Darker than Your Wonderland, Chapters 22-24

Part 7 is here.

22: Father

It came to a head that June shortly before they left for the holidays. As Rose and Scorpius walked to the room of requirement together, they passed Aphelocoma. The younger girl gave Rose a look of surprise, which made Rose grind her teeth. Why shouldn't I be friends with Scorpius?, she thought resentfully.

Even when they'd settled into their chairs, she was still fuming.

Scorpius pulled a letter from his robes. "This came this morning," he told her. "My father would-"

"Your father would what?" She snapped. "Would like the 'mudblood' to leave you alone?"

"...would like to invite you to join us for dinner at some point during the holidays. What did you just say?"

She didn't reply.  Her skin was flushed and she suddenly felt as if any movement would result in falling.

"What did you just accuse my father of?" He repeated, his tone dangerously soft.

She rallied her fury; it was the only strength she had at that moment. "Your father hates me, doesn't he? Me and my family? He thinks I'm not good enough for you, doesn't he? And your sister, too! Because my grandparents are muggles!"

Scorpius stared at her, stunned. The anger drained out of Rose, leaving only shame. She suddenly felt that she'd made a terrible mistake.

"You want to know what my father thinks of you?" Scorpius asked. His voice was quiet but intense, his eyes worse. She felt them burning into her, and couldn't look away.

Between then, a pensieve melted into place, as if it had always been there. Not taking his eyes from hers, Scorpius placed his wand to his forehead, and used it to draw a shimmering stream of memory into the basin.

"Look," he said, and it wasn't a request.

23: Pensieve

She saw Scorpius and his father. Draco was seated at a desk, while Scorpius stood in front of it.

He looks so young, Rose thought, realising that Scorpius was only twelve here.

"Father -" Scorpius began. Draco waved a hand and cut him off.

"Scorpius, I won't say that I wasn't surprised. That was a very awkward position to be put into with no warning."

Scorpius thought for a moment then said, "I understand, father. I apologise."

Scorpius sounded like an adult, in his apology. Rose knew that at his age both she and Hugo would have uttered either a sulky 'sorry!' or an overly affectionate one, eager to have the disagreement over with. They wouldn't have stood there and considered the situation.

Draco nodded. The two regarded one another as equals, and Rose noticed a small smile lighting up Draco's eyes.

"Why did you keep it from me, my boy?"

"Father, I -" Scorpius seemed lost for words. "I didn't think you'd approve."

Draco nodded again, this time, his eyes distant and lost in thought.

"I understand, my son." He said. "You and I both know that I had my problems with both of her parents. I made a great many mistakes then, ones that I know you will not repeat."

Scorpius shook his head, solemnly.

"I do not believe that I am able to fix the past, Scorpius, or to make amends. All I can do is ensure that you and your sister do not repeat it. And I must apologise for the situation I have put you in, for the effect my past has had on your present."

This time Scorpius nodded. Rose was fascinated by the way the father and son interacted. The elder Malfoy seemed to make a great effort to treat his son as an equal, and Rose did not doubt that Scorpius had been right – Draco did love him. Although physical interaction between the two was so cold as to be nonexistent, they understood one another.

Thinking back to Scorpius' desire to care for Aphelocoma, Rose realised why it had meant so much to him. He'd wanted the responsibility so that he could show his parents that he was growing into an equal, that he was being raised into a good man. He wanted to make them proud of him.

She regretted how much of Scorpius she'd missed by forgoing his invitations to observe him with his family. So much of him was clear in this context, more than she could ever have suspected, and she wished she'd seen more of it.

"I should make this absolutely clear;" Draco continued. "I do not disapprove of your friendship with Miss Weasley."

Scorpius smiled then, in a small but noticeable way. Draco smiled back.

"After all," he continued. "The Malfoys have retained their money and blood, but what have we lost? The wizarding world does not trust us. We have much reduced power, politically. Our respect is greatly lowered. My boy, if it suits you to build bridges with the Weasleys or Potters, rest assured that this will not have a negative effect on your family. Quite the opposite. Times have changed, and they now have the things we lack.  They are now the pinnacle of our society.  Only a very stupid man would stay wedded to his past ideas when the context has changed so drastically, and whatever else I may be Scorpius, I do pride myself on not being more stupid than I can help."

Scorpius rolled his eyes then, his smile growing wider. "Father, you are a Slytherin to the end."

