Stephen King's 11/22/63

[Wire9Vintage]

Anyone else read(ing) this time-travel novel? I finished it a while back, and I quite liked it. Some new twists on the old theme of time travel, with several nods to things like Quantam Leap, Groundhog Day, Doctor Who, and even Life on Mars (UK version).

Thoughts?

 

[Espee]

I found something to nitpick on the front and back covers (which might not even be attributable to the author.)
They represent alternate outcomes, as reported on the front page of a newspaper. The photo of JFK's car in the motorcade is captioned, in part, "... on November 22, 1963."
Newspapers of that day or the next, would have read "today" or "yesterday" or "Friday."

 

[Wire9Vintage]

Yay! Finally a response! You do have a point (speaking as a former reporter myself). Have you read the book?

 

[potemkin_city_limits]

I read the book and I thought it was quite long winded. I was expecting to get a story about a guy traveling through time to save JFK and instead its like 700 pages of a guy living a life in the late 50s with a tiny little bit of the JFK story thrown in. When I finally reached the point where he was attempting to save JFKs life I almost didnt care anymore because the rest of the book had so little to do with that.

I really liked Stephen Kings older books but after reading Under The Dome and now this one I feel like he just goes off into way too much detail about nothing and it really takes away from his story.

 

[PhilS]

I thought it was very enjoyable, although I still don't understand how you can go back in time, change the timeline, and go back to your present and know what you did. I could see going to a different, parallel timeline (that's what they did in the recent Star Trek) but you'd be coexisting with your parallel self. Also, do you age when you live time in the past? So if you spent five years in the past are you 5 years older when you return?

 

[Wire9Vintage]

That's how I understood it. Remember his surprise at how much Al had aged in so short a time. Anyway... Willing suspension of disbelief is always required!

 

[58FURY]

I administrate a forum dedicated to a "character" in, and the title of, one of King's books.

Although I'm still a fan, personally I think King's writings went a little perverse during "Gerald's game", verging on Paedophilia.

"It" had a couple of similar disturbing "childhood" memories in it too, from one of it's characters.

I started Duma Key.... but my progress is slow..... just like the plot.

Is Under the Dome worth reading..... the publicity said it was as good as The Stand?

Thanks.

Lee.

 

[potemkin_city_limits]

I administrate a forum dedicated to a "character" in, and the title of, one of King's books.

Although I'm still a fan, personally I think King's writings went a little perverse during "Gerald's game", verging on Paedophilia.

"It" had a couple of similar disturbing "childhood" memories in it too, from one of it's characters.

I started Duma Key.... but my progress is slow..... just like the plot.

Is Under the Dome worth reading..... the publicity said it was as good as The Stand?

Thanks.

Lee.

I liked Under The Dome a lot more than I liked 11/22/63. The ending is a little out there but in general it was a more interesting story. There is also a random chapter told from the perspective of a dog that does absolutely nothing for the story but thats Stephen King for you.

 

[katiesparkles]

I love 11/22/63, cried like a baby reading the ending and I'm quite curious about the movie adaption (I hope they don't f* it up and get good actors). Think I finished it within a week or so, every minute I had I spent reading that book. Definitely looking forward to re-reading it again, too.

58Fury, I read Duma Key right after 11/22/63 and couldn't get into it at all at first, but it was a good book all in all. Once you get towards the middle you can sympathize with the characters more IMO.

I also recently finished From a Buick 8 and liked it a lot, definitely worth a read if you like King!

Right now I'm half-way through Under the Dome, and next I want to read Colorado Kid.

<-- I love King, in case you haven't noticed. I missed the reading/signing session for 11/22/63 last year and am still bummed. Hope to catch Mr. King sometime this year in Boston!

 

[58FURY]

Thanks.

I've just read a couple of Stephen King's recent compilation books.

Everything's eventual and Just after Sunset..... easy to read if you can only nip in now and again.

Buick 8 was okay.... but you never really knew why it had all come about.


I'd like to find the time to read more classic horror like Poe, Shelley, Stoker, Wells, Wilde.....

...... can anyone recommend any good old fashion ghost stories?


Katie..... if you do ever meet him, I'd love to know his thoughts on "Christine"..... he's an elusive guy and I know a lot of guys that'd love to hear from him.


Thanks.
Lee.
England.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

It seems that there was a similar novel published some years ago (can't think of the author or title) that had the main character going back in time to foil the JFK assassination in order to bring back his brother who was killed in Vietnam. Of course this is based on the premise that had JFK lived the Vietnam War (or at the very least further American involvement in it) would have never happened and thus the main character's brother wouldn't have been killed, and so on, and so on.

 

[katiesparkles]

58fury, I'll make sure to ask him! I wish I could just ask him to have yea with me, because in case I ever do meet him it'll probably take me an hour to get over "oh God, are you real?" hahaha. I'm such a fan girl.


Buick8 and why the "stuff" came out... I've yet to read the Dark Tower but I read up on the story and it's def. connected. You know how in the end he sees "other stuff" when he looks into the car? Its like a portal...Yeah... I don't want to spoil it for anyone so I'm jut gonna shut it now.

