Having read many of Stephen Kings excellent books, I expected to find this as easy to read and enjoy as all the others. But it has an inbuilt problem for me as a reader from the UK. The language and cultural references in the first chapters are frequently confusing and sometimes even incomprehensible.
Generally speaking, if I come across a book where I can’t empathise with a single character in the first three chapters, I abandon it and don’t write a review. Because this one is by an author with a well-deserved great reputation, I felt I could indulge my disappointment without doing his sales or standing any harm at all.
I need to care about at least one of the players if I’m to devote my precious time to a book. Because this one bore the name of Stephen King and I both admire and know many of his works, I continued through the fog of meaningless references as far as page 111, where I gave up the battle to understand or even care about the underlying aspects of the story. I had failed to understand much of the surface matter already and the idea of ploughing through 713 pages made me almost lose the will to live!
There is undoubtedly a good story here, why wouldn’t there be considering the pedigree? But it isn’t one I’ll be giving any further time to.
Perhaps, when employing jargon, dialect and social references that are understood only by the people of the area in which the story is set, it might be a good idea to let potential readers know this is the case.
Many fans will no doubt buy this book, but I suspect a lot outside the boundaries of the region depicted in the opening chapters will do what I did; give up.
[Any review is a personal opinion. No reviewer can represent the view of anyone else. The best we can manage is an honest reaction to any given book.]
Stuart Aken 
Maybe being a short story teller isn’t so bad after all. Moat of my books are around 200 to 300 words. If there is a lot more to tell theyare put in a sequel. By th way Stuart, I loved your review of my book Murder on Lake Haverly, however Amazon would not publish it perhaps because it was from another country. I have been a little slow writing since the stroke, but am trying to get back up to speed.
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Thank you, Brenda. Getting back to writing after a stroke has got to be hard work. My sister had a stroke 6 years ago and is still confined to a wheelchair as her left side is more-or-less non-functional. Her mind, however, is as good as it always was, but the tremors make her keystrokes on the mobile texts somewhat hard work to decipher. I hope your mobility skills are unimpaired and you’re able to do the physical work needed to write again.
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I must agree and admire your review of this book, even if it didn’t go past page 111. I am reading a book with similar problems now, but written by a person on your side of the pond. I don’t like books where I have to look things up!
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Thank you, Noelle.
As a writer, I understand the problems faced when creating a piece set in a locale that is not necessarily familiar to most readers. The balance between authenticity and consideration of the reader’s needs is never easy. But placing the work in front of different beta-readers should generally highlight any points that may need additional explanation. I’m curious about the book you’re reading at present. If you’d like to share, I’ll see if I’ve read it and can lend some illumination.
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It’s a book for Rosie’s Book Review Team, Stuart, a gothic horror sort of book that I would probably rate as a 3/5. Not worth your time – it’s too valuable.
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Thank you for saving me the time, Noelle. As you guessed, not my type of book.
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The reviews of this novel haven’t been stellar with some calling the writing boring and convoluted while others have said that it’s a poor representation of the devolution of a society and/or also just a replay of The Stand and Under the Dome. My understanding is that most of the book was written by Owen King (he did the recent – and very poor – rendition of The Stand in miniseries format) and that accounts for many of its difficulties. I haven’t read a Stephen King book in a very long time now. Not sure why but I think life cut into my “long-novel” reading time.
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I understand your comment about life cutting into long-novel reading time, Lynette. So many books out there to read and so little time!
I hadn’t looked at any other reviews for this one, so didn’t know some have not been complimentary. I’m not surprised, though. I’ve enjoyed every other Stephen King book I’ve read, so this was quite a disappointment.
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