Draco grinned back. "Another thing I pride myself on, Scorpius. Now go play with your sister, I have work to do."

24: Beyond

Rose stared at Scorpius, feeling her pulse thudding in her throat.

For years now, she'd been convinced that his father didn't approve of their friendship, that he'd called her horrible names, that he'd looked down on her. It shook her to the core to learn that these thoughts were all in her head.

Her eyes met his, and he nodded, his face stony. Then he broke their gaze and started pacing.

"You didn't even give him a chance!" Scorpius raged. He couldn't seem to bear to look at her now.  "You and your father – you were so damn sure that he was still the same person he was as a teenager! You didn't think he could grow, or change, or make a sensible decision! You focused on your own prejudice, and refused to see what was right in front of you!"

"Skip - "

"Don't call me that!"

Rose drew back as if she'd been slapped.

"And my sister! What has my sister ever done to you? She doesn't like you, but it's not because of your parents! It's because-"

And he paused for a breath, his fury leaving him, replaced by something older and more weary.

"...It's because she thinks you're no good for me. Because we talked about how you avoid me sometimes. How you don't want me to meet your family, and refuse to meet me. Because she thinks you can never forget that we're Malfoys, and I always told her that that wasn't true, but I guess-"

His voice cracked, and he paused, furious at himself for showing any kind of weakness.

"I guess she was right."

Rose gaped at him.

She didn't know how to make it right. He was right; she'd taken all those stories from twenty-five years ago, and turned his father into a demon. She would have hated it if someone had done that to her father, however well deserved. She knew from Scorpius' memory that Draco had been willing to build bridges between their families, though he wasn't brave enough to take the first step; but she'd continued to cast him in the role of the villain, and hadn't given him a chance. She'd listened to stories, and jumped to conclusions, and hadn't taken the time to simply listen to her friend, and treat him like a friend.

Good guys - something she'd always prided herself on being - weren't supposed to do things like that.

Scorpius started pacing again, working himself into anger, to keep himself away from tears.

"I bet you were congratulating yourself," Scorpius spat. "On being so kind to a Malfoy!" He put on a mocking, high-pitched voice. "Oh, poor Scorpius, his father's so evil! I must save him from the evil Malfoys! He's okay, he's not like a real Malfoy, he's acceptable!"

He glared at her.

"My father has never had a bad word to say about you, Rose.  Never. Are you going to hold his past mistakes against him – against us – forever? Is that what you see, every time you look at me, the grandson of a Deatheater, the son of someone beyond redemption?"

"People change, Rose. My father isn't the same person he was a quarter of a century ago, and I'm not him, and he isn't my grandfather."

For the first time in her life, Rose was lost for words. Her world had shrunk to those two ice-blue eyes, now brimming over with an anger which, she knew, was there to disguise the hurt.

After a few seconds, which seemed to stretch on forever, he broke their gaze again, and stormed out.

It was all hitting her at once. She knew that his friendship with her was the only really close friendship he had. She looked back over all the conversations they'd had, as she knew he must be doing. All those times she'd said "our families won't approve", and she'd meant his father, and he must have thought she meant hers. How long had he spent thinking her parents didn't like him, that she'd been avoiding their meeting for that reason?

He'd never have told her how much that had hurt. And how much worse, now, to know that she'd thought so little of his father, of his family? His family, who meant everything to him, like hers did to her.

Rose let herself fall backwards, onto a sofa which had appeared. She needed to process this. She needed to think. 

Part 9 is here.

Darker than Your Wonderland, Chapters 19-21

Part 6 is here.

19: Enigma

Rose and Scorpius' friendship wasn't the same, after that. She couldn't forget how Aphelocoma had looked at her, like she wondered why Rose was talking to her brother. It made Rose wonder why, in fact, she was talking to Scorpius.

They still spent some time together, but not like they used to. They'd study together, in the Ravenclaw common room but they no longer sat around and read books with each other.

Rose missed him, deeply. She missed sitting with him for hours, neither of them needing to say anything at all. She missed talking about books with him. She missed watching his face, unguarded as he read, especially now that she only saw it guarded, in front of others.

He was so good at keeping his face guarded. His natural expression was the one that made him seem haughty and that served to keep people away, as he preferred. He rarely showed true happiness or pride, not in any obvious ways.

Rose heard people mutter about his family sometimes, particularly Gryffindors, who were still deeply suspicious of the Malfoys. He never showed that he'd heard that, either.

