Brent Nyitray
Fairlington Blade
Let the mutherfuker burn!
jnc4p
Kevin S. Willis
Michigoose
lmsinca
markinaustin
Arcanaut
novahockey
quarterback
ScottC
yellojktIn my review of Stephen King’s Under the Dome, I wrote:
It might be interesting if King–a very good writer when he challenges himself—tried to write a Michael Crichton style novel, like State of Fear, which—to be fair—showed about the same nuance and subtlety in it’s characterizations of environmentalists that King does in Under the Dome regarding conservative Christians.
In 11/22/63, he hasn’t precisely done that, but he’s come a lot closer than he has in a while. King’s Crazy Christians™are nowhere to be seen, and the typical Evil Right Winger© that also makes frequent appearances in King’s work, is barely heard from. A segregationist billboard in 1962 Texas is attributed to The Tea Party Society (when, in fact, it would have more likely been the John Birch Society; I can’t find any indication that anybody referred to themselves as Tea Party anything in the early 60s) in a throw away, but that’s it. The central bad guy is Lee Harvey Oswald and a few of those who egged him on, and they’re rabid left-wingers and Marxists.
It may seem that I’m praising King with faint damns, but this was a really good book. I still think his best book is probably The Stand, but when he challenges himself he tends to produce some of his best work, and I think 11/22/63 falls squarely in that category (Eyes of the Dragon, King’s only real foray into a traditional fantasy, is another example for King challenging himself and creating a great little book).
The book deals with what might happen if someone found a tunnel in time in the back pantry of a greasy spoon, one that always leads out to exact same moment in 1958. History can be changed, but every time you go back, time is reset, and any changes you made the last time are wiped out. This leads to Jake Epping, a recently divorced high school teacher, attempting to interfere with history for personal reasons, and then attempting to prevent the assassination of JFK in order the save the world. While doing so, he gets a job, falls in love, and ends up making a mess of things in very interesting ways.
I found the ending very, very satisfying, especially after the anemic conclusion to Under the Dome. I was not surprised to read that King’s son, novelist Joe Hill, actually came up with the ending, one that largely replaced whatever King’s original ending was.
If you’ve read a lot of Stephen King, you’ve met all these characters before. Some of them literally–there are, as is typical in most of King’s books, cameos from previous novels, notably It, and a Plymouth Fury (probably not Christine, but maybe) makes more than one appearance. However, Jake Epping is reliably King’s ass-kicing alter-ego, Sadie Clayton has appeared numerous times as the True Love™who both too aware of what makes the hero special, and too easily convinced that the protagonist is magic, has experienced the impossible, has telepathic powers, or is from the future. Most of the other characters are now very familiar, although with different names, but I imagine any writer who produces as much as King does would fall back repetition. In an interesting turn, he acknowledges this in a way, by intentionally echoing character names, vocal tics, and events. The narrator refers to this repetition as harmonization, suggesting that his existence out of time causes frequent echos around him, and in the lives of those he touches.
Stephen King did more historical research on this novel than on any previous novel, and it shows. The one truly new character, for King, is the setting. From his own creations, such as Derry, to Lisbon, Maine to Dallas, Texas, he works hard to craft a sense of time and space. He’s clearly got a strong sense of what his imaginary town of Derry was like in the late 50s (more clear, I think, when he covered the same basic stretch of time, in the same imaginary down, in It). His depiction of the real Dallas and Fort Worth to his fictional Jodie, Texas enjoy a tremendous depth and clarity. It helps makes what could have been another typical King novel into an exception King novel—one that I plan to read again in a year or so, or at least listen to on audiobook. Two thumbs up from me. I highly recommend.
Finally, King mentions that, like Under the Dome, he originally had the idea for this book years ago (in this case, 1971; in the case of Under the Dome, it was the late 70s and early 80s). I find this an interesting approach. Stephen King retired from writing in 2002 (part of this may have been ongoing pain from his accident, which he may have found better ways to manage, since then), but has been almost as prolific since his retirement as he was before. Lately, he’s been mining the ideas of his youth to see what he can come up with, and he’s come up with some interesting things. As much as I disliked Under the Dome (and, to be fair, many loved it, I just thought it was a mess), the idea of going back to old ideas and tackling them anew seems to work, by and large, for Mr. King. It certainly works here.
For an opposing viewpoint, check out Rachel Cooke’s negative review in The Guardian. I think she misses the point, but then, of course I would think that.
