In Which We Discuss Bag of Bones

Bag of Bones was first published in 1998, shortly before my 10th birthday. It has a lot in common with Rebecca, another book I read a few years ago, although it treats the core elements differently.

This is one of the many novels in which the main character is a writer. If I recall correctly, this was the book where I first found out that King’s novels weren’t published in written order, though it might have been Lisey's Story; sometimes, he wrote too prolifically and would stash a few, as the character Mike Noonan does. When I started this project I did consider making the effort to find out the order in which the novels were actually written and to read them in that order, but I came to the conclusion that that would be unreasonably difficult.

The other day I thought about the fact that Shakespeare’s plays begin to have happier, more optimistic endings as he got older. That was one of the reasons I wanted to read an author’s work in chronological order; to see how it changed as they aged. When I did this with Lisa Jewell a few years ago there were a number of changes. What stood out most was her concern about children, after she had her own.

King’s writing is so prolific that I actually find it harder to step back and see trends. It’s like trying to watch a plant growing by staring at it for every hour of the day. There are trends; for instance, Rage and Carrie, both about teenagers, were written when King was younger – although The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, which focuses on a young girl, was published in 1999, when King was 52 and presumably written when he was at least in his 40s. His children make a difference as well; many characters are openly based on King’s family, and he does have a gift for observation.

I remembered Bag of Bones wrong; the first time I read it, it felt like it was a lot more about Sara and a lot less about Maddie. This time, I was waiting for the whole bit with Maddie to get out of the way so we could get to the main story about Sara. I was about three hours from the end – audiobook – when I finally twigged that Maddie was part of the main story.

The audiobook includes an interview with King on the topic of audiobooks. When he first wanted to listen to them, very few unabridged recordings were available, so he would pay his children $18 for each ninety-minute tape recording of a book he wanted to have read. It really is no wonder that King’s two sons, Owen King and Joe Hill, both grew up to be authors.

What is interesting is that relatively few of King’s characters are LGBT, despite the fact that his daughter Naomi is openly gay. Naomi’s life is less open than her brothers’, as she is less of a public figure. Perhaps King also considers her life to be private. I didn't realise, until I read this article, that she's a wheelchair user.  I'm not sure at which point in her life she began using a wheelchair, but it would be interesting to see if King's characters start using them more after that point.  So far, I think it's only been Paul Sheldon in Misery.

The next work of King’s is The Storm of the Century, a TV series for which he wrote the script. I’ve decided that while I will try to watch the series, I won’t try to hunt down the script to read it. I’ll be moving on to The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon – another book I’ve read before.

In Which We Discuss Books I Read in my 28th Year, Week 3/52

Five books last week! That’s the 27th August to the 3rd September – and yes, I realise I’m writing this on the 7th of September! I’m moving to Manchester in eight days, which involves a lot of wrapping things up. For instance, returning my last West Midlands library book. I’d returned all the books I’d borrowed from Sandwell, Dudley, and Solihull, so that only left House of Leaves to go back to Birmingham. I finished rereading it this week and then took it back. It was a little anti-climactic, really.

I feel like I took in more of the book this time; I noticed little things like the substitution of the word ‘heal’ for ‘heel’. A few notes from my journal;

- If Johnny is the minotaur then his footnotes are the roars, echoing around the House of Leaves. This also indicates a communication through time, a la For the Time Being.
- Navidson doesn’t feel that the tapes really capture the true scope of the house. Really, films not capturing the fullness of a ‘house of leaves’ (book)?

I finished rereading (listening to) Feet of Clay and Jingo this week. Both books in the Ankh-Morpork City Watch sub-series of the Discworld.

Some comments from my diary about Men at Arms; Dorlf reminds me a lot of Simony from Small Gods. They’re both the kind of atheists who spend a lot of time thinking about god. I also spent some time wondering if Cheery is trans, since her genitals are never discussed. She might be; it’s totally irrelevant what genitalia she has, both in and out of universe. She wants to present as female, so she does.

I nearly cried when Big Fido died, the poor mad bastard. He so desperately wanted to be a fallen angel rather than an ascending ape, a la Science of the Discworld. That’s what his wolf thing was about.

In the alternate timeline of Jingo, Vimes dies on the barricades of Ankh-Morpork. Since he’s not yet seen it from the other side, as he will in Night Watch, he’s likely having flashbacks to the first one and watching Keel die, especially when his fellow Watchmen start dying around him. TV Tropes also points out some specific tearjerkers in the order in which the characters die; Detritus immediately after Cheery, as if he waded into a group to avenge her. Visit alongside other Watchmen, finally accepted. Carrot immediately before Vimes, as if he took a the blow for him.

Reg Shoe as well; imagine the flashbacks he’ll be having to the Glorious 25th of May.

Pretties is the second in the Uglies series, another one which I’ve read before. I do like Shay, and it’s a pretty good version.

Bag of Bones I’ll be writing a longer post about later.

In Which We Discuss the Dark Half

First an update on where I am with my project to read all of Stephen King's novels in published order. As before, the red and blue are books I've now read, with red indicating books I had read previously. Below that, the bolded titles are those I'd read previously.  You'll notice that Stephen King has added another two book to the end of the list so far this year, with another to be published in 2016.

