Guest EXPAT Posted February 9, 2012 Posted February 9, 2012 I'm completely absorbed in the new Stephen King book. I think it is his best book in years. I love the time travel element and how he set up the time travel rules. And I like the historical linkages. Sometimes you get what you ask for. Or you don't realize what you ask for. . . Quote
Guest EXPAT Posted February 9, 2012 Posted February 9, 2012 I thought this was a good review of the book as well: I think most people can agree that the assassination of JFK on November 22, 1963 was a watershed event in human history. It led to Vietnam, the Civil Rights movement, and possibly a prolonged Cold War*. Had he not been shot in Dallas on that day, perhaps Vietnam might not have happened, or at least been smaller in scope. Perhaps the Civil Rights movement might have unfolded differently. Perhaps the Cold War would’ve escalated into a full-blown nuclear conflict between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. There’s really no way to know what would’ve happened, other than via alternate historical fiction. Which is exactly what Stephen King’s latest novel, 11/22/63, is all about. 11/22/63 takes place in both 2011 and the late 50s/early 60s. In 2011, high school English teacher (and all-around tall dude) Jake Epping is contacted by his friend, diner owner Al Templeton. Al knows he’s in the end stages of cancer, but he doesn’t want to die before showing Jake the secret of his diner: a rabbit hole in his stockroom that leads to September 9, 1958. Jake takes a quick trip, enjoys a root beer, and then returns to Al’s diner. Only two minutes have passed in the real world — only two minutes ever pass in the real world, no matter how long someone stays down the rabbit hole. That’s when Al drops the bomb on him: for the past four years, he’s been living in the hole, trying to stop Lee Harvey Oswald from killing President Kennedy on November 22, 1963. He’s amassed a notebook full of research, one that he can no longer use because he knows he has very little time left. So Al implores Jake to take on the mission. Jake, meanwhile, has plans of his own for the rabbit hole. On October 31, 1958, the father of one of his adult education students back in 2011 murdered an entire family, and Jake wants to set it right. That’s when he learns that the past is obdurate — it doesn’t want to be changed. It’ll throw up obstacles to try and stop anyone who does. And if it’s this hard to save one family — a minor part of the tapestry of history — how hard is it going to be to save the leader of the free world five years later? In general, I’ve enjoyed what Stephen King novels I’ve read, with the exception of The Regulators and Desperation, which I think I may have been too young (at the time) to get the full experience out of. King has written the only book I’m too scared to read again — The Sun Dog, about a Polaroid camera that takes photos of a dog about to attack, and nothing else — and, clearly, he knows his craft well enough to keep putting out bestsellers that are later adapted into TV shows and films. I did enjoy 11/22/63, despite its slow start; clearly the novel was exhaustively researched, and although it does have the requisite Maine scenes, there are a lot of other set-pieces across the eastern half of the U.S. as well. In the past, Jake travels to two towns in Maine, along the eastern seaboard, southwest Florida, and finally to Texas where Oswald is going to shoot Kennedy. But the book isn’t just about that. Even if Jake does have a mission which will end on November 22, 1963, when he — he hopes — stops Oswald from committing murder, he can’t spend the entire intervening time just doing nothing. I mean, I get bored on a Sunday afternoon if there’s no football on TV, and that’s in 2011 when there’s plenty of other things to do. Eventually, after setting right some wrongs, Jake settles in a small town in Texas — the first truly-friendly place he’s found since coming to the past — and takes up his old mantle as an English teacher. That, I think, is where the story starts to get good. It more-or-less ceases to be about Oswald and starts being about Jake, and how he conducts his life in the past. And what he learns is that, be it 1961 or 2011, life still goes on. People go to school, go to work, and fall in love, just like in his own time. On Star Trek, time travel is often used to right a wrong or fix a mistake, or even just to do research into the past. The thing about Star Trek is that, at the end of the episode (or movie), everything wraps up in a neat little bow. Lieutenant Christopher is returned to his fighter jet, the whales save earth, Captain Sisko isn’t killed in an engineering accident, and Harry doesn’t miscalculate and kill the entire Voyager crew. 11/22/63 shows us that that’s not exactly the case — which, I suppose, is what happens with a lot of alternate history and time travel fiction. King reminds us often that the past does not want to be changed, and it will fight any way it can. And it fights Jake pretty hard, even going so far as to exact revenge upon him for what he does. I found 11/22/63 to be somewhat of a departure from the King fiction I’ve read in the past — there are no monsters, no supernatural forces, no blood-showers at prom**. Just a rabbit hole in the stock-room of a diner that, when you walk through it, takes you to September 9, 1958 and allows you to change history. The rest of the novel is almost pure historical fiction — a man of today experiencing the past first-hand. It speaks to King’s exhaustive research on the subject, as well as his storytelling skill, that someone like me (whose favorite era of American history is 1875-1930) can pick it up and become immersed in it almost immediately — it’s believable, relatable, and damn interesting. Quote
Members Lucky Posted February 9, 2012 Members Posted February 9, 2012 Yeah, we discussed this last November. Last November Quote
Members JKane Posted February 9, 2012 Members Posted February 9, 2012 I've thought about picking this up, I love well thought out time travel stuff! Now I'm more tempted... But I have always avoided King because I'm not much into creepy/horror, I know his writing tends to be very uneven, and because I tend to be a completest--so avoiding prolific authors when I know some of their stuff sucks is a good idea! Quote
Guest EXPAT Posted February 9, 2012 Posted February 9, 2012 I've thought about picking this up, I love well thought out time travel stuff! Now I'm more tempted... But I have always avoided King because I'm not much into creepy/horror, I know his writing tends to be very uneven, and because I tend to be a completest--so avoiding prolific authors when I know some of their stuff sucks is a good idea! This is not what you might think of as a Stephen King book and his storytelling here is excellent. I'm surprised how hooked I've become to this story. I'm almost 1/2 way through it now. And it's been hard to get me hooked on any book in the last couple of years. Quote
Members eeyore Posted February 10, 2012 Members Posted February 10, 2012 OK. Two solid recommendations, yours and Lucky's. This is going to be my next read once I finish Eric Larsen's In the Garden of Beasts, which also has the Lucky seal of approval. Let's not forget about the new John Burdett novel too. Haven't read it yet but it probably should be on everyone's read list if it's not already. Quote
Guest EXPAT Posted February 10, 2012 Posted February 10, 2012 I'm speeding through this book now and I will be very upset when I finish. I haven't been this excited about a book in a long long time. Quote
