The King and I

Read in October 2023 Published in 1974, Stephen King’s first published novel takes us into the life of Carrie White, a less-than-popular high school student who possesses the power of telekinesis. As Carrie goes through puberty, her power seems to intensify, and she begins to learn how to harness and control/direct it. Carrie has had a pretty rough go of things. Living with her over-protective and obsessively Christian single mother, having no friends at school, and living such a sheltered life as to not knowing what is happening when her period starts, Carrie is an easy target for ridicule, particularly by mean girl Chris, but when Tommy invites her to prom (at his girlfriend Sue’s request), and is actually kind to her, a glimmer of hope appears. Hope which is quickly diminished when prom night rolls around… This was my first time reading this novel, and I very much enjoyed it. It’s told in an interesting way through a number of narrators, newspaper articles, interview notes and ...

As someone now in her mid-40s, I have referred to Stephen King as the constant man in my life for a number of years now. I first learned of him when I was around 12 years old, and when sleeping over my cousin’s house we watched the movie Stand By Me . As the credits rolled, and I saw it was based on the novella The Body by Stephen King, I thought, I’ve got to track this book down. I can’t remember exactly whether Different Seasons , the collection which included The Body , was the very first or just one of the first King books I read. Memory is funny like that, and especially mine when it comes to books. I know I very quickly read a bunch of King books all in a row, but some of them I have absolutely no memory of, I just know I read them. I figured, as it’s been over 30 years since I read some of these books, and I have a shocking memory anyway, it was worth re-reading the King books I had, getting any books I was missing, and doing a full chronological read of all of his books. T...