Because I seem to have build up a backlog of books I’ve read but haven’t written about, here’s a round up of three Stephen King novellas.
Throttle, written as tribute to the Richard Matheson short story Duel, is a collaboration between King and his son, Joe Hill. The story deals with a gang of outlaw bikers that get chased down (and, in some cases, run over) by a truck on a deserted piece of highway. I couldn’t tell whether the son imitates the father or vice versa, but it doesn’t matter. It’s a fun little story. (And the comic they made of it is pretty sweet as well.)
- Book read
- Joe Hill & Stephen King — Throttle
- First line
- They rode west from the slaughter, through the painted desert, and did not stop until they were a hundred miles away.
I wasn’t as found of Ur. Even though I know it was exclusively written to promote Amazon’s Kindle, I couldn’t help but see it as just that: a Product Placement Novella. Even the ties to a certain dark tower that stands in a field of roses—different Ur’s are different levels of the tower, and the messing what future Ur’s tell you will get you in trouble with the low men in yellow coats, if it do ya fine and I say thankee—couldn’t mask that. It’s certainly not among King’s best short fiction.
- Book read
- Stephen King — Ur
- First line
- When Wesley Smith’s colleagues asked him—some with an eyebrow hoicked satirically—what he was doing with that gadget (they all called it a gadget), he told them he was experimenting with new technology, but that was not true.
And then there’s Mile 81, where on a pretty ordinary day a car shows up at an abandoned rest stop. From there on it’s more like From a Buick 8 than Christine, as the car doesn’t run people down, but rather swallows them whole. Not quite a top story either, but it’s entertaining enough.
- Book read
- Stephen King — Mile 81
- First line
- “You can’t come,” his older brother said.
As an added bonus to this issue, The Great God Pan by Arthur Machen. I lump it in here because my main reason for picking it up is another King story, N. from Everything’s Eventual. I first suspected that story to be a riff on H.P. Lovecraft, but according to King, it’s a riff on Machen’s Pan. In the story, a young woman’s mind is destroyed in an attempt to reveal the great god Pan—and thus the power of nature and paganism—to her. Years later, another mysterious woman drives young men to madness, and then suicide. To me, it seems typical of the era: like Lovecraft, it isn’t scarry or horrific per se, but it’s more about the mood and the tension of what might happen.
- Book read
- Arthur Machen — The Great God Pan
- First line
- “I am glad you came, Clarke; very glad indeed. I was not sure you could spare the time.”