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Location: Living near our Nation's Capitol since 2010
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Thanks Cenk A for an analysis of SK's works. I confess to being a fan of his. Some, of course, are better than others. I especially prefer his earlier works, but that is just me.
I am currently reading his new one, a collection of short stories. its called Full moon, No Stars. No, it is not his greatest work, but its entertaining.
For those who have not read SK..and I have a hard time believing there are many of you, I do urge you to read his works..especially the early ones. Surely you will enjoy them.
"A Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Marquez-Garcia. If check out any given critics' list of "Top 50" or even "Top 20" novels of all-time, chances are good that this book will be on it. So, at the urging of a chick I was dating a few years ago who had her degree in English Lit, I gave it a go. Jeez, what a piece of shiatsu! Why did the author use all those same Spanish names? Very confusing; no plot to speak of. Total self-indulgent literary masturbation. The novel is supposed to be of the genre referred to as "magical realism" but for me the only thing magic about it was how anyone could really think it of a classic!
Wow this really says it for me. I had read Love in the time of Cholera and really thought it was BRILLIANT--- though it was not an "easy " read. It was work but it was wonderful. So I decided to tackle Hundred Years of Solitude. At first Iw as liking it, but was so troubled and confused with all the same names.. I had to give up on it. I still think about trying it again. I was relieved to read your summary so I know it wasn't me!!!
Wow this really says it for me. I had read Love in the time of Cholera and really thought it was BRILLIANT--- though it was not an "easy " read. It was work but it was wonderful. So I decided to tackle Hundred Years of Solitude. At first Iw as liking it, but was so troubled and confused with all the same names.. I had to give up on it. I still think about trying it again. I was relieved to read your summary so I know it wasn't me!!!
Isn't it funny how one person loves a book and another hates it? I have not read Love yet because my best friend (we have very similar tastes in books) absolutely abhorred that book. I've been reluctant to read it. I saw the movie, and it was one of the worst movies I've never seen. Right up there with Waterworld (#1 worst) and Batman Returns (#3 - after Love). After reading your opinion though, I'm more open to trying it, but I'll need more coaxing.
I tend to rate more by author then individual books, but the one book I have not been able to finish, after trying SEVERAL times is "The First Wives Club" by Olivia Goldsmith. I always thought it was weird, it's on my top ten favorite list of movies, but reading the book causes me eye twitches. The women all sound so snippy and awful in the book...... I think whoever wrote the script for the movie from that pile of nastiness smashed between a book cover deserves a medal.
The five best books thread has me perplexed. I found myself thinking, 'man, but could I talk about some of the worst! Oh, LOL.'
For me, and I'll stick my neck out here, it has to be a toss-up between the author Nicholas Sparks, and the book, The Bridges of Madison County. My problem with the authors/works actually has more to do with what I see as 'plausible' or 'believable.' Unless I am reading what I know is purely fantasy, or something, I want to a story to resonate with honesty or reality.
As much as I enjoyed the sweet, almost saccharine story of Sparks's The Notebook, I was frustrated by Message in a Bottle, and never picked up another title of his. I admire him -- or anyone who can stick to a work and see it published -- for continuing to write, but I think he is largely a good storyteller and not a good writer. Likewise for The Bridges of Madison County. I was enjoying the story enough until the anti-climatic (all puns intended) moment when the silly photographer gets on his soapbox about being a man out-of-step with the times and rants about for pages, no less. OMG, but I'd have handed him his trousers and sent him on his way.
So, those are two that come to mind. I hope I've defended my opinion. I am curious to see what works other readers have hated, and why.
Oh, I forgot Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Had to read that in college, and all I could think was 'just shoot me.'
Belva Plain...I stopped reading her..it seemed her main character always ended up committing suicide..like they were to weak
Yeeah, you will get blasted not because of your feelings towards King but because of your uninspired notion about his stories being the "same one churned out over and over, with minor details changed and the basic plot the same" and you truly deserve to get blasted as the following list will probably help you understand your mistake. I challenge you to find another author/ storyteller/ writer in the history of modern fiction with this exhaustive range of works both in terms of thematic scope and format:
1. King has released many classic works dealing with staples of horror fiction:
a) The Stand- considered by many to be one of the best post-apocalyptic novel - this theme also runs through in some of his shorts stories loosely connected to the Stand. Cell is another book in this field, this time blended with zombie-theme.
b) Salem's Lot- considered by many to be the best modern vampire story, or at least as good as the classic Dracula- it is the modern classic version of vampire legend.
c) The Shining- considered by many to be the best modern (or ever) haunted house story, or at least on par with the genre's other classics by Shirley Jackson and Richard Matheson. Haunted house theme is also done from another point of view in "1408".
