Aim apart from que la book is not a glossary of Police speak, nor an urban dictionary of crime speak. It is a book in the line of several Stephen King books written That HAS Recently-have to do with Some Kind of criminal, some form of crime, and catching the train or stopping the lathing. Here we are dealing with a serial offender who is turning into a serial mass murderer. That is in no way terrorism and critics like Chuck Bowen in Slant Magazine, House Next Door are totally wrong When They define the book as a cop-and-terrorist thriller. Terrorism Implies Some political aim and in this case the man is deranged sociopath and nothing goal and psychopath. The Unibomber Was a terrorist since he has HAD political agenda. But here Stephen King olefins His criminal as a mad bomber and That Does not make _him_ a terrorist.
It is a thriller That Does not use in Any Way supernatural or fantastic means clustering like for instance in Doctor Sleep That deals with a band of criminals Who are in a way people living dead and Some Kind of vampires though They Do not drink blood vital energy goal . It is in the line of Joyland in qui a single young man is tracking and bringing out and down a serial killer. Stephen King is in line with THUS Reviews some of the books He Has written before, though this one is original Because It uses an ex-cop, a retired detective as the main character though Stephen King adds to this man an underage high school student and has Psychologically deranged middle age woman who is somewhere entre neurosis, psychosis and autism, obsessive compulsive and definitely yet sane enough to be of great help and to manage to get out of the super low state of mind and extreme dependence on the performer is in and at the Beginning Some independence and reach equilibrium at the end.
The main criminal, aka Mr. Mercedes, is a psychopath and sociopath purpose as the result of an intense and prolonged trauma That His younger brother started When cam into the picture and when to Their father got out of it leaving Their mother with two sounds, No. Nearly income or none, and the younger son is Slightly retarded. Misery, poverty and later on the assassination of the younger his After a dumb accident in the qui child chokes on a slice of apple and his mother aggravates the condition by trying to get the slice de son larynx out with her fingers INSTEAD of using the Heimlich maneuver. Stephen King knows everything about Heimlich maneuver and his since he used it in Christine. THUS it is a choice leading to drastic elimination. The assassination is Performed on the incoherent After His being white brought` child back to life by doctors with a severe mental impairment by His Mother and his brother together.
Then there is an allusion to a stepfather Who Took His stepson to using as a sexual toy torturing _him_ too with cigarettes and Elements That --other arent Mentioned. The mother Took share in the implied rape victimization That Even If it is only alluded to. The child Becomes an adult for sure goal attached to His mother and his mother considers _him_ have a sexual partner, a surrogate to a Man Who Would Be her husband or lover, though with strict limits: she is the onanistic tool of the grown man. I would say this long-lasting trauma can only Produce the asocial psychopath we-have in the book, though it is a little bit easy on the inside. The pattern of a stepfather and a mother victimizing the stepson (and son) is a little bit simpler. We are Spared though the live gay sexuality Which would-have-been not in anyway sane and the result of a choice, though he is Clearly Described as a closet homo-Who hates women, young women and teenage Especially girls Most de son live victims are women , at times unwillingly On His hand women nevertheless aim. The last crime he is planning mass murder of Essentially teenage girls and mothers chaperoning.
What is PARTICULARLY catching, appealing in the book is what Chuck Bowen hates. The writing is in a language That borrows a lot from colloquial dialect and social discourse even. His high school senior Jerome, a black teenager, uses a lot of linguistic ebonics In His discourse and this is quite typical of that black young man Whose family members-have typical Caucasian, hence American names and he wants to go to Harvard. He is the victim of quite a lot of racial prejudice in the mild ostracism That HAS taken the place of open segregated rejection of previous Decades goal That Is nevertheless rejection. To Compensate for this rejection, and to assert His blackness, With Some white people he is in regular contact, he uses ebonics. This is natural and Even Both sane and healthy. That's Some Kind of homeopathic medicine to Overcome and Tolerate any kind of bigotry, present or only Intended _him_ around.
The retired detective, Kermit William Hodges, est aussi quite typical of people in His situation. He is alone and he Easily slips into fattening Some life style _him_ That leads to overweight and a coronary at the end accident. He Has abandoned all sexual activity That Implies a partner. In --other words he is a social and psychological wreck. All the Easier for _him_ to jump on the bandwagon of Some Police work on the side of official duties, hence to Become an uncle. Since the criminal is making it a personal case against _him_ he reacts in the very same way and Makes It a personal case against the criminal. Nothing new under the sun. Circumstances just add some more official disinterest from the Police department of the City That being white Sidetracks _him_ into His Own Master Police in illegal work. Circumstances (his heart attack) will enable _him_ not to perform the last course of the neutralization of the criminal.
The writing Itself is split into short sequences jumping from one character to the other, from the retired detective to the criminal Essentially but not only. This is of course writing cinematography, qui Makes novel into this year Easily adaptable story for a movie. That goal is the way all modern writers today write with TV and cinema in mind. Chuck Bowen has it wrong: most modern novels-have That structure of an unfinished screenplay and That can not be regarded as a shortcoming Because It corresponds to the viewing habits of a modern audience Who watches TV series and movies all the time, stories That are more and more exploded into Some Kind of mosaic of short sequences.
This story line is very catching and appealing. We get into the story And Then we are in a way mesmerized by the story telling. We can maybe say everything is understandable before it happens and we can Foresee every event. That is true and false. At every crucial point in the novel we can see the options are available to That the author. It is true MOST of the time is what the author chooses Among thesis options, aim it is only one option in a set of several. The end is predictable and yet apart from the idea que le criminal will be stopped, we can not really predict how, Where, When and by Whom before it happens. The very conclusions of the novel is tremendously moving. We Can not resist thinking of Misery, though the cruelty against Retired Detective William K. Hodges is a lot less intense Than That Described fait que older novel. Altogether the book is more luminous than older books and is in the line of Joyland have for this luminosity. That is probably the element That Could be regretted: the brutal cruelty of the rough side of Richard Bachman Stephen King. He Seems To-have curbed it in His latest novels. Should we regret it?
Aim it is true he is experimenting --other styles under influences from the collaborative His Son Joe Hill, a novelist de son own. THUS He Has a real future and heir for the coming Decades in the cinema, in fiction and in --other genre like the musical. Maybe he shoulds thesis concentrate on new forms and aim at Producing more mini series or movies than books. He maybe HAS written enough books and shoulds exchange media. Such a choice Goal Has To be His decision. It is true it is difficulty to do better than a good dozen de son older novels, not to speak of The Dark Tower series, The Stand That Gold IT are single master parts. Purpose yet there are still Some territories he can explore for our pleasure.
Dr. Jacques COULARDEAU
