If you had not read The Shining already, the 2013 publication of Doctor Sleep, the sequel, presented an opportunity to revisit one of the best ghost stories of our time, a perfect justification for stepping through those bat-wing doors for the first time.


1st Edition cover – Published January 28, 1977 – 447 pps

It has been a lifetime since I read The Shining for the first time, over thirty years ago. I enjoyed it then for its effectiveness in telling a scary, no, a very scary story. Reading it now is colored, as is all of life, by our accumulation (or lack of accumulation) of experience. We see, or appreciate colors, textures, shapes, structures, and feelings with more experienced, educated eyes. We have seen, or are at least aware of real world things that are scarier than any fictional spectres. So, what does it look through old, cloudy lenses?

It remains a very scary story. The things that stand out for me now are not so much the deader rising up out of a bathtub to pursue a curious child, although that is still pretty creepy, or the mobile topiary, which still works pretty well at making the hair on one’s neck and arms stand at attention. But King was using the haunted house trope to look at more personal demons. And those shine through more clearly now.


From Allyn Scura’s blog

He had some drinking issues at the time he wrote the book, when he was 30, and concern about that is major here. Jack Torrance is an alcoholic, no question. He also has issues with anger management, not that the little shit he clocks while teaching at a New England prep school didn’t have it coming. He did. But one cannot do that to a student, however deserving, and expect to remain employed for long. His little boy, however, most certainly did not deserve a broken arm. Jack is very remorseful, and wants to make things right. He manages to get a gig taking care of the Overlook Hotel in Colorado over the winter. It will offer him a chance to get something right after a string of getting things wrong, offer a chance to save his marriage, and offer an opportunity to work on his unfinished play. Risky? Sure. But a gamble worth taking. And his wife, Wendy, agrees, despite having serious misgivings. There are no attractive alternatives.

Of course, we all know that the Overlook is not your typical residence. Odd things happen, sounds are heard, thoughts from somewhere outside find their way into your mind. Jack is targeted, and boy is he vulnerable.

But five-year-old Danny is the real key here. He is the proud possessor of an unusual talent, the shining of the book’s title. Danny can not only do a bit of mind-reading, he can also see things that other people cannot. And for a little guy he has a huge talent. He also has an invisible friend named Tony with whom only he can communicate.

It is difficult to think about the book without finding our mental screens flickering with the images of Jack Nicholson in full cartoonish psycho rage, the very effective sound of a Big Wheel followed by a steadicam coursing through the long halls of the hotel, and the best casting decision ever in choosing Scatman Crothers to play Dick Halloran. By the way, the hotel is based on a real-world place, the Stanley Hotel, in Estes Park, Colorado. And the Overlook’s spooky room 217 was inspired by the supposedly haunted room 217 at the Stanley.


This image is from the hotel’s site – they clearly embrace the spectral connection

The room number was changed in the film to 237, at the request of the Timberline hotel, which was used for exterior shots. There is so much that differentiates Kubrick’s film from the book that they are almost entirely different entities. The differences do require a bit of attention here. First, and foremost, the book of The Shining is about the disintegration of a family due to alcoholism and anger issues. How a child survives in a troubled family is key. The film is pretty much pure spook house, well-done spook house, but solely spook house, nonetheless, IMHO. There is considerable back-story to Jack and Wendy that gets no screen time. You have to read the book to get that. Jack is a victim, as much as Wendy and Danny. You would never get that from the slobbering Jack of the film. The maze in the book was pretty cool, right? I d it too, but it does not exist in the book. I believe it was put in to replace the talented topiary, which is the definition of a bad trade. There is significant violence in the book that never made its way into Kubrick’s film, but which very much raises a specter of domestic violence that is terrorizing real people living in real horror stories. There are a few lesser elements. Jack wielded a roque mallet, not an axe. Danny is not interrupted in his travels through the corridors by Arbus- twin sisters. And the sisters in question are not even twins. There are plenty more, but you get the idea. An interesting film, for sure, but not really the most faithful



interpretation of the book. King saw that a film that more closely reflected what he had written reached TV screens in 1997, with a six-hour mini-series version.

