King's March

I love a readalong.

And I love Stephen King.

Well, that's not quite true.

My relationship with Stephen King has been more turbulent than a simple bookish love affair.

And it all began with Mr Books.

Mr Books & I met during our Uni days many, many moons ago. I was just nineteen, he was twenty. And he loved Stephen King...so much so that he gave me It for our first Christmas!
I know, I know! Nothing says I love you forever like a scary clown, disappearing children and creepy drains!

Our first road trip holiday together saw me scaring myself silly with Pet Sematary while the future Mr Books, amused himself by practicing his Jack Nicholson Shining laugh when I least expected it!

During this happy, youthful time together, I devoured Cujo, Carrie, Fire Starter, Christine, Salem's Lot, The Talisman, The Eyes of the Dragon, Misery, Different Seasons, The Stand & The Gunslinger 1, 2 & 3.

But, sadly, inevitably, the seemingly never-to-be Mr Books & I parted company.

I tried to maintain my King-love, but The Tommyknockers, Dolores Claiborne & Dreamcatcher stretched the friendship to breaking point.

In 1994 The Stand mini-series came to my attention.
My profound disappointment with the appalling adaptation caused me to go back and reread a few of the early King's. My opinion at this point, was that King had lost his way. His best & genuinely scary book writing days were behind him and that with the exception of The Shining, it was impossible for the screen to do justice to his creeping horror.

Not long after, I discovered that King was still writing The Gunslinger series (as I continue to call it, though it has now been renamed The Dark Tower series.)

I wrote about my love affiar with this series last year here & I revised my opinion again. Yes, King could still write - as long as he stuck to the fantasy/horror genre that he did so well and stayed away from the alien/dream shit!

Then I watched The Shawshank Redemption & realised that his short stories especially, could be adapted successfully to the big screen.

And just like a big screen romance, Mr Books & I found each other & true love again!

During our time apart, he had also drifted away from King.

And so it was that this time around, I re-introduced Mr Books to Stephen King via The Gunslinger series.

Together we watched The Green Mile & The Shining. And in a fit of madness, we also decided to re-watch The Stand mini-series (this book sooooooo deserves a better screen version!)
We've read and watched Under the Dome together (although I gave up on the TV series long before Mr Books conceded defeat!)

Mr Books has now also read Duma Key, 11/22/63, Joyland & Mr Mercedes. Knowing how pressed I am for quality reading time, he insists that the only one I really need to read is 11/22/63.

Which is my very long-winded, round-about way of saying that, this month, during King's March, hosted by Wensend and Fourth Street Review, I will be reading 11/22/63.