vast numbers of acquaintances whom we can leave laughing.
- - - - -
Anything with the power to make you laugh over thirty years later isn’t a waste of time. I think something like that is very close to immortality.
Pete Riley is a freshman at University of Maine in 1968, there on scholarships and therefore required to maintain a 2.5 GPA. All is going well enough until an outbreak of Hearts, the card game, hits the third floor of his dorm. All but 3 of the fellas spend most of their time not in classes playing for a nickel a point. Everyone’s grades begin dropping; many of them face losing their scholarships. No biggie, you think, it’s just college, freshman year at that, they can figure it out later. Except this is 1968, and men, boys really, who have no college to hide behind are sent to Viet Nam to die. For “democracy.”
There’s no way for me to adequately describe the anger you feel in every single word of this story. Pete knows next to nothing about the war upon arrival, knows nothing of the mysterious peace sign one of the boys is wearing. By the end of his first semester he may not know a lot, but he knows something is fucking wrong about the entire situation, and he’s ready to learn.
The way King offsets the “victories” the US obtained with some atrocity we also committed (from sinking boats full of refugees to bombing our own Marines) in the same sentence, almost like throwaway lines, is… gutting. My dark humor says “oh look, the US has always been shit, it doesn’t even matter who’s in office. This country was founded in blood and hate and genocide, how can it possibly get better” but my stupid hopeful heart says maybe one day we can get it figured out.
Carol is a freshman at UM as well, and she and Pete begin dating. She’s going to marches and demonstrations while Pete is playing his life away in Hearts. But the one who doesn’t make it through their first semester isn't Pete.
Idk. This one has a lot to process. It has brought up a lot of anger for me, towards the goddamn right wingers. People I’m surrounded by here in SW Indiana, my family included. It brings up the shame of buying into it as a young adult. It brings up the hope that because I, and my brother, and honestly a fair amount of people I went to school with, have been able to see through it, grow, and do better, others may as well.
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Story 3: “Blind Willie” (2 stars)
I didn’t love this. I’m not even sure I understood it. Maybe the light at the end of the tunnel is in the fourth and final story, but idk. Willie, ol’ “hold Carol down while she’s bashed with the bat” Willie, is married and made it through Viet Nam alive. To make penance for beating Carol up all those years ago he’s fabricated 3 identities that allow him to panhandle as a blind man, raking in up to $3,000 a day sometime in the 80’s. He is full of retrospective wonderings that seem to have little bearing on the story, or what passes as a story. His wife has to know something is up, she helps pass out the bags of money to various churches, but I’m not sure what he needs 3 identities for; possibly 4 because of the end and his plans for the cop. Idk man, lol.
+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+
Story 4: “Why We’re in Viet Nam” (3 stars)
(Turns out there’s 5 stories, lol) This one is about ol’ Sully John. And it's fucking depressing as shit. We meet up with him some 30 years after the war as he’s going to a funeral of a fella he served with. There’s some flashbacks from hell and some dialogue with his sergeant or lieutenant and it just makes you want to jump out a tall building. That’s all I got, man. Except I wish we’d get an update on Bobby.
+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+
Story 5: “Heavenly Shade of Night are Falling” (4 stars)
It’s Bobby. It ties up a lot of things, but I still say Willie’s story didn’t fit in here, and now I wish I’d gotten some sort of update on Pete.
You’ll have to forgive me, I didn’t write this when I finished it, but after I finished the second story. I think I was hoping Bobby would be part of it, so I just kept going. He isn’t though, not the second one; unsure about 3&4 yet.
Bobby is a young boy of maybe 11 or so in 1960, with a terrible fucking mother. She withholds love and affection as punishment, usually for something that wouldn’t even warrant a normal scolding. She works a lot but refuses to give him any money, I’m talking not even 50 cents to get an ice cream or go to the movies. For his birthday she doesn’t give him an actual present, but instead an “adult” library card. I went down the Reddit hole on her, and idgaf about what happened to her later in their story, that doesn’t excuse the shit mother she was. Anyway.