- 15/6/13

Carrie - 1974 -  June 15th 2013
'Salem's Lot - 1975 - June 30th 2013
The Shining - 1977 - July 28th 2013
Rage - 1977 - July 31st 2013
Night Shift - 1978 - August 28th 2013
The Stand - 1978 - March 20th 2014
The Long Walk - 1979 - March 23rd 2014
The Dead Zone - 1979 - June 2014
Firestarter - 1980 - August 16th 2014


- 15/6/13 to 17/8/14 - 9

Roadwork - 1981 - 23rd August 2014
Danse Macabre - 1981 - 7th September 2014
- BONUS: Small World (Tabitha King) - 10th September 2014
Cujo - 1981 - 20th September 2014
The Running Man - 1982- 22nd September 2014
The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger - 1982 - 30th September 2014
Creepshow - 1982 - 1st October 2014
Different Seasons - 1982  - 24th October 2014

- 17/8/14 to 25/10/14 - 8 (17)

Christine - 1983
Pet Sematary - 1983
Cycle of the Werewolf - 1983
The Talisman - 1984
Thinner - 1984 

- 25/10/14/14 to 14/07/2015 - 5 (22)

Skeleton Crew - 1985
It - 1986
The Eyes of the Dragon - 1987
The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three - 1987
Misery - 1987 

- 14/7/15 to 18/10/2015 - 5 (27)

The Tommyknockers - 1987
Nightmares in the Sky  - 1988
The Dark Half - 1989 

- 18/10/2015 to 22/12/2015 (30)

Four Past Midnight - 1990
The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands - 1991 
Needful Things - 1991
Gerald's Game - 1992
Dolores Claiborne - 1992

Nightmares and Dreamscapes - 1993
Insomnia - 1994
Rose Madder - 1995
The Green Mile - 1996
Desperation - 1996

The Regulators - 1996
Six Stories - 1997
The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass - 1997
Dark Tower: Little Sisters of Eluria (Legend) - 1998
Bag of Bones - 1998

Storm of the Century - 1998
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon - 1999
The New Lieutenant's Rap - 1999
Hearts in Atlantis - 1999
Blood and Smoke - 1999

"Riding the Bullet" - 2000  
On Writing - 2000 
Secret Windows - 2000 
The Plant - 2000      
Dreamcatcher - 2001

Black House (with Peter Straub) -2001
Everything's Eventual - 2002
From a Buick 8 - 2002
The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla - 2003  
The Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah - 2004

The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower - 2004
Faithful - 2004
- BONUS: 20th Century Ghosts (Joe Hill) - Jan 2005
- BONUS: Josie and Jack (Kelly Braffet)  - Feb 2005
- BONUS: We're All in This Together (Owen King) - 2005

The Colorado Kid - 2005
Cell - 2006
Lisey's Story - 2006
Blaze - 2007
Duma Key - 2008

Just After Sunset - 2008 
Stephen King Goes to the Movies - 2009
Ur - 2009     
Under the Dome - 2009
Blockade Billy - 2010

Full Dark, No Stars - 2010
Mile 81 - 2011    
11/22/63 - 2011
American Vampire (with Scott Snyder) - 2011
"Throttle" (with Joe Hill) - 2012

The Dark Tower: The Wind Through the Keyhole - 2012 
A Face in the Crowd (with Stewart O'Nan) - 2012
"In the Tall Grass"  (with Joe Hill) - 2012
"GUNS" - 2013
Ghost Brothers of Darkland County - 2013

Joyland - 2013
The Dark Man: An Illustrated Poem - 2013
Doctor Sleep - 2013
Mr. Mercedes - 2014      
Revival - November 2014

Finders Keepers - 2015
The Bazaar of Bad Dreams - 2015
End of Watch - 2016

I've just finished reading The Dark Half, which came out when I was about a year old.  It came out after the Richard Bachman psuedonym had been revealed, and draws its plot heavily from that.  In other words, it's about an author whose pseudonym comes to life after it is revealed and symbolically buried.

Thad Beaumont is the writer while George Stark is the pseudonym.  George is also Thad's twin brother, who was consumed in the womb - something that may happen in as many as one out of ten pregnancies.  When Thad starts writing, at the age of twelve, the tissue of George Stark begins to grow again in Thad's brain and is removed as a brain tumour.

Later, George Stark raises an excellent point.  Why shouldn't he survive?  Why does he have to die?

Happily, he's not a very nice guy so we don't need to delve too deeply into that.

When I write, I worry a lot about being misinterpreted or offending people, to the point where it hinders whatever story I'm trying to tell.  In Stephen King's position, I'd have been worried about implying I'd like to murder the person who discovered my pseudonym.  I think that's a small part of why he's a better writer than me; that he's not overly concerned about that, and doesn't let it get in the way of a good plot.

This is the first book to be published after Tabitha King's ultimatum over Stephen King's drinking and drugs problems (not including his essay in Nightmares in the Sky), and you can see some of that in Thad's relationship to George.  George is a part of him, and not a part he completely rejects.  He can see that it's a part of him that threatens his family, his friends and his well-being, as well as something that keeps him from his best work; however, it is still a part of him.  It's still his twin.

Despite that, George Stark has to go because he's not a very nice guy.  Because he threatens everything Thad Beaumont holds dear.

Sheriff Alan Pangborn later shows up in Bag of Bones, another book that I've read previously.  You can read James Smythe's article here.

The next book is Four Past Midnight.