Irrelevancies of a personal nature
The opening shot was filmed on the Going–to-the-Sun Road in Montana’s Glacier National Park in Montana. I have had the pleasure (7 times in one visit) and recommend the drive wholeheartedly. It is a pretty narrow road though, so you will have to drive carefully. Bring along the appropriate musical media for the best effect, Wendy Carlos’s Rocky Mountain, and dress warmly. It was below freezing when I reached the top of the road, in August. Some exteriors for Kubrick’s film were shot at the Timberline Lodge on Mount Hood in Oregon. I visited but did not stay there back in 2008. Sadly I do not have any decent personal photos from the place. I can report, though, on a bit


This shot was found on Wikimedia

of kitsch. There is a place in the hotel where an ax is lodged in a block of wood, with HEEEEERE’s JOHNNY on the ax, a tourist photo-op. And yes, I did. Sadly, or luckily, the shot did not come out well, so you will be spared.

Back to the book, Danny’s talent is a two-edged sword. He is afflicted with seeing more than anyone his age should have to see, but on the other hand, he has a tool he can use to try to save them all. Whether he can or not is a core tension element here.

King is fond of placing his stories in literary context. He peppers the text with references to various relevant books and authors. I expect these are meant to let us know his influences. Horace Walpole, author of The Castle of Otranto, a Gothic classic, is mentioned, as is Shirley Jackson, of Hill House fame. King had used a quote from this book in Salem’s Lot. A family saga rich with death and destruction, Cashelmara is mentioned as are some more contemporary items, The Walton Family, the idealized antithesis to the Torrance Family, Where the Wild Things Are and novelist Frank Norris. The primary literary reference here is Poe’s The Masque of the Red Death, which is cited many times. There had been a costume ball back in hotel’s history and it is the impending climax of that party, the unmasking, that looms here. And toss in nods to Treasure Island and Bluebeard for good measure.

King often includes writers in his work, avatars for himself. I write about writers because I know the territory. Also, you know it's a great job for a protagonist in a book. Without having to hold down a steady job, writers can have all sorts of adventures. Also, if they disappear, it's a long time before they are missed. Heh-heh-heh. – from an AOL interview Jack Torrance is a writer as well as a teacher. The play that Jack is writing undergoes a transformation that mirrors Jack’s own. In fact, there is a fair bit or mirroring going on here. Jack’s affection for his father as a kid was as strong as Danny's is for him. His father was an abusive alcoholic. While Jack is not (yet) the monster his father was, he is also an alcoholic with abusive tendencies. I never had a father in the house. My mother raised my brother and I alone. I wasn’t using my own history, but I did tap into some of the anger you sometimes feel to the kids, where you say to yourself: I have really got to hold on to this because I’m the big person here, I’m the adult. One reason I wanted to use booze in the book is that booze has a tendency to fray that leash you have on your temper…For a lot of kids, Dad is the scary guy. It’s that whole thing where your mother says, ‘You just wait until your father comes home!” In The Shining, these people were snowbound in a hotel and Dad is always home! And Dad is fighting this thing with the bottle and he’s got a short temper anyway. I was kind of feeling my own way in that because I was a father of small children. And one of the things that shocked me about fatherhood was it was possible to get angry at your kids. (from the EW interview cited in Extra Stuff)He’s right. I have had the pleasure and I know. Wendy gets some attention as well, as we learn a bit about her mother, and see Wendy’s fear that she has inherited elements of her mother’s awfulness.

Not everything shines here. There are times when five-year-old Danny seems much older than his tender years, even given his extraordinary circumstances. It struck me as surprising that there is no mention of anyone suggesting that maybe Jack might attend an AA meeting. But these are single dead pixels on a large screen.

If you want to read horror tales that are straight up scare’ems, there are plenty in the world. But if you appreciate horror that offers underlying emotional content, and I know you do, my special gift tells me that The Shining is a brilliant example of how a master illuminates the darkness.

This review, with images intact, has also been posted on my blog

=============================EXTRA STUFF

Definitely check out the Wiki for this book – nifty info on the King Family’s stay at the Stanley, and yes, there was a Grady at the Stanley.

