Current Events > Any Stephen King fans here?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Recently read The Outsider. Loved it. I am starting The Tommyknockers now.
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Dark Tower Junkie right here.
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I've read a lot of his books. Most recently the Dark tower series
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Jagermeister513 posted...

Dark Tower Junkie right here.

First 4 books each one was better than the previous one. Amazing.

Sadly it started to go the other way with the 5th book and I was only baffled and disappointed with books 5-7.

Wind Through The Key Hole was a pretty nice follow up although it didnt have much to do with the main DT storyline.
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I've read about a dozen of his books.

If you haven't already read it you gotta check out The Stand, then after The Dark Tower series.
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Zodd3224 posted...

Jagermeister513 posted...

Dark Tower Junkie right here.

First 4 books each one was better than the previous one. Amazing.

Sadly it started to go the other way with the 5th book and I was only baffled and disappointed with books 5-7.

Wind Through The Key Hole was a pretty nice follow up although it didnt have much to do with the main DT storyline.

I feel the same way. When I started getting into King only the first three books were out. The ones he wrote after his accident seemed like a different series.
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I'm actually thinking of reading IT for my next book. I haven't seen either version of the movie so the story will be new to me.
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a-c-a-b posted...

I'm actually thinking of reading IT for my next book. I haven't seen either version of the movie so the story will be new to me.

It is so damn good. Unfortunately like The Stand and The Dark Tower the ending is dissapointing.

I think The Shining may be his best book beginning to end.
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I liked The Stand but my god he doesn't know how to end a book
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I read Tommyknockers forever ago. I really don't remember much. Recently finished Dark Tower. An I in the minority in that the ending didn't bother me? I mean, it felt right. There were some elements that felt rushed, but overall I was satisfied.

On a slightly related note, I'm one of the few who liked Rose Madder and plan to reread it now that I can place it in context with the DT books.
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I dig what I've read of his stuff

Black House, the Dark Tower series, the Long Walk, Rage, and the Talisman
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Night Shift and Nightmares and Dreamscapes are my favorite short story collections.
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Pet Sematary was pretty good too.
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Pet Cematary was nice. The only books I really didnt enjoy by him were Hearts in Atlantis and Salem's Lot.
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The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon is the only King book I never finished.

Not a fan of From A Buick 8 either.
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Zodd3224 posted...

Salem's Lot

Omg I finished this one recently. Such a chore, and really no payoff whatsoever. It just kind of ends.

Love seeing Long Walk mentioned. Such an excellent story.
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Love most of his books. The books under his pen name Richard Bachman were all pretty good as well

TrevorBlack79 posted...

Zodd3224 posted...

Salem's Lot

Omg I finished this one recently. Such a chore, and really no payoff whatsoever. It just kind of ends.

Love seeing Long Walk mentioned. Such an excellent story.

I liked Salem's Lot. I read it after I finished the Dark Tower series so it was nice to get a bit more of Father Callahan's back story.
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a-c-a-b posted...

TrevorBlack79 posted...

Zodd3224 posted...

Salem's Lot

Omg I finished this one recently. Such a chore, and really no payoff whatsoever. It just kind of ends.

Love seeing Long Walk mentioned. Such an excellent story.

I liked Salem's Lot. I read it after I finished the Dark Tower series so it was nice to get a bit more of Father Callahan's back story.

That was why I read it. But I wish I hadn't, lol
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Axiom posted...

Love most of his books. The books under his pen name Richard Bachman were all pretty good as well

Which books?
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I tried reading Salem's Lot because of Father Callahan, but I couldn't get into it.

the Dark Tower had a good backstory for him anyway, so I just went with that.
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I'm more of a fan of the Bachman books, but I definitely like Stephen King on the whole. That said, "The Long Walk" remains my favorite of his work and I wish some sort of visual adaptation would happen even though it'd be pretty difficult to adapt one hundred kids walking and make it interesting enough to hold people for an hour and a half-two hours. Maybe a fake documentary of sorts? I dunno.
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I liked 11.22.63 a lot.

