it's post 1985 stephen king, so yea, it's shit
I just finished the audiobook, and it's the first Stephen King novel that I've actually 'read'...
Is it just me, or is there more truth to that Harry Potter copypasta than most people think?
Every time he dresses up plot contrivances as "the past harmonizes", and the characters are plain as shit, an earnest everyman and a well built blue eyed blonde virgin with an insatiable sexual appetite that has all of the good aspects of stereotypical 50s/60s female devotion and none of the bad ones. There's no great insight into Oswald, JFK, the historical customs...if there's any judgement, it's usually just "this is old thinking and sucks".
Even the stuff I liked, like the romance, was just your typical pulpy romance dressed up with vague thriller aspects. The structure is dumb as shit, King gets around the problem of not killing Oswald months before the assassination by blessing the lead character with a coma and amnesia for months. Then on the day of the assassination, he has to drive like 40 miles to Dallas with mere hours to go, just because he is a dumbass. It's so artificial.
Man, if this is what is passing for grade A lit these days...
>>7879109
It's a fine piece of fiction that will hold your attention and entertain you. The ending is a bit disappointing, but that is to be expected from Stephen King. It doesn't really contain any deep shit, but it has a good story and decent characters. I would recommend it for someone looking to pass some time.
>>7879204
This is the origin of the copypasta, it's actually originally about King, not HP
http://archive.boston.com/news/globe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2003/09/24/dumbing_down_american_readers/
>>7879109
Dunno but the trailer looked interesting.
Fuck Franco though.
>>7879480
>Fuck Franco though
Why?
>>7879109
Definitely one of the best SK stories imo.
lots of slog imo
>>7879109
>Stephen King
What do you think?
>>7879204
I don't think anyone really thinks of it as "grade A lit". Stephen King just writes airport fiction and churns it out by the metric fuckton. His books are never anything more than cheap entertainment, and a lot of them don't even do a particularly good job of being that either. He'll be entirely forgotten maybe 10-15 years after he dies.
>>7879109
The main goal of the book is to stop the JFK assassination. Only problem is, it's mostly filler
>>7880389
His bibliography is a great record of 70s-2000s Americana and popular culture, so he'll probably be remembered by historians for that reason if nothing else.
>>7879204
Yeah, everything was really contrived and uncontroversial and all the contrivances tied everything up into a bland, acceptable message to be delivered about how messing with the past is a no no and everything happens for a reason and you should just accept that this is the best of all possible worlds. :^)
Overall it felt like made-for-TV science fiction--especiallythe Yellow Card Man who was straight out of Dr. Who or Star Trek.
At the same time I appreciated it for being quaint. Stephen King reminds me of pre-2000s pop culture and gives me good nostalgias.