d) Carrie/ Firestarter- two uber-child stories backed by social themes (the former deals with the misguided teenage angst and horror in the USA schools using telekinetic powers as the ground, the latter attacks at the sinister government using the pyrokinetic powers as the backdro) Carrie is considered one of the best debuts in the history of modern fiction
d) Christine- the best modern haunted-car fiction that is still unrivalled
e) Pet Sematary - one of the best Monkey's Paw versions and, interestingly, a different look at zombie fiction mingled with themes addressing how to cope with the death of your loved ones- considered by many to be the most horrific book both in King's ouvre and in general fiction
f) Cujo- another social commentary addressing the relations between husbands and wives and the mechanics of the relations between families, using a rabid St Bernard horror as a backdrop. one of the most know iconic animals/ beasts in modern fiction, right behind Moby Dick and Jaws.
g) Dead Zone- another political story using future-seeing powers as a backdrop, addressing questions such as if Hitler could be killed, in what way would history change?
2) King has released excellent coming of age novels with or without suparnatural tones and horror
IT- Considered by many (including me) to be the best horror novel, and sometimes, one of the best fiction works, blending everything that is pure horror, kneaded with family-child relations, racism in 50s USA and the childhook nostalgia.
The Body- mostly known in the movie version, Stand by Me, a somber, sincere account of a child's growing up and looking at his past. This simply shows how versatile and talented King is in that he can tell a great story without those "cheap" trills.
The Talisman a collaboration with Peter Straub (which as many King books do falls in more than one category here)
3) King has written excellent prison stories. Shawshank Redemption and Green Mile. Should I need to elaborate more?
4) King has written excellent, if sometimes bloated, speculative and truly imaginative science-fiction books: The Running Man (the end of which is more shivering when you think about 9/11), the Long Walk, the Tommyknockers, Dreamcatcher and, most recently, the magnificent Under the Dome.
You can find many science-fiction stories in his collections, the Jaunt in Skeleton Crew being one of the most original and most horrific sci-fi story next to Alien. Also, the Langoliers in Four Past Midnight is one of the most original sci-fi novellas ever. The famous Mist is also a sci-fi novella with heavy straight horror tones.
5) King has written great fantasy novels, shockingly better than many seasoned writers in the genre: The Eyes of the Dragon, Talisman and most notably Insomnia. As usual there are many short storises, and of course, that great western fantasy the Dark Tower series, which is a sub-genre in its own. Regulators is another dark fantasy attempt. I am not so sure but Needful Things may be categorized in this group too.
6) King has written great straight thrillers and crime novels. Colorado Kid is the most known example, Rose Madder and Blaze (published under Bachman name) are also thrillers and many stories in his collections include pastiches or homages to Sherlock Holmes and other great detective stories (the story of flexible bullet, the ledge etc)
7) King has written great stories dealing with author-fan relation (Misery), author's relation with his muse or alter ego (the Dark Half, Secret Window), the author's block (Bag of Bones, the Shining), creative powers gone awry (the excellent Duma Key).
8) King is the most prolific and one of the best short-story writers of the USA. He has published five (yes that is 5) short story collections, ranging from pure terror to most poetic ones with any theme and any kind of story you can expect. 3 of these collections are simply masterpieces, one of them is very good and one of them is good. Just guess how great they are. He also won the prestigious O'Henry Award with his short story "The Man in Black Suit"
9) The guy is also a prolific and excellent novella writer, collecting his novellas in the classic Different Seasons, the more mundane Four Past Midnight and the most recent and excellent Full Dark, No Stars. In his novellas he mostly explores the dark relations between humans without much place for his famous supernatural thrills.
10) The guy published great non-fiction books: Danse Macabre (an almost chronological breakdown of the horror genre (including movies) for the second half of the last century), a classic how-to-write book with semi-autobiographical tones (On Writing), baseball books and baseball articles.
11) The guy has written dark incest books and their effects on families, in particular, on daughters (Gerald's Game) and on mothers (Dolores Claiborne).
12) Believe it or not, the guy has written love stories using horror as background: Bag of Bones, and most recently, Lisey's Story.
13) The guy never gives up his pop-culture side: He is writing his column in EW.
14) In his collections, you can find poems and yes, even a teleplay.
15) He has written scenarios, the best and most original one being the Storm of the Century.
16) And encompassing all things above and going beyond them is the Dark Tower, which according to some is the single rival to the Lord of the Rings as fantasy series are concerned.
17) He has written a werewolf book in the calendar format.
I am tired but I am sure that there is more that I have not covered.
Now just look and still TELL me that he writes the same thing "over and over" with "minor changes in details". Your words sounded terribly wrong then and they still sound ultimately laughable now.
PS: I am not a native English speaker so sorry for my grammatical mistakes or wrong choices of words.
What an exceptional post.
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wasn't me!!!