I also recommend checking out SK’s site if you want to learn more about him

An interview with King in Entertainment Weekly

BTW, here is a shot of the model snowmobile that Dick Halloran drives back to the Overlook


A few other SK's we have reviewed
Under the Dome
Duma Key
Lisey's Story
Doctor Sleep
Revival
Mr. Mercedes
Just After Sunsetfantasy fiction horror ...more823 s5 comments megs_bookrack1,758 11.9k

This was my 4th-time reading The Shining.



You read that correctly, the 4th-time. I'm aware rereading isn't for everyone, but I am a huge supporter and fan of rereading, especially tried and true favorites.

I know a lot of people feel it is a waste of time, but for me, when a story is special enough to you, each time with it is a whole new experience. That's exactly how I feel every time I open the pages of this book.



Additionally, I feel where I am at in my life plays a huge role in what I take out of a reading experience.

For example, the first time I read this, I was in high school. You better believe that 14-year old Meg walked away from this having picked up on different things than 44-year old Meg does, reading it now.



My experiences have shown me that rereading allows me to focus on different areas of any particular story. This time around, for me, I felt myself really drawn to the private thoughts and emotions of this cast of characters.

Jack's experience, in particular, as he struggles with the position he finds himself in, his loitering addiction and the love for his family, hit me hard this time. Instead of seeing his horrible aspects front and center, I thought more about what was going on with him internally.

There were moments of clarity for him, when he could see beyond the fog of the hotel's power, moments where he cherished his son and wife, but they would slip away mist. It made my heart ache for the whole family.



This experience also reiterated for me how much I love Wendy and Hallorann. They got played dirty in the movie adaptation and we all know it. Not by the actors, the acting was fantastic, but yeah, they feel completely different people in the book, IMO.

Again, I was beyond impressed with some of the scenes in this still having the ability to scare the shit out of me, even after all these years. The perfect example would be the first time Jack tries to trim the topiary.

That freaking scene gets my pulse racing every time!



I also felt I paid more attention to the history of The Overlook this time through; when Jack is looking into it. I really felt focused in those sections and loved being reminded of its intensely lurid history.

Finally, I would just give all the stars in the universe, yet again, to King's sense of place with this one. His ability to transform a hotel into an actual character in the story is just a masterpiece. It's basically the standard to which I compare atmosphere in all other stories.



I'm so glad I took the time to reread this. It was exactly what I needed to re-energize my reading. You better believe, this won't be the last time either!

Earlier

Here's the thing, July hasn't been the best reading month for me. I've had a lot of 2-to-3-star books. I'm frustrated. I'm getting disgruntled and burnt out on it honestly.

I have never been in a reading slump before, but I definitely feel myself drifting into that territory...



I feel in an effort to keep that from happening, I am going to reread one of my top-3 favorite books of all-time. If anyone can shake me out of this funk, it's Jack Torrance.



I hear the fourth times a charm!!!

Original:

Hi. Hello!

It's me again, with another book you should consider picking up, if you haven't read it yet.



The Shining is my second favorite book of all time.

A true classic of Horror literature. I have read it a few times and it gets me EVERY. DAMN. TIME.



This is one of the most atmospheric books I have ever read, with The Overlook Hotel, ultimately becoming a character in its own right.

There are so many chilling moments from crazed topiary animals, to haunted elevators, and evil playground equipment.

Sounds intriguing, doesn't it?



Read it.
Read it now!

Meg's Advice:

The Shining is best read on a cold, windy night, when you are home alone and there is the slight possibility that you may lose electricity. Candles burning are a must for this one!

favorites stephen-king-read741 s11 comments Kat268 79.8k

i- i don't even know what to say that hasn't already been said about this but lemme give it a shot.

god DAMN this is king at his best. i know, i know, "kat that is so cliche. couldn't you have picked a less popular king book to stan?"

i guess not, but hear me out.

1. first of all, i love a good old fashioned haunted house story and that's exactly what this is. the slow progression of madness that overtook jack and the introduction of new ghosts (or hallucinations, whatever you decide) was INCREDIBLE. not to mention the thing that i think king writes best is the feeling of confinement, and what's more confining than being snowed into a haunted hotel that literally wants you dead?? oh right, nothing.

