From Psychics to Weather

Here are my thoughts on the next three books in my Kingly journey.

The Dead Zone (published 1979)

Years ago I stumbled upon the telly version of this book, the one staring Anthony Michael Hall as the psychic Johnny Smith. Just one more of King's books making the transition into visual media. Man, what a lucky guy! Anyway. I adore this TV show still, though I must admit I was so unhappy with the way it ended, but such is life. We can't be happy with everything.

Keeping the show in mind I eagerly delved into the pages to see how closely the TV show stuck to the book. All readers are guilty of doing this, don't deny it! Of course, in my mind I instantly picture Hall as John. The are definitely differences between the two, like the fact that John is rich on the show and not so much in the book. But the journey is roughly the same. It was fun revisiting Walt and John and Sarah and all the others.

Now I might want to get around to watching the movie to see how that fairs to the other two. Might be interesting to compare all three!

Firestarter (published 1980)

I had never even heard of this book, but was lucky enough to borrow a copy from my aunt's King library. It follows the frantic life of a little girl who possess telekinesis and her dad's desire to keep her out of the hands of nefarious people. I would consider this one of the unknown gems of King's career. I made quick work of it. I do have to say that speech/thought process of the girl did not quite match with her age, at least not in my mind. Maybe I just need to be exposed to more young children, who knows.

Good luck on me for finding the movie adaptation of this one!

The Mist

My first encounter with this story actually came about through a short story collection. To discover it was a standalone was startling, pleasing, and came with its own level of misgivings. What age I was when I first read this slips my mind but the story managed to affect me in the way no King work had before. Though the tight suggests mist the substance in the story is more like fog and after this story I discovered the inability to be out in the fog alone, specifically at night. I find it unsettling.

In my mind the suspense factor to The Mist comes from the simple fact that you do not know. You don't really know what's lurking in the mist/fog. You don't really know what caused the mist/fog, though there's speculation it might be the fault of the military. And you don't really know how far it has spread across the states.

I haven't seen the movie version of this either, but I am anxious to see what they've done.

On Wednesday I'll be back to cover Cujo, Cycle of the Werewolf and Christine, thus catching up to where I am on the list.