Scorpius Malfoy was an enigma. Rose wished they could go back to the days when she'd been the person he didn't guard against, but she didn't know how.

She didn't even know where to start.

She didn't even try.

20: Clearly-

It was in February that she overheard Aphelocoma talking with her friends. Rose was waiting for Al, sitting in an alcove by the Slytherin common room, when Aphelocoma walked out, surrounded by her friends.

"The Weasley girl?" Aphelocoma was saying in response to a friend's question. "I guess that's all over. Merlin knows why they were ever friends in the first place. She's clearly-"

Aphelocoma's voice faded, as she drew further away from Rose. Hidden in her alcove, Rose was red with fury. She was clearly what? Too poor? Too common?

Fuming, Rose marched off in the other direction, deciding that she'd see Al later when she'd cooled down. She headed for the library, but abruptly turned around when she saw Scorpius and headed off to spend the rest of the day hiding in her dorm.

A week later, Rose had decided that enough was enough. At breakfast, she screwed up her courage and sat next to Scorpius instead of with the other girls from her year. He smiled at her when she did, a genuine smile.

Rose didn't often take the time to reflect on it, but she knew that Scorpius wasn't close to anyone except herself and his sister. There were people he spent time with, but none that he was really close to.

She took a book from her satchel and showed it to him under the table. The Visitor, it was called, by the same author as Beauty.

"Come with me after classes?" she asked. "Let's go read, like we used to."

"Yes," Scorpius said, smiling again, his fleeting, genuine, smile. "Anywhere in particular you wanted to go?"

21: The Shadow

She took him to the room of requirement, a place her mother had told her about. Today, it had a roaring fire, two cosy armchairs, and a plate piled high with little cakes and biscuits.

They talked about Beauty first, the book he'd given her. Looking at the publishing date, Rose knew that Snape must have bought the book shortly after her parents had started at Hogwarts. She wondered if he'd been thinking of Lily; it seemed more feminine than his usual tastes. She wondered if he'd thought himself akin to the lover who was believed long dead, and abandoned, but was found and reclaimed, almost too late.

Scorpius' gift The Visitor, a book about a future world where people had forgotten the present, and misunderstood the meanings of mundane items. Where people thought that muggles living today were magic, and that the simplest match stick was evidence of their great power. Rose found it frightening, how knowledge could be so easily lost between generations and superstition grown in its place and she thought Scorpius would be interested in that idea, too.

They settled down to read companionably by the light of the fire, in peaceful silence except when they wanted to discuss something in one of their books.

For the next three months, they were back to their old friendship. They were happy. The only shadow, as Rose saw it, was that of his parents.

Part 8 is here.

Darker than Your Wonderland, Chapters 16-17

Part 5 is here.

16: Bluffing

Things were almost the same between them after that. She didn't hug him any more – Scorpius didn't do physical affection, she knew, though he had appreciated it that time – but they'd study and read together.

Scorpius had changed since they'd met, Rose realised. He'd been a shy, quiet boy, who'd kept himself to himself. He was still shorter than her, still had a boyish face, but the girls she knew were already becoming envious of their closeness. His shyness and quietness was tempered with a charm that transfigured them into cool and aloof, now he was fourteen.

They didn't share as much as they once had. Now they were both thoroughly entrenched in puberty, they had secrets from one another. Rose developed a crush on another boy in their year, a Gryffindor, Mike Finnegan. He didn't have the glass handsomeness of Scorpius, but he was cute, and had a cheeky sort of charm that made her laugh. She enjoyed watching him, and daydreaming about him, from a distance. She never got up the courage to approach him.

Likewise, she never got up the courage to talk to Scorpius about their kiss, or about the hug. He metered out physical affection so carefully that she thought they must be important. At times, she was convinced that he was in love with her, and was only waiting for the right moment. She stacked up the evidence in her mind, and knew there could be no doubt.

At other times, she stacked the evidence again, and found quite a different total. She knew they were just friends; he'd rejected her kiss, hadn't he? He'd never touched her of his own volition, had he?

Sometimes, she thought about kissing him again, seeing what would happen. She thought he might go along with it, not because he fancied her, but simply because he trusted her. She didn't want to do that to him. She loved being friends with him, and although she daydreamed about lying in his arms to read, or kissing him again, she wasn't quite ready for any of it to really happen. The whole issue was so confusing, so contradictory, that she didn't want to share it with anyone, especially not him. She wanted to get it sorted in her head, get it all straight, then act on it, not spread her confusion to him.