2. the characterization!!! ah! the way that king wrote these characters was just *chefs kiss* not only did i care about danny, wendy, and (sometimes) jack, but we also got to rip back the layers of their relationships with each other and dynamic as a family which i LOVE. even if you don't think this is a great horror story, don't deny it is a baller family drama.

3. the horror of it all. whether you want to look at it as a family being attacked by ghosts, or a father being overcome by an extreme case of cabin fever, or even if the whole murdering thing doesn't scare you but you can see the fear that comes with having a family member who battles with some kind of addiction, this book is fucking scary. it may not have made me physically jump or scream, but i can tell you that it's a story that is gonna stick in my brain and not let go for a long long time (just any good horror should)

now for the obligatory comparison to the movie:

it's common knowledge that king himself hates the Kubrick movie, but i love it. so much. it's one of the first horror movies i ever saw and i've seen it many times since, so while it's a popular opinion to love the book and shit on the movie i just can't bring myself to do it. yes, they're very different in a lot of ways, but honestly i think that Kubrick did the best with what he had to work with.
a BIG part of the novel is rooted in internal conflict. we spend so much time inside of jack, danny, and wendy's heads that it would have been impossible (imo) to translate that to the screen without a near constant voiceover ( basically just the audiobook playing over all the scenes) sO, i can't fault the movie for what it lacks in depth of character and explanation...i just can't. however, if for some reason you're reading this and you have seen the movie but haven't read the book YOU BETTER READ THE FCKING BOOK ARE YOU JOKING?? READ IT.

anyway,
dear mr. stephen king,
i'm sorry i ever said that your popular books were overhyped. some of them are *cough* IT *cough* but this one isn't.
luv, kat

okay that's all read this book i don't have an outro okay byeeeee1,113 s3 comments Earline845

This scene from Friends pretty much sums up my feelings about this book:


"Rachel: Hmm. (she opens the freezer) Umm, why do you have a copy of The Shining in your freezer?

Joey: Oh, I was reading it last night, and I got scared, so.

Rachel: But ah, you’re safe from it if it’s in the freezer?

Joey: Well, safer. Y'know, I mean I never start reading The Shining, without making sure we’ve got plenty of room in the freezer, y'know.

Rachel: How often do you read it?

Joey: Haven’t you ever read the same book over and over again?

Rachel: Well, umm, I guess I read Little Women more than once. But I mean that’s a classic, what’s so great about The Shining?

Joey: The question should be Rach, what is not so great about The Shining. Okay? And the answer would be: nothing. All right? This is the scariest book ever. I bet it’s way better than that classic of yours."
adaptation creepy-house favorites ...more3,359 s2 comments Chelsea Humphrey1,487 81.6k

This was most excellent; I can 100% see why this is many readers favorite Stephen King novel. Heck, it's my favorite novel of his to date, although I have a good number of his books to catch up on. I've found myself overly critical of his work in the past, possibly due to the fact that he's so well known, but I feel it's more been a fault on my end. Previously I've picked up one of his doorstops at a time I wasn't prepared to fully invest in the time and energy it takes to immerse oneself into his world building and lengthy details. This time, I was ready. (Also, this was only 600 pages which felt a novella compared to IT.)

I'm finally able to understand why so many people hold the standard of traditional horror in comparison to this novel. Sure, it has all the creepy crawlies and spooky wookies to get your heart racing, but it's so grounded in reality that I had a hard time rationalizing with myself that "it's just a story." The 150 page set up is well worth the reader's time, as it lays the groundwork for much of the why behind the narrative, and it also gave me a chance to bond with precious Danny before the shit hit the fan.

I may be the last person on the planet to have read this book, but just in case I'm not, I wanted to share some of the things that really hit home with me. Just IT is, at heart, a disturbing coming-of-age story, The Shining was an impeccable tale of extreme cabin fever with a hefty dose of "the destructive nature of alcoholism". When you break it down that, the supernatural elements actually seem to take a backseat to the very real horror of what it's living with someone struggling through addiction. I've heard all the stories of how this book helped SK realize his own struggle with alcohol, and I'm inclined to believe it's true as the writing here was heavy laden with emotion and depth.