*on my phone, apologies for any typos

 

[DNO]

I'm now reading 11/22/63 and thoroughly enjoyed the first half. It would seem, however, that I'm having a hard time staying interested now that 'George' is spending his time tracking Oswald. I am finding the second half to be somewhat tedious. I could easily see myself closing it one of these days and never going back to it. Wouldn't be the first book that I've treated in such a cavalier manner, I'm afraid.

 

[scotrace]

Anyone following the adaptation on Hulu?

 

[Benzadmiral]

I love 11/22/63, cried like a baby reading the ending and I'm quite curious about the movie adaption (I hope they don't f* it up and get good actors). Think I finished it within a week or so, every minute I had I spent reading that book. Definitely looking forward to re-reading it again, too.

. . .<-- I love King, in case you haven't noticed. I missed the reading/signing session for 11/22/63 last year and am still bummed. Hope to catch Mr. King sometime this year in Boston!

King is a fantastic storyteller. Literary historians of the future, if they're honest, will probably rank him along with Dickens -- both were prolific, both were immensely popular, both have had numerous films made from their works (Dickens had stage plays first, of course).

11/22/63 is vivid; it grabbed me from the very first page. King doesn't often write in first person in his novels, but when he does it's even more *immediate*, if you know what I mean, than his 3rd person tales. Yes, it's long. I suspect he set it up that way, having his narrator step in to 1958 instead of 1961, so that he (King) could immerse us in that long-ago world of men in suits, ties, and hats, women in dresses and gloves, cars with carburetors, and a society that was still sane. Not to mention a charming love story that is integral to the plot and to the narrator's character development. Utterly fascinating to me were the details he's included which I know are true. For example, Oswald did live in New Orleans as a small boy, went to junior high here, attended what would be my high school many years later (though he didn't graduate), and lived on Magazine Street in the uptown area (I believe the house he rented might still be there).

For those who are only part way through or haven't started it yet, I will say only that the last portion of the novel is quite . . . disturbing.

I haven't seen any of the adaptation on Hulu yet -- but I'm inclined to think the casting of James Franco as the time traveler is a good choice.

 

[Edward]

Dickens is a good comparison. In my mind, King deserves far more recognition for his quality as an author than he gets, but such is the fate of an author who is both popular in his own lifetime and has the temerity to be so while writing what can mostly be categorised as genre fiction. I think his most recent piece I've read is the sequel to The Shining, which is a tremendous book. I keep meaning to organise myself and collect and read them all. This Kennedy one might well be next, as it's one I still haven't got to yet.

 

[PeterB]

The story was well researched but King puts attitudes of the present day into the late 50s. I had the impression that he wants us to think that the period was quaint or somehow inferior to the present time. He can't help that. And too much swearing as always in his books

 

[Benzadmiral]

The story was well researched but King puts attitudes of the present day into the late 50s. I had the impression that he wants us to think that the period was quaint or somehow inferior to the present time. He can't help that. And too much swearing as always in his books

I'm rereading the story again. To be fair, his lead character, Jake Epping, is a thirtysomething when the story begins in 2010 (?). So he probably would have those attitudes toward the late Fifties-early Sixties. I don't recall if King gives those attitudes to other, "native" 1950s-60s characters that Jake encounters.

 

[Benzadmiral]

. . . I'd like to find the time to read more classic horror like Poe, Shelley, Stoker, Wells, Wilde.....

...... can anyone recommend any good old fashion ghost stories? . . .

Lee.
England.

Lee,

You could try M.R. James. He seems to me the epitome of the classic English ghost story. "Oh, Whistle, and I'll Come to You, My Lad" and "Casting the Runes" (the latter adapted into that neat B & W thriller film Curse of the Demon). There's also a creepy little story called "The Ash Tree."

"How Love Came to Professor Guildea," by Robert S. Hichens, is very effective; look here: http://gaslight.mtroyal.ca/pguildea.htm I read it as a boy, thought it okay, but was blown away by it when I reread it as an adult. Apparently his novel The Paradine Case became the Hitchcock film.

Speaking of Hitch, if you pick up some of "his" old anthologies 1945-1965 (he didn't really choose the stories, but his editors were great) like Bar the Doors or Fear and Trembling, you'll find a slew of ghost or supernatural stories in the good old mold. James's "Whistle" is in the Fear and Trembling collection, too.

 

[PeterB]

I'm rereading the story again. To be fair, his lead character, Jake Epping, is a thirtysomething when the story begins in 2010 (?). So he probably would have those attitudes toward the late Fifties-early Sixties. I don't recall if King gives those attitudes to other, "native" 1950s-60s characters that Jake encounters.

Benzadmiral, on reflection, I have to admit that you are right. I think the difficulty is that King writes for the popular audience, and thus his main characters must have some of the assumptions of the audience members, in order to be believable. I have to keep reminding myself that my own views are eccentric, not to say reactionary, and not those of a thirty-something. In all fairness to King, I thought the story was a good idea, and well told in general; he certainly did his research about LH Oswald, didn't he? What I did notice was that in the early chapters the residents of the town in Maine tend to come off as local comic characters rather than as three-dimensional people, apart from the Janitor and his family. But a good plot, nonetheless.