Stephen King

Frylock said:
His books have great/good plots, but he describes everything to death, im reading black house, which could probably be 100 pages shorter.

His books are ideal to turn into movies, as all the time he wastes describing stuff can be done in one screen shot
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Well he did read Tolkien a lot as a boy. THAT'S an author who over-describes things. oO

Anyway, just started to get into King after a lot of peer pressure from friends. A mate of mine is a big fan and he keeps pointing out King's books when we're in a bookshop, so I've finally got started on The Dark Tower series. I've wanted to do that for a couple of years now, but just never got around to it.
His style is really unlike anything I've ever seen before. It's slightly annoying feeling so connected with the gunslinger, and yet not knowing so much about him. It's a really gripping way to write, though.
 
Love King, but since he finished the Tower series (oh gods the ENDLESS years waiting for Wizards and Glass, don't get me started) he just seems to have lost it. Cell was OK, Liseys Story made no sense to me and I don't dare pick up any post Tower books now.

And I can't even think of DT 7 without welling up, and I cried at the end of Insomnia, which I loved!
 
I like some of King's work, but for the most part it is not hos horror or thriller books that attract me like it does so many others. I prefer his stories such as Low Men, Green Mile, Hearts in Atlantis and so on.

He is a master of coming out with epic story after epic story, but his description turns me off some times because he goes into depth far to much. Which is why I sometimes would prefer to see a movie based off his book rather then his book so I can avoid the description. My favorite of his movies are Hearts in Atlantis and The Green Mile.
 
They made a movie off Hearts in Atlantis? I didn't know that. Might have to look for that one. For the most part, movies based off his novels are good.

Compared to his other novels, Hearts in Atlantis didn't do much for me. I loved the book simply for his writing style and story-telling skills, but that was about it. I honestly can't remember it all that well...

The Green Mile's downright epic, though. I normally hate reading books more than once, but I actually picked that one up again.
 
I didn't like the Hearts In Atlantis movie. They took out the connections to the Dark Tower in exchange for some kind of government psychic conspiracy, which seemed unnecessary...The director obviously didn't know anything about the books (saying that he took out all the connections to the alien stuff or something). It was ok for what it was, I guess...but it wasn't Hearts In Atlantis.
 
Hearts in Atlantis, the DT series. amazing.
but re-reading (for the 17th time) The Stand.

completely addictive

and i agree with the liseys story comment. not at all up to his usual standard
 
VoN said:
They made a movie off Hearts in Atlantis? I didn't know that. Might have to look for that one. For the most part, movies based off his novels are good.
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It's actually based off the Low Men part of the story, has nothing to do with the college years.

I didn't like the Hearts In Atlantis movie. They took out the connections to the Dark Tower in exchange for some kind of government psychic conspiracy, which seemed unnecessary...The director obviously didn't know anything about the books (saying that he took out all the connections to the alien stuff or something). It was ok for what it was, I guess...but it wasn't Hearts In Atlantis.
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Personally that was one of the reason why I liked it to much. One of the rare moments in my life where I loved the movie a lot more then the book. I'm man enough to admit that the movie got to me, very moving. Plus the musical score heightened the atmosphere.
 
I found it difficult to get through Lisey's Story because it felt like such a personal work. He writes a lot about writers, but this was the first time he really wrote about the wife of a writer, and one going through the death of her husband. I kept thinking that it must be sort of how he would have seen things happening (minus the supernatural & such) had his jog been a more deadly incident. In the end, I ended up getting the audio book, which was fantastic. I ended up thinking it was actually one of his better books. I also LOVED the fact that afterwards, I read Wizard & Glass again and found out that Walter actually makes a reference to it by talking about a "blood bool".
 
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Thanados said:
Hearts in Atlantis, the DT series. amazing.
but re-reading (for the 17th time) The Stand.

completely addictive

and i agree with the liseys story comment. not at all up to his usual standard
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You've read The Stand seventeen times??? God, man. That book's well over 2,000 pages. Took me an age just to read it once, though it was time well spent. The Stand is probably my favorite of King's novels.

The movie disappointed me, but I guess it'd be utterly impossible to include ALL the events from the book.
 
I actually liked Lisey's Story. I definitely understand where you're coming from - it felt like I jumped into a world full of inside jokes and an inner language between two people, but the story really gripped me.

It was also my first King book, so I'm sure once I read others, I'll think back on LS and think, seriously!? lol. I have The Stand, The Shining, and Pet Semetary on my bookshelf, on deck. :]
 
I just started picking up his books, and I have to say I dont think I will be putting them down anytime soon. Just recently I have read The Regulators,and The Eye of the Dragon , then maybe pick up It, and the Dark Tower series.

Is Desperation any good? It says that it is a compainion novel to The Regulators.
 
Desperation IS good...It acts as a kind of mirror to The Regulators in a way...You'll notice familiar evils, which is actually quite a common occurrence with the Dark Tower related books/stories...I personally liked Regulators more, though...there's more religious connotations in Desperation than I usually enjoy...But yeah, definitely pick up the Dark Tower books...if you're paying close enough attention while you read it, you'll notice at least one major character from Eye of the Dragon (& you should pick up The Stand for the same exact character in that too)...
 
I adore Stephen King. I "acquired" my mum's copy of It at the age of 12 and haven't looked back. I prefer his older ones to the newer ones, as they just got a bit weird. Also, Cell freaks me out, because it's not impossible. Improbable, but not impossible

Can I just also add that I love the Stephen King films because he does a bit of an Alfred Hitchcock in them, in the way that he appears in a lot of them. He does a lot of his own screenplays and I just think he's amazing...
 
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I dont like how he writes his books when i was reading the dark half I got through the first three pages and said " well that sucked ' because it was hard to actually like the book and start reading more of it.
 
He's talented rightly enough. However, I feel he tries too hard to be a 'real writer'. lots of his novels have a character who writes horror, and is annoyed they arn't considered real writers. I think Stephen feels this way himself. For example- the first half of 'IT' was very well written, but then you couldn't help but catch on: h was deliberately trying to make the book as epic as possible. His attempts at metaphor were awful (turtle? kid sex etc) and obviously were just him trying to be intelligent and insightful. The length too gets me. I really think he made it as long as he could on purpose, to TRY and make it epic and cult-status worthy.

If he would just stick to the writing itself, he would be great. But he tries too hard to be smart and it rarely works- only with the Green Mile really. And that wasn't so much intelligent; more sentimental and appealing to human nature etc.
 
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