I apologize for ever calling Mr. King over-hyped. I'm grateful my previous experiences with his wordier novels didn't deter me from finally choosing to read this, as it's a gem of a book and a classic in it's genre. I still despise Sleeping Beauties though and refuse to change my opinion on the matter. ;) Highly recommended to any other below-the-rock dwellers who may not have happened across this one. Now- to watch the movie or not?library564 s1 comment Anne4,201 69.9k



Is this horror?
I'm genuinely asking here because I'm not a horror aficionado, so I don't know what all constitutes that genre. To a layman myself, IT was horror because it scared the piss out of me and I couldn't sleep without the lights on for a while. The Shining is more a Spooky Family Drama. Yeah, yeah, there at the end things got a little hairy, but it was still mostly a human trotting around getting all stabby.



Now, I say mostly because good old Jack is getting some help from a couple of freaky paranormal spectres and...
THE HEDGES!



In an effort to be transparent, I feel I should mention that I've never actually watched the movie that was based on this bestselling novel. My husband (who has long since stopped being surprised by me) gasped out loud when I told him that a few days ago. So, I'm guessing from his reaction that I'm probably in the minority. Now, normally, whether or not you've seen the movie doesn't matter at all, but this is a pretty iconic movie we're talking about, so even without having seen it, I kind of knew the plot a bit and (of course) knew who acted the starring roles. I know, I know. None of that matters at all when you're talking about a book. But I just thought it might be relevant because the movie is so incredibly well known that even peasants myself who haven't seen it, immediately recognize certain images from the film.



I said that to say this: Jack Nicholson is definitely not the Jack Torrence I was seeing in my head, as described by Stephen King. King's Jack was a handsome young guy who was married to a beautiful woman. Now, Shelly Duval is a fine actor and so is Nicholson. But...
Anyway. I was just surprised to find out that the characters in the book were hotties.
I've heard the book and movie are very different in a lot of ways, but that both are good if taken separately. I'm planning to rent the movie soon and find out.



Alright. The gist is that there's this guy (Jack) who made a few mistakes because he was a bit boozy, and is now trying to go straight and get it together for his family.
He's a bit of a pompous ass, truth be told. One of those people who feel as though everyone around them just doesn't understand their tortured genius, you know? But he's not just that guy. Which is where King's brilliance as a writer comes in.
He doesn't make Jack the bad guy, he makes Jack a guy.
He's trying. He's trying so hard to stay on the wagon, he's trying so hard to be a better husband, and he's trying so hard to be the father Danny deserves.
And if he hadn't landed a job at a fucking Haunted Hotel, I truly believe he would have made it work.



Or maybe not.
Regardless, Jack is only one of the important characters in this Hallmark Family Movie Channel story. You also have Jack's sweet and beautiful (if a bit too mousy and faithful to the old fucker) wife, Wendy. And, of course, their little son, Danny.
Danny has The Shine . <--which, when I found this out, FINALLY explained the name of this fucking book to me! Do you know how many years this has been subconsciously niggling at my brain?
Well, neither do I.
But when fellow psychic, mind reader, and hotel employee, Dick Hallorann, tells Danny what rooms to avoid over the winter because he can feel Danny's super-bright Shine? It was a puzzle I didn't even know I was trying to solve clicked into place! It was one of those moments you have where you suddenly realize that there's one less thing you don't know. For one brief second, I felt the universe had given me a high-five I hadn't asked for and then didn't even pull away at the last second.



So, what happens when you toss a recovering alcoholic with a penchant towards abusive behavior, an overly-optimistic woman who tends to flutter instead of walk, and a 5 year old who can tell what they are both thinking, inside of a hotel that basically wants to eat them?
Well, I don't want to spoil anything for the 3 people who don't know how all this turns out, but...



Anyway. Good stuff. I'm glad my pals forced me (once again) outside my comfort zone.

Buddy Read with The Jeff & The Angry German 4/16
Because who doesn't child abuse?

buddy-read classics ghost-story ...more448 s1 comment Jeffrey KeetenAuthor 6 books250k

“The thought rose from nowhere, naked and unadorned. The urge to tumble her out of bed, naked, bewildered, just beginning to wake up; to pounce on her, seize her neck the green limb of a young aspen and to throttle her, thumbs on windpipe, fingers pressing against the top of her spine, jerking her head up and ramming it back down against the floorboards, again and again, whamming, whacking, smashing, crashing. Jitter and jive, baby. Shake, rattle, and roll. He would make her take her medicine. Every drop. Every last bitter drop.”