Me. I'm also a fan of his son, Joe Hill.
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I've never heard or The Long Walk but it seems popular. I'll try it after TommyKnockers
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Thinner
The Running Man
The Long Walk
The Regulators

Honestly The Running Man was better than the movie despite the movie being pretty good. The ending was great

EverDownward posted...

I'm more of a fan of the Bachman books, but I definitely like Stephen King on the whole. That said, "The Long Walk" remains my favorite of his work and I wish some sort of visual adaptation would happen even though it'd be pretty difficult to adapt one hundred kids walking and make it interesting enough to hold people for an hour and a half-two hours. Maybe a fake documentary of sorts? I dunno.

they're working on an adaptation

https://deadline.com/2019/05/stephen-king-the-long-walk-new-line-movie-andre-ovredal-directing-1202620157/
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Zodd3224 posted...

Axiom posted...

Love most of his books. The books under his pen name Richard Bachman were all pretty good as well

Which books?

You can find four of them in "The Bachman Books" collection. Rage, Running Man, Road Work(I think) and my favorite The Long Walk. There was also Thinner.

Years later, he wrote either Regulators or Desperation. Two books with the same character names, but each published under a different author name.
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Zodd3224 posted...

Recently read The Outsider. Loved it. I am starting The Tommyknockers now.

I read 95% of The Outsider, didn't finish it because I got distracted.

Reminded me a lot of The Dark Half, so you should give that a try too if you really like The Outsider.

Haven't read a Stephen King book I liked as much as IT though.
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The Running man movie is pretty much an in name only adaptation. Still a great film but the two are very different.
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Zodd3224 posted...

I've never heard or The Long Walk but it seems popular.

After World War II, America has become a dystopian country and one of the ways people vent is by hosting the annual "Long Walk," which consists of one hundred kids across the country coming together to walk and the last one still walking wins "The Prize," which is anything he wants for the rest of his life. Each walker has three warnings that they can accrue before "buying a ticket" on the fourth warning and dropping out of the walk.

It's fucking great. The premise alone instantly intrigued me and when I finally read the book I felt like my money was definitely well spent. What I didn't expect was how sad the story gets at times.
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boxington posted...

EverDownward posted...

I'm more of a fan of the Bachman books, but I definitely like Stephen King on the whole. That said, "The Long Walk" remains my favorite of his work and I wish some sort of visual adaptation would happen even though it'd be pretty difficult to adapt one hundred kids walking and make it interesting enough to hold people for an hour and a half-two hours. Maybe a fake documentary of sorts? I dunno.

they're working on an adaptation

https://deadline.com/2019/05/stephen-king-the-long-walk-new-line-movie-andre-ovredal-directing-1202620157/

Oh man, this is awesome news. I know Frank Durabont had the rights to film it or whatever for the longest time...but even still, I'm pretty excited.
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First half of The Outsider I was completely captivated. Second half wasnt bad but once the main questions about what is happening are resolved it loses a lot of intrigue.

I liked The Shining as much as It. The Stand is up there as well it's just hard to shake that ridiculous ending.
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I liked Mr Mercedes and Finders Keepers but I thought End of Watch was terrible.
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The Stand's ending is what it is, but it's still his best work.

It was one of those books where I'd read it every single chance I got. And when I wasn't reading it I was thinking about it.
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I liked the Dark Tower ending too. But my mom & best friend both hated it. I think that's definitely a story where the journey is meant to be more important than the ending, which is kind of the point--

To me, the entire point of story is that the other members of the ka-tet help Roland find his humanity again. At the beginning, he is basically an emotionless revenant trying to finish his task no matter what else happens. The other characters remind him why he was trying to get to the Dark Tower in the first place, and that's why when it starts over again this time he has the horn.

Anyway, if you're going to track down the Bachman books, try to find an old used copy. About 15 years or so ago, King decided he didn't want Rage to be available anymore because of all the school shootings like Columbine as he didn't want anyone to read it & use it as inspiration.

pfh1001 posted...