It never occurred to her that he would be confused too, that he would suffer such conflicting feelings. Everyone else seemed to have things together; they seemed to know what they wanted, to know what they were doing, and why. It wasn't until she was much, much older that she realised that everyone was just as confused as she was, at fourteen. Everyone was bluffing.

17: Think

They shared a carriage again on the way back to King's Cross at the end of their third year. Rose was re-reading the book he'd given her at Christmas; Beauty, it was called. She liked the idea that beauty bred true; that things would turn out okay in the end.

As the train drew into the station, she saw Draco Malfoy waiting on the platform. She drew back, so she couldn't be seen from the windows, and told Scorpius to go on ahead, that she'd write him something on the Seposita Stilus parchment later.

Rose left the train a few minutes after Scorpius did, which gave him and his father time to find one another. She smiled at him, briefly, as she passed, and saw Draco appraising her with a cool stare. Her cheeks flushed, but she held her head high, as her parent's stories, overheard since she was a child, came flooding back.

He can think what he likes, she thought, furiously. Skip and I will always be friends. And if he ever calls me a mudblood to my face, I'll –

18: Slytherin

That year, their fourth, was the year that Aphelocoma Malfoy started at Hogwarts.

Rose and Scorpius had sent messages to each other all through the summer, but had been able to see each other very few times. For much of the summer, Scorpius had accompanied his sister in buying her school equipment.

He'd asked for the privilege, he told Rose, wanting the responsibility of caring for his sibling. Rose didn't quite understand why it meant so much to him - she'd never willingly volunteer to take care of Hugo - but she was pleased for him.

Scorpius and Alephocoma walked onto the train together. Rose was already in their usual carriage, curled up with a book. Scorpius nodded to her as he passed, his hands on his little sister's shoulders. She smiled at him, but stopped quickly when she saw Aphelocoma's expression. The younger girl looked disdainful, confused as to why Rose was smiling at her brother.

Rose watched them walked past, further into the train. That was the first year in which she and Scorpius hadn't sat together.

Aphelocoma was sorted into Slytherin, and Rose wasn't at all surprised.

Part 7 is here.

Darker than Your Wonderland, Chapters 13-15

Part 4 is here.

13: More to Lose

In a letter written later that week, Rose poured her heart out to her mother. She was still young enough to do that, though she wouldn't be for much longer.

Your father worries too much, Rose. Hermione had written. She'd ended with a warning, not for Rose, but for Scorpius. Remember that he has more to lose over this friendship than you do. I can't imagine his father being pleased over your relationship, though he may have learned to live with things that displease him by now.

Reading that reminded Rose of a conversation she'd overheard over the summer.

"I doubt he was pleased that his boy ended up in Ravenclaw," her mother had said. Her father had agreed.

Alone in the dormitory, Rose wondered if her friendship was hurting Scorpius. She knew that even if it was, he would never tell her or anyone else.

14: Rejection

Most of Rose's cousins were attending Hogwarts now, and she found herself distracted by them. It took her over a month to notice that Scorpius had returned one of her books without asking to borrow another. She wondered if he was avoiding her, and admitted to herself that the idea wouldn't surprise her.

She thought about their kiss a lot. It hadn't meant so much to her at the time, but now that they weren't speaking nearly as much as they used to, it grew in significance, along with the idea that she had been rejected.

15: They -

Before Rose knew it, it was Christmas. It had been weeks since she and Scorpius had spoken, the longest they'd gone since that first summer holiday. They were both fourteen now, her birthday passing in the September, and his in the November.

She'd decided not to go home for Christmas, a decision that had not surprised her family.  At least, not nearly as much as she'd expected. She may have spent more time with her cousins recently, but they'd never quite understood her as a Ravenclaw. She'd kept herself to herself since the sorting.  Since longer before then, if she were totally honest.

She'd told her family that she had a lot of studying to do, what with the new classes she'd taken up. They didn't question her decision, especially when they remembered how hectic her mother's schedule had been during her third year.

Scorpius stayed too, exactly as she'd heard that he would. A few days before Christmas, she sought him out in the library.

"Skip?" She asked, peering over a pile of books.

He looked up from his parchment, rubbing his forehead.

"Haven't seen you in a while, Rose," he replied, his face guarded.

Rose chewed her lower lip. He'd never been like this with her, not before this year. She wondered whether or not his father had told him to be distant. Still, she decided to plough on with the course she'd chosen.