For a guy myself who loves to read and write taking the job as a winter caretaker of The Overlook Hotel sounds a dream job.


The Stanley Hotel inspiration for The Overlook Hotel

The time requirements for the job are miniscule leaving me plenty of time every day to work on the next “great American novel”. Before leaving for this foray into isolationism I would calculate just how many books I would need to sustain me through the winter and then increase it by ? or so. Jack Torrance makes the case that because he is an educated man he is better suited for the job.

“A stupid man is more prone to cabin fever just as he’s more prone to shoot someone over a card game or commit a spur-of-the-moment robbery. He gets bored. When the snow comes, there’s nothing to do but watch TV or play solitaire and cheat when he can’t get all the aces out. Nothing to do but bitch at his wife and nag at the kids and drink. It gets hard to sleep because there’s nothing to hear. So he drinks himself to sleep and wakes up with a hangover. He gets edgy. And maybe the telephone goes out and the TV aerial blows down and there’s nothing to do but think and cheat at solitaire and get edgier and edgier. Finally...boom, boom, boom.”

Now Jack may be an educated man but he is carrying around more baggage than any one bellhop could ever get delivered. He has a double helix of trouble an alcohol problem intertwined with a really nasty temper. He has lost jobs. He has beaten a young man senseless. He has broken his son Danny’s arm, little more than a toddler, because he messed up his papers.

Jack is always sorry.


Jack playing Jack

When not drinking he wipes his lips so often he makes them bleed.

His father was a violent man and King does give us some background on Jack’s childhood which may have been intended to lend some sympathy for Jack. Just because we follow the threads back to why he is the way he is doesn’t mean that he is anymore able or for that matter less dangerous. He may be an educated man, and he may have made the case as to why he is more qualified to be a caretaker cut off from the world, but as it turns out he wasn’t suited for the job, not suited at all.

I was sitting in an American English class at the University of Arizona, what seems an eon ago, when a woman, older than the rest of us by probably 15 years or so, raised her hand and asked the teacher why we weren’t reading Stephen King for this class. I remember distinctly peering at the syllabus and seeing Steinbeck, Faulkner, Hemingway and Fitzgerald among others. It was the canon of American Literature about to be explored by some of us in depth and by some of us only by way of Cliff Notes or Sparks Notes. Some in the class I could almost pick them out by their shiny perfect teeth, which I found abhorrently boring trees planted in perfect rows, belonged to the Greek Houses and would be showing up to class only to turn in their papers carefully culled from the vast files of papers written by past Sorority Sisters or Fraternity Brothers who had received As in this class for their efforts. After all it isn’t about learning, but about passing. I’m there probably feeling slightly nauseous from the flashing brilliance of pearly whites from the orthodontically challenged when the teacher turns to me and says “Jeff why do you think we aren’t teaching King in this class?”

Here I am thinking about this woman wanting to wedge King between my literary hero F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway. I don’t think I’d even read King at this point, but I’d been working in a bookstore for many years and knew how important he was to providing me with a paycheck. He developed cross genre appeal bringing horror forward from being a subspecies of science-fiction and away from residing in a spinner rack of books at the back of the bookstore for those social abnormals dressed all in black.

I didn’t really know how to answer the question except in the most bland way possible. I said he hasn’t stood the test of time. I could tell my answer was about as satisfying as a week old bagel to the woman, and I was hampered by the fact that I really didn’t want to insult the woman. The teacher also looked mildly disappointed. I could tell she was hoping to see blood in the water and I failed to be the shark she thought me to be.

The woman’s question does show the issue about Stephen King that is debated in most literary circles whether they are a book club down at the local library or the academic break room at a major university. He has legions of fans. He makes millions every time he puts out a new book which feels four times a year. The problem is he is a genius. He isn’t a genius in the way that Pynchon, Gaddis, or Wallace are geniuses. He is a genius storyteller. So if so many people are reading him he really can’t be any good...can he?