Anyway, if you're going to track down the Bachman books, try to find an old used copy. About 15 years or so ago, King decided he didn't want Rage to be available anymore because of all the school shootings like Columbine as he didn't want anyone to read it & use it as inspiration.

Huh really. I thought Apt Pupil was way more disturbing

The ending of the Dark Tower was the least of my problems with that entire book. Flagg going out the way he did, everything with Mordred, Black House ending up having nothing to do with the series, Crimson King throwing Harry Potter toys from a balcony, Susannah throwing Roland's guns away in the trash, the guys running the breaker prison acting like gunslingers don't exist even though their robot spy told them that Roland's group were planning to take out the Wolves.
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one of my favorites is The Eyes of the Dragon. the story is nothing like Game of Thrones but the world it's in is kinda like it. it's a dark medieval fantasy concept. like GoT. but the story is about some royal drama. I read it when I was around 11 and I thought it was really cool. I wish THAT could be a movie.

He's great and so is his son, Joe Hill.

Joe Hill's "The Fireman" is probably the most creative take on a post apocalyptic America and about how to deal with the fact you know you're going to die and how to live what's rest of your life.
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Jagermeister513 posted...

The ending of the Dark Tower was the least of my problems with that entire book. Flagg going out the way he did, everything with Mordred, Black House ending up having nothing to do with the series, Crimson King throwing Harry Potter toys from a balcony, Susannah throwing Roland's guns away in the trash, the guys running the breaker prison acting like gunslingers don't exist even though their robot spy told them that Roland's group were planning to take out the Wolves.

Indeed. Basically everything after book 4 is an issue for me. Which is a shame because after 4 books I felt like it could have been like my favorite series of books.
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a-c-a-b posted...

The Stand's ending is what it is, but it's still his best work.

It was one of those books where I'd read it every single chance I got. And when I wasn't reading it I was thinking about it.

King isn't very good at endings honestly.
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creativerealms posted...

a-c-a-b posted...

The Stand's ending is what it is, but it's still his best work.

It was one of those books where I'd read it every single chance I got. And when I wasn't reading it I was thinking about it.

King isn't very good at endings honestly.

I thought his ending for The Shining was much better than the movie. In fact the whole book is infinitely better than the movie imo. But yes for the most part he shits the bed for his endings.
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Yeah the miniseries (not the same as a movie) was pretty bad.
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Spiritlittle posted...

He's great and so is his son, Joe Hill.

Joe Hill's "The Fireman" is probably the most creative take on a post apocalyptic America and about how to deal with the fact you know you're going to die and how to live what's rest of your life.

glad someone brought up Joe Hill. I read Horns last year and it has some of the most cathartic villain comeuppance ever
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I think comparatively Joe Hill is a better writer. Mainly in that he's eaely stuff is better then his father's early stuff. Not that Steven King's early books are bad.

That said The Fireman was probably my least favorite.
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Axiom posted...

pfh1001 posted...

Anyway, if you're going to track down the Bachman books, try to find an old used copy. About 15 years or so ago, King decided he didn't want Rage to be available anymore because of all the school shootings like Columbine as he didn't want anyone to read it & use it as inspiration.

Huh really. I thought Apt Pupil was way more disturbing

Looking this up, I had no idea the guy who played the live action version of Leon in the 1998 RE2 commercial in Japan also played the lead role of Apt Pupil. Insane.
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I more or less lost interest in his books when it felt he started moving away from actual monsters as the menace of his story. Gerald's Game and Dolores Claiborne left me less than impressed. I assume I read Rose Madder because I found the paperback in my collection, but I couldn't tell you a single thing about it.

Finished the dark tower series but it really went of the rails with the last book or two. I enjoyed Insomnia (which it seemed a lot of people hated), but checking his books, that is the most recent one I have read multiple times. The Talisman was near the top of my favorite books of his, so was pretty hyped when a follow-up was announced. Then I read it, and recall thinking "WTF with all this dark tower crap in here".

So was a huge fan of his in middle school through college (late 80's-early 90's), then discovered other authors whose books appealed to me more than King's newer stuff did.
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