"I brought you a present." she said, holding the package out.

He smiled then, a real smile, one that seemed almost grateful. She wondered then whether his family had sent him any Christmas presents, or whether they would shun him, for being a Ravenclaw who'd befriended a Weasley. From what she'd heard she wouldn't have put it past them and, not for the first time, she felt a flicker of hatred towards his father.

Scorpius reached into his bag and drew out a similar package. "I got you a present, too."

She returned his smile. "We don't have to wait till Christmas, do we?"

He'd grinned properly then, that new expression he'd only begun using since he'd hit his teenage years. It accentuated his eyes and sharp cheekbones, making him look devilishly handsome. "Not if you don't want to,"he assured her.

On mutual agreement, they ripped open the wrapping paper right there and then. They'd bought each other books, of course.

She'd given him a new paperback, The Child Garden. She thought he'd find the future shown there interesting. She'd loved the story, when she'd read it; it was about love, and loss. It was about misunderstandings, someone working hard to unwittingly destroy something they didn't know they had. It was about doing exactly the wrong thing for all the right reasons.

She'd cried after reading it, and she'd wanted to share those feelings with him.

He'd given her a second-hand book, one of Severus'. It had been well-read, and she realised that he was giving her something he couldn't easily replace. She hugged him then, spontaneously.

Scorpius blushed furiously; the first time she'd seen him do more than flush slightly.

"I thought you were avoiding me," he confessed, when she let go.

"I wasn't sure if you'd want to be around me," Rose said, awkwardly.

"Why not?" he asked, sounding hurt. "Did I do something?"

"Oh, no! Oh, Skip, it's not you!"

"Then what, Rosie?"

"It's...our families, Skip." She said eventually, meaning, of course, his family.

She watched clouds drift through his eyes, before they shut down again.

"I see," he said.

She wasn't going to let him go this time. Instead, she leaned over and hugged him again, grasping him tightly.

"They don't have to know," she said.

"Rose -"

"Shh, Skip. I missed you. I'm not going to lose you. They don't have to know."

She waited, clinging, eyes closed. He stroked her hair.

Part 6 is here.

Darker than Your Wonderland, Chapters 10-12

Part 3 is here.

10: Seposita Stilus

It was that January that Scorpius suggested the Seposita Stilus charm. Rose hadn't known what it was, until he'd explained.

The charm would be cast on two pieces of paper, allowing each to see what the other said. He could write a message on one, and it would show up on the other. She could turn it over, write back, and that reply would show up on his copy. They'd be able to wipe the previous messages off before writing new ones.

Once he'd described it, Rose realised that she had heard of the charm before. It was something her older cousins had mentioned using to pass notes in class, and something her uncle George had experimented with, to sell in the shop. The way he'd talked of using it made her think of text messages, something she'd only recently learned about when her muggle grandmother had let Rose play with her mobile phone.

They'd tried it at once, writing messages to one another all through potions. It was almost pointless, since they were sitting right next to one another, and they nearly got detention when the professor realised how little attention they were paying, but it was fun, and quite addictive.

11: Summer

They used the Seposita Stilus a lot during that summer between their second and third years. They were both thirteen now, and their parents had decided that they were old enough to go out alone, so long as they knew where they were heading. Rose's parents never asked her whom she was intending to meet, and she assumed that Scorpius' didn't, either. They took it as a free invitation to see one another.

It was a golden summer. That was the year where every day was sunny, and lasted forever. The year she started calling him 'Skip'. The year they confided in each other that they'd never been kissed.

Rose thought it was probably herself who'd first suggested that they try kissing each other. Just once, for practice. They'd been out near the woods this time, and the sun was halfway to setting. The light had bronzed his hair and burnished hers.

She could still remember how it had felt, when she'd placed her hand on his cheek, and slowly drew him to her. They'd kissed, clumsily. His lips were soft, and her pulse thudded in her throat, until she wasn't sure if she was breathing any more.

They'd drawn away from one another, smiling shyly, then laughing.

"We're too young," Scorpius had said, and she'd agreed.

They were too young.

It was the last golden summer.

12: Aphelocoma

Rose's third year was the year that her younger brother, Hugo, started at Hogwarts. It was also the year that she met Aphelocoma Malfoy, Scorpius' sister.

The girl wasn't starting at Hogwarts that year; she'd just come to see her brother off. She watched Rose from beneath her father's arms, with heavy-lidded, ice-blue eyes. Her expression held a disdain that Rose had never seen on Scorpius' face.