Someone on GR made the really good point that Stephen King does not need him to buy and read his books. He has writer friends, below the radar, that need his support more. That is so true and one of the more annoying things about King is that a percentage of them don’t read anything else. They would come into the bookstore and hound us for the release date of the next Stephen King. I would sweep my hand grandly through the air and point out several other authors that may fill the time between King novels. They simply were not interested.

The thing of it is I used to love being one of those scruffy minded individuals that are always trying to find the next great writer before anyone else. There was no reason to read King because there were no points to be scored with my group of pseudo-intellectual friends by saying something so insipid as “is anyone else reading the new King?”

When I worked at Green Apple Books in San Francisco, which by the way that city is one of the best reading publics in the United States, we catered to University professors, want-to-be writers, actors, and a slew of other professionals such as doctors, lawyers, and bankers. It was a well educated lot to say the least. I thought my days of selling King were over....wrong. Customers with wire rimmed glasses and elbow patches on their tweed jackets would bring up these academic books so obscure that I had no idea we even had them in the store, and invariably in the pile somewhere would be a Stephen King novel. I was still too caught up in my self-image as a reader to really think about taking a walk with the “normals” and start reading King, but I was starting to think to myself... hmmm I wonder what’s going on in them thar books?

Redrum.
Murder.
Redrum.
Murder.
(The Red Death held sway over all!)



Danny, Jack’s five year old son, has what one character referred to as “a shine”. If people are thinking about something intently, Danny can read their thoughts. He also has an invisible friend named Tony who can take him places, a bit more elaborate than my invisible friend Beauregard. What a dud he turned out to be.

Danny loves his father, actually more than his mother Wendy, which is such a painful realization for her. She has stood in the breach. She DIDN'T break his arm. She protects him from everything including his FATHER. As the malevolent force at the hotel begins to exert more and more influence on Jack and Danny she is relatively unaffected by hallucinatory thoughts. The interesting subtext of this novel is that Jack thinks the hotel is after him. As Danny explains:

“It’s tricking Daddy, it’s fooling him, trying to make him think it wants him the most. It wants me the most, but it will take all of us.”

A precocious five year old with a brain of such singular existence that the evil entity of The Overlook Hotel must have him. Another interesting aspect of the book is the fact that most people will not be affected by the ghostly influences of the hotel unless they have an imaginative brain to start with. They must have a mind open enough to hear the voices and realize the possibility that they may be real.

Did I mention that I’m not really interested in that job anymore?

I know this story. I haven’t watched the movie or read the book previously and yet I’m very familiar with the plot.

It didn’t matter.

While reading this book I was on the edge of my seat. My pulse rate elevated. My mind buzzing with lizard brain flight or fight responses. This guy King knows how to tell a story. There is this scene on the stairs between Jack and Wendy that is probably one of the most intense fight scenes I’ve ever read in literature. I was right there with the characters feeling the thud of the roque mallet and the grind of my broken ribs.

Stephen King is a cultural geek of the first order. He enjoys reading and promoting writers. He is a self-made man. A man blessed and haunted by a vivid imagination. He gets big points from me for mentioning Welcome to Hard Times and also McTeague two books that are members of my favorite obscure literature list. I it when a writer tells us what his characters are reading. He mentions television shows such as The Avengers, which I loved discovering recently that Honor Blackman (Pussygalore) preceded Diana Rigg on that show, and King also mentions Secret Agent Man starring Peter McGoohan. For the last two years I’ve been sifting through old television shows, thank you NETFLIX, and finding shows that I really . Besides the two shows King mentioned I’ve also enjoyed watching The Baron starring Steve Forrest and Sue Lloyd and the short episodes of Honey West starring the ocelot Bruce. I also have The Saint queued up starring Roger Moore. I have fond memories of watching that show as a child late at night in the summer time.

There has been a hue and cry from his fan base for Stephen King's work to be looked on as literary classics. They feel he is not given the respect he deserves for being a great writer. He is accessible to the average reader, and yet; somehow, puts the right hooks in his writing to please the elevated reader. We do him a disservice, I feel, to try to make him into something he is not. That said, probably the best of King will be read 100 years from now. He is the consummate storyteller still enamored with the unknown and the unknowable. He has a child wonder for the world and I for one will make a bigger effort to see the world more often through his eyes.

