Review: Revisiting Stephen King

Mr Mercedes/Revival. Stephen King. Crime thriller and fantasy horror respectively.

I haven't read Stephen King for years, though for a long time I had been a fan, writes Brian Byrne. I guess you go through phases of reading fantastical stuff, and I eventually tired of it. And the horror also can become overpowering. Though there's no gainsaying that it is always nice to read a really professional writer, of which King is one of the best.

Anyhow, a bout of holidays tempted me to bring a couple of his current books with me from Kilcullen Library, and halfway through said holiday, they're now well and truly read. Both were stories I was impatient to get back to, both quite different. Both also with quite scary characters

In the first, Mr Mercedes, the deliberate killing of several people by the driver of a stolen Mercedes is Billy Hodges' last unsolved case when he retires after a working life as a detective. When he receives a letter from the killer some time later, it kicks him into some freelance investigating of the case. Through what's a non-horror in the author's usual style, we follow the story both through Hodge's mind and that of the killer, to a cliff-hanging end.

It's much more a thriller than a King horror, and truly well done. King has a way of getting the soul of his characters onto the printed page very well indeed, and his dialogue is tight but thoughtful. As a writer too, the author has lived and worked at his craft long enough to be able to convincingly show the details of the various ages of his characters, and bring them alive without over-dressing them.

There's real humanity here, too, especially in the Hodges character and those he interacts with. And a very chilling lack of any human feeling except his own self absorbed psychosis from his antagonist. From the beginning, we know from where both sides are coming -- the drama is in trying to decide where both will end up.

The second novel is Revival, where King uses the theme of the 'fifth business', a term in writing movies to describe the external character or thing to the normal elements of the story which transforms the action. Often appearing at different intervals to do its catalytic job.

This is a 'life' story, told through the progress and otherwise of Jamie Morton from a young boy to his old age. A fairly ordinary American life it would have been if it wasn't for his interaction at critical times with his 'fifth business', a pastor who befriended him as a youngster.

The pastor, who later dumps and revives his religious links as they suit his own journey through life, has an obsession. One which, literally, powers his and Jamie Morton's lives, and the lives of those with whom they both come in contact.

It's a story that sneaks up on the reader at various points, building an almost compulsive curiosity as strong as is that of both key protagonists. Again, King's superb command of narrative and dialogue is a treat to read.

Not so, though, the conclusion of the pastor's obsession, which will be particularly disturbing to those of faith. Of course, it's a novel, fiction. But sprinkled with enough credibility to maybe leave some readers with small nightmares.

Well, the story does deal with nightmares, real and imagined ...

Both recommended. If this is your thing.