Seeing this, Rose's father had asked, quietly, "are you still friends with that Malfoy boy?"

"I am," Rose had replied.

Her father looked between Rose and Aphelocoma, then nodded at Draco. Lowering his voice, he asked "does he treat you right? Is he nice to you?"

"Yes dad!"

With one last glance at the Malfoys, Rose's father had led her away to stand with her brother and cousins until the train was ready to leave.

"Be careful, Rose," he'd said to her. "This boy isn't his father, I know. But I never knew a Malfoy who didn't have ulterior motives, who didn't have other plans hidden inside their plans."

Seeing her face, he'd added, "I'm sure he's a lovely boy, Rose. I just don't want you to get hurt."

"I won't," she'd lied, though she hadn't known that at the time.

Rose and Scorpius were unable to find an empty carriage this year. However, the one they did find was occupied by only two other people, fifth years who spent the entire time focused on one another, so Rose and Scorpius were able to talk privately.

"Your sister seemed nice," Rose offered.

Scorpius grinned widely, a new expression for him. "That's new. She never seems nice to strangers."

Rose smiled back. She was three or four inches taller than Scorpius now, and beginning to look more like a young woman than a little girl. He still looked like a boy.

"What was your father whispering?" Scorpius asked.

"Oh," Rose began. "He asked if we were still friends. He wanted to know if you were nice to me."

"What did you tell him?"

"That you were."

"Why did he feel the need to ask?" Scorpius asked, frowning.

Rose decided to be honest. "I think it's because of the problems he had with your father at school," she said. "He thinks your father may not approve."

Scorpius didn't reply. Instead, he remained gazing at her, and, for some reason, his expression reminded her of the one she'd seen on his sister's face. She squirmed uncomfortably, and tried to go back to her book.

"Does your father not approve?" Scorpius asked, interrupting. His face was closed now, not open and vulnerable as it would have been if he'd asked the question a year, or even a few months, before.

Rose's ears went red, as she tried to think of how best to phrase it.

"I think he mostly tries not to think about it," she eventually said. Scorpius nodded, then picked up his book, and started reading. The conversation was over.

Rose noted that he hadn't denied her father's accusation.

Part 5 is here.

In Which We Discuss the Gunslinger

I have to admit, The Gunslinger is another one I didn't particularly like.  I didn't particularly dislike it either, and I'm glad to have read it, just so I can now discuss it when it comes up.

It's a western.  I'm not that big on westerns.  And I think Roland is a very stupid and annoying name.  I don't know why I think that.  I just don't like how it sounds.

The Gunslinger was published in June of 1982.  Stephen King was very prolific in that year.  The Gunslinger and The Dark Tower series as a whole do eventually connect the vast majority of King's work together, mostly through sharing characters.  The Dark Man, Randal Flagg, for instance, we have already seen in The Stand.

I also think Randal Flagg is a stupid name.  Probably why he doesn't appeal to me as a character or as a villain.  It makes me think of Randal from Recess, which is not really the intended effect.

I don't think The Dark Tower series is for me, but I'll plough on regardless.  James Smythe enjoyed it a lot more and has lots of intelligent things to say about it.

Next up is Creepshow.  It was released as a graphic novel, with script by Stephen King, but first it was a movie, screenplay also by Stephen King.  Since the comic is expensive and the movie is not, I'm going to watch it rather than read it.

In Which We Discuss the Running Man

A lot of people have sited this as one of their favourite Stephen King  novels.  I can't say I'll be joining them.

Running Man  was a pretty quick read.  Two days, if I recall correctly.  I didn't dislike the book, but reading it more than thirty years after it was published, it did not compare well to more modern books.  Chart Throb  and Dead Famous did the reality TV parody in a way I preferred.  I feel like Play or Die did the hunting human plot better.

I think a big reason why I preferred Play or Die was that it was set in a world closer to mine.  I had a better idea of the options available to the main character, so I could better evaluate her decisions and therefore her resourcefulness and intelligence.  I didn't feel like I could do that with with the Running Man.

Weirdly, wikipedia keeps saying that Running Man is similar to Battle Royale and Hunger Games.  No it isn't, not more so than any other novel.

I've never seen the movie, but I gather it's very different from the book.  James Smythe has, and continues with his excellent Guardian articles here.

Unusually, The Running Man doesn't appear to have any links with other Stephen King novels.