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I also have a Facebook blogger page at: https://www.facebook.com/JeffreyKeetenThis entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.Show full reviewbook-to-film horror331 s Lyn1,909 16.8k

About as perfect a haunted house story as can be, King was at his best here.

It's as though he built a haunted house and then filled every nook and cranny with detail. King is also at his best in regard to characterization, all well rounded and complete, we know family relationships, group dynamics, all the old hidden buried fears.

King touches base with psychological elements, theological, metaphysical, spiritual, and cryptic aspects of a ghost story to wrap the reader in a blanket of horror.

** I watched the 1980 Stanley Kubrik film recently and this made me want to reread the book (which I need to anyway). Kubrik's film grasps the psychological elements of the book and delivers an extra large thin crust The Works pizza of haunted house horror. Jack Nicholson's portrayal of Jack Torrance is still the defining image of this tortured man. While some critics have derided the slow pace of the film (atypical for jump-out-and-yell-BOO! horror fliks of the time) I felt that Kubrik was building the tone and mood of the story to the grisly final moments. King himself has attributed mixed emotions to the film as an adaptation, but has consistently agreed that the imagery of an internal struggle with the dark side of Jack's psyche is a contribution to the horror film genre. King also disagreed with the casting of Nicholson who too closely identified with insanity (due largely to his exceptional work in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest). Interestingly, King himself was battling alcoholism while writing the classic and viewing his work and Kubrik's vision from this perspective adds greater depth to an understanding and appreciation of both.

312 s Nandakishore Mridula1,261 2,380

Quite simply put, The Shining is the best horror story I have ever read. It scared the hell out of me.

Over a period of time, I have noticed certain standard "motifs" in horror stories. One of these I call "The Lost Child". Such stories will typically involve a child, who can see what the silly grownups cannot see (or, even if they do see, don't acknowledge because it goes against reason and logic): and who fights, however high the odds stacked against him/ her are. Danny Torrance is such a boy.

Danny can read minds. He can see the frightening thoughts inside his Dad's and Mom's heads ("DIVORCE", "SUICIDE") but is powerless to do anything about it. Danny does not know that he has a gift; he takes it as a matter of course, until Dick Halloran of the Overlook Hotel tells him that he "shines on".

Jack Torrance, Danny's Dad, reformed alcoholic and struggling writer, is trying to put his life back together after a tragedy. He gets what he sees as the ideal chance when he lands the job of caretaker of the Overlook Hotel for the winter. In the snowed-in hotel with only his son and wife Wendy, Jack assumes that he will get enough quality time to be with his family, patch up old quarrels, and write that breakout novel.

But the Overlook has other plans. The hotel, which feeds on and grows in strength from the evils committed on its premises, wants Danny-permanently-to join its crew of ghostly inhabitants. And to do that, it needs to get to Jack...

The novel slowly grows in horror, starting with mild unease, moving up through sweaty palms and dry mouth, to pure, gut-wrenching terror. Jack's slow slide into madness is paralleled by the growth in power of the hotel's dark miasma, and Danny's extraordinary capabilities. We are on a roller-coaster ride into darkness.

The world of grownups is often frighteningly incomprehensible to young children: these fears seldom die as we grow up, but remain dormant in our psyche. There are very few of us who does not have a ghost in our childhood somewhere. It is when the writer invokes this ghost that story gets to us. King does a masterly job of awakening that child, and putting him/ her in the midst of childhood terrors through the alter ego of Danny Torrance, lost in the cavernous corridors of the Overlook.

There are a lot of passages which literally creeped me out in this novel (the topiary animals, the fire hose in the corridor, the woman in the bathroom to name a few). As King has said elsewhere, the monster behind the door is more frightening than the monster slavering at you: this book is full of such monsters. More importantly, you will keep on remembering your own boogeymen while you are reading; and long after you finish, you will feel the urge to look behind you.

Horror stories are a form of catharsis. As King says, the writer takes you to the body covered under the sheet: you feel it, and are frightened. At the same time, you are relieved that the body is not you.

A true masterpiece.


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