Hola, gang.
Let's just cut right to the chase, shall we?
As I have made it abundantly clear, I do love me some Stephen King. For better or worse, I'm hooked on his relentless writing, all character based and paired up with other-worldly horrors. It may not be the most high minded and literary for those of us that still enjoy the written word, but man if it isn't habit forming. It all began years ago.
I"m pretty sure Desperation was the first book of King's that I read. There's the possibility that it was Needful Things but that cold winter year was so damn unpleasant that I tend to run together or straight up block out some of the memories. I was a miserable little pissant in middle school, I recall that much. My older brother had either sneaked home a book of King's or just slipped it under the parent's watchful radar. He could be plenty convincing when he wanted to be. Whatever the case, I picked up Desperation out of curiosity, having heard his conversations with our neighbor Ryan over the messed up thematic elements and horrible occurances. My morbid litte mind was more than just a bit curious, I'll confess. The illicit nature of the book was soon lost on my hungry mind - I was so desperate to keep reading that I thought nothing of bringing the book to school, sneaking the 700+ page book into my stack of required texts. I still remember Ms. Zubrowski asking me if my parents knew I was reading such gruesome fodder. I smiled and nodded, saying "They don't mind, as long as I'm reading."
In what was perhaps a harbinger of things to come, Desperation was both an examination of faith and a tale of evil things setting their sights on mankind. I was struck, as a young adult, by the honest and frustrated take on religion and nature of God that King took in the novel. On top of the angst-ridden diatribes were the nihilistic attacks on humanity as seen through the ancient deity Tak. In a way, they set the tone for my appreciation for horror literature and my rationalization for the world around me - awful, incomprehensible things may happen on any given day, but they do not mean I have to lie down and accept them. I am not just a reaction to the world but a presence in it, one that can shape it as it happens.
The plot of the book is actually fairly simple - a long forgotten and malevolent evil is released from its imprisonment beneath the ground in the desert. It begins leaping from person to person, killing and consuming everything in its path as it continues marauding through the desert. When the ancient entity inhabits the hulking body of a local sheriff, it uses the man's authority and power to capture a group of people travelling through the local township. These people are find themselves imprisoned by the sheriff as a result of his con, and soon find themselves tasked with combating the demonic force. What ensues is a confrontation with evil, faith and one's own fallibility. It's a moving book.
Desperation is not one of King's highest regarded works. I'm willing to overlook that, though, as it has always been one of my favorites, if only for it being one of my earlier experiences. There's plenty of horror to go around here - animals being possessed, inhuman acts of violence, wanton destruction and an absence of the divine. Desperation is filled with the lonesome scares of the wilderness that draw on our sense of the natural world aligning with the gods against us. It set me on a new path when I was a teenager, one full of peculiar tales with distinct characters. Give it a read for a Southwestern taste of torture.
Let's just cut right to the chase, shall we?
As I have made it abundantly clear, I do love me some Stephen King. For better or worse, I'm hooked on his relentless writing, all character based and paired up with other-worldly horrors. It may not be the most high minded and literary for those of us that still enjoy the written word, but man if it isn't habit forming. It all began years ago.
I"m pretty sure Desperation was the first book of King's that I read. There's the possibility that it was Needful Things but that cold winter year was so damn unpleasant that I tend to run together or straight up block out some of the memories. I was a miserable little pissant in middle school, I recall that much. My older brother had either sneaked home a book of King's or just slipped it under the parent's watchful radar. He could be plenty convincing when he wanted to be. Whatever the case, I picked up Desperation out of curiosity, having heard his conversations with our neighbor Ryan over the messed up thematic elements and horrible occurances. My morbid litte mind was more than just a bit curious, I'll confess. The illicit nature of the book was soon lost on my hungry mind - I was so desperate to keep reading that I thought nothing of bringing the book to school, sneaking the 700+ page book into my stack of required texts. I still remember Ms. Zubrowski asking me if my parents knew I was reading such gruesome fodder. I smiled and nodded, saying "They don't mind, as long as I'm reading."