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All Things in Moderation 
Does anyone else noticed the idea was cribbed from a short story of a long time ago? I think it was Larry Niven. I think the basic idea is that there is a corps of time travelers who work on setting things right. Shades of Quantum Leap, no? This one fellow is recruited in after he commits suicide. He decides to go rogue and try to prevent his suicide. Odd thing after odd thing happens each time he tries to stop it. In the end, he manages to do it somehow.Then a meteor comes and does the job anyway.Don't mess with Mother Timeline.BB
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I read all of Stephen King's novels for a long time and then I quit. You make it sound much more interesting than others he's written since "The Stand", maybe I'll give it a whirl. Thanks Kevin. I'll probably get it for my son for Christmas and let him read it first though.
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Same here, lms; read a lot of his early stuff and then just slid away from it and not even really sure why. Although I was never able to make it past the first 50-100 pages of The Stand, even though everybody says it was his best. If you read this one, will you give me your assessment als? (And Kevin, not sure of the technical definition of "traditional fantasy," but would you not consider his Tower series to be so?FB, LOL on Quantum Leap. I cannot count how many years it has been since I thought of that series.
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Fairlington: Most time travel tales tend to detail the fixed nature of time. One of the things I always liked about Back to the Future is that they portrayed time as fragile, rather than inflexible and unchangeable. That was a novel approach in many ways. I was addicted to The Stand after the first 100 pages. I've since read it three times, I guess, and listened to it once on audiotape (the version for the blind–amazingly, there is not official audio version for the regular consumer). 11/22/63 is a long book, but I really enjoyed it. Would heartily recommend it. However, I was also a big fan of a few particular later-era novels: Bag of Bones and Duma Key. Skip Cell, Gerald's Game. Needful Things was all right. Dreamcatcher was very strange, but also a fun enough experience, listening to it on audiobook. I remain a big fan of From a Buick 8, but it's not for everybody. Under the Dome is a big, fat skip for me.
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Kevin:the version for the blind–amazingly, there is not official audio version for the regular consumerHow would you tell the difference?BTW…I'm a huge fan of The Stand. Read it first when I was in high school, and several times since. I immediately got the "unedited" version when it finally came out. Thought that was even better than the original. The TV mini-series was good, but not quite the quality of the book.
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Scott: How would you tell the difference?It's not available to consumers. You can either check it out of the library, if you have a branch that has the audiobook, or you can bittorrent it, if you can find it on a torrent (this would be a violation of copyright laws, so I'm not recommending it).You will not find it as an audiobook at Audible, or elsewhere. It's made available expressly to the legally blind. I'm not sure on the details, but I think a specific non-profit arranges for the recording and distribution, with part of the agreement being that it's not sold commercially. And the license limits the distribution of the audiobook to the legally bind and organizations that make it available to the legally blind, such as public libraries. Some of the stuff in the unedited version (Billy the Kid–who seems identical to the same Billy the Kid that appears in The Green Mile) adds little to the overall story, but I still enjoyed reading. Having read them both, I completely understand why the editor wanted to cut out the preamble. My first read having been the original printing, there's just something about how it started out with Stu Redmond watching that car weaving this way and that, headed for the gas station. It just made for a very strong start. An indelible image, that hooked me right there. But I still liked the prologue that covered just how that man got in that car. What I love most about The Stand is that it is such a behemoth. As many characters as a Russian novel, over a dozen locations, dozens up dozens of B stories, it shouldn't work. It should be a godawful mess. And yet, it's not. It's frickin' amazing. Didn't care for the mini-series, I just don't think The Stand is going to make a good movie. I thought so as a kid (and thought that about The Talisman, which might be a good movie in the right hands), but I now I don't think whatever Stand movie comes out will be all that great. Maybe if Frank Darabont directs. 😉 BTW, okie: my distinction with traditional fantasy is that Eyes of the Dragon is a self-contained story with a tower and a prince and an evil magician and a poisoned king. It actually takes place in the world of The Dark Tower, but doesn't have trains or guns inter-dimensional travel. It does have Randall Flagg, from The Stand, but you never know about that relationship within the context of Eyes of the Dragon. The point being, King reigns his normal tendency to throw in multiple universes and the kitchen sink into Eyes of the Dragon, keeping it firmly in the boundaries of the classical fantasy genre, and it really works well.
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Kevin:It's not available to consumers.Ah, I see. I was imagining an audio cassette labelled "Official Version for the Blind" with a little square box on the cover that said "Not to be sold to sighted peopple".
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