An older gentleman moves into the third floor of their building, and befriends Bobby. Bobby’s mother dislikes him from the start, probably because she wants Bobby to continue to be starved for affection and it’s quite clear that Ted has taken a liking to Bobby same as Bobby does for him. Ted soon enlists Bobby into “looking out” for the “low men,” men in yellow coats with flashy cars, men who communicate with “lost” posters and astronomical symbols in sidewalk chalk. Bobby figures Ted is a little kooky, but he really wants this bike and his shit mom won’t help him, so he agrees. And finds out Ted isn’t so kooky after all, and that there are more worlds than these.
I left out Carol and John, Bobby’s best friends, and perhaps they do have some bearing on the story - especially Carol and her attack - but the main of the story is about Bobby and Ted. And it’s a wonderful story; exciting, suspenseful, heartwarming, heartbreaking. Carol is featured in the second story though, and I think John will be in the third or fourth for sure.
+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+
Story 2: “Hearts in Atlantis” (5 stars)
The trouble is, for the born smartass, the impulse has nine times out of ten been acted upon before the brain can even engage first gear.
- - - - -
Us class clowns aren’t wild about making friends - two or three are apt to do us for a lifetime - but we don’t take very well to the bum’s rush, either. Our goal is vast numbers of acquaintances whom we can leave laughing.
- - - - -
Anything with the power to make you laugh over thirty years later isn’t a waste of time. I think something like that is very close to immortality.
Pete Riley is a freshman at University of Maine in 1968, there on scholarships and therefore required to maintain a 2.5 GPA. All is going well enough until an outbreak of Hearts, the card game, hits the third floor of his dorm. All but 3 of the fellas spend most of their time not in classes playing for a nickel a point. Everyone’s grades begin dropping; many of them face losing their scholarships. No biggie, you think, it’s just college, freshman year at that, they can figure it out later. Except this is 1968, and men, boys really, who have no college to hide behind are sent to Viet Nam to die. For “democracy.”
There’s no way for me to adequately describe the anger you feel in every single word of this story. Pete knows next to nothing about the war upon arrival, knows nothing of the mysterious peace sign one of the boys is wearing. By the end of his first semester he may not know a lot, but he knows something is fucking wrong about the entire situation, and he’s ready to learn.
The way King offsets the “victories” the US obtained with some atrocity we also committed (from sinking boats full of refugees to bombing our own Marines) in the same sentence, almost like throwaway lines, is… gutting. My dark humor says “oh look, the US has always been shit, it doesn’t even matter who’s in office. This country was founded in blood and hate and genocide, how can it possibly get better” but my stupid hopeful heart says maybe one day we can get it figured out.
Carol is a freshman at UM as well, and she and Pete begin dating. She’s going to marches and demonstrations while Pete is playing his life away in Hearts. But the one who doesn’t make it through their first semester isn't Pete.
Idk. This one has a lot to process. It has brought up a lot of anger for me, towards the goddamn right wingers. People I’m surrounded by here in SW Indiana, my family included. It brings up the shame of buying into it as a young adult. It brings up the hope that because I, and my brother, and honestly a fair amount of people I went to school with, have been able to see through it, grow, and do better, others may as well.
+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+
Story 3: “Blind Willie” (2 stars)
I didn’t love this. I’m not even sure I understood it. Maybe the light at the end of the tunnel is in the fourth and final story, but idk. Willie, ol’ “hold Carol down while she’s bashed with the bat” Willie, is married and made it through Viet Nam alive. To make penance for beating Carol up all those years ago he’s fabricated 3 identities that allow him to panhandle as a blind man, raking in up to $3,000 a day sometime in the 80’s. He is full of retrospective wonderings that seem to have little bearing on the story, or what passes as a story. His wife has to know something is up, she helps pass out the bags of money to various churches, but I’m not sure what he needs 3 identities for; possibly 4 because of the end and his plans for the cop. Idk man, lol.
+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+
Story 4: “Why We’re in Viet Nam” (3 stars)
(Turns out there’s 5 stories, lol) This one is about ol’ Sully John. And it's fucking depressing as shit. We meet up with him some 30 years after the war as he’s going to a funeral of a fella he served with. There’s some flashbacks from hell and some dialogue with his sergeant or lieutenant and it just makes you want to jump out a tall building. That’s all I got, man. Except I wish we’d get an update on Bobby.
+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+*+
Story 5: “Heavenly Shade of Night are Falling” (4 stars)
It’s Bobby. It ties up a lot of things, but I still say Willie’s story didn’t fit in here, and now I wish I’d gotten some sort of update on Pete.