Friday Favorites

Looking for something to read over the weekend?

Nothing on your book radar that is screaming “read me!”?

Check out my Friday Favorite  – it may not be new, it may not even be by an author you have ever heard of, but it will be a book that has captured both my imagination and my heart.

This week, to mark the release of Mr King’s latest book, Sleeping Beauties, written in collaboration with Owen King, I thought I would take a look back at one of my favorite Stephen King novels,  Doctor Sleep.

Doctor Sleep (The Shining, #2)
by Stephen King (Goodreads Author)

Reviewed by

Sandy *The world could end while I was reading and I would never notice* Jones

May 23, 2014  

it was amazing

EXCERPT: ‘He was sitting at the mouth of the stormdrain, looking down a scrubgrass slope at the Cape Fear River and the bridge that spanned it. The night was clear and the moon was full. There was no wind, no snow. And the Overlook was gone. Even if it hadn’t burned to the ground during the tenure of the peanut farmer President, it would have been over a thousand miles from here. So why was he so frightened?

Because he wasn’t alone, that was why. There was someone behind him.

“Want some advice, Honeybear?”

The voice was liquid, wavering. Dan felt a chill go rushing down his back. His legs were colder still, prickled out in starpoints of gooseflesh. He could see those white bumps because he was wearing shorts. His brain might be that of a grown man, but it was currently sitting on top of a five-year-olds body.

Honeybear. Who—–?

But he knew. He had told Deenie his name, but she didn’t use it, just called him Honeybear instead.

You don’t remember that, and besides, this is just a dream.

Of course it was. He was in Frazier, New Hampshire, sleepingwhile a spring snowstorm howled outside Mrs Robertson’s rooming house. Still, it seemed wiser not to turn around. And safer — that, too.

“No advice,” he said, looking out at the river and the full moon. “I’ve been advised by experts. The bars and barbershops are full of them.”

“Stay away from the woman in the hat, Honeybear.”

What hat? he could have asked, but really, why bother? He knew what she was talking about, because he had seen it blowing down the sidewalk. Black as sin on the outside, lined with white silk on the inside.

“She’s the Queen Bitch of Castle Hell. If you mess with her, she’ll eat you alive.”

THE BLURB: Stephen King returns to the characters and territory of one of his most popular novels ever, The Shining, in this instantly riveting novel about the now middle-aged Dan Torrance (the boy protagonist of The Shining) and the very special 12-year-old girl he must save from a tribe of murderous paranormals.

On highways across America, a tribe of people called The True Knot travel in search of sustenance. They look harmless – mostly old, lots of polyester, and married to their RVs. But as Dan Torrance knows, and spunky 12-year-old Abra Stone learns, The True Knot are quasi-immortal, living off the “steam” that children with the “shining” produce when they are slowly tortured to death.

Haunted by the inhabitants of the Overlook Hotel where he spent one horrific childhood year, Dan has been drifting for decades, desperate to shed his father’s legacy of despair, alcoholism, and violence. Finally, he settles in a New Hampshire town, an AA community that sustains him, and a job at a nursing home where his remnant “shining” power provides the crucial final comfort to the dying. Aided by a prescient cat, he becomes “Doctor Sleep.”

Then Dan meets the evanescent Abra Stone, and it is her spectacular gift, the brightest shining ever seen, that reignites Dan’s own demons and summons him to a battle for Abra’s soul and survival. This is an epic war between good and evil, a gory, glorious story that will thrill the millions of hyper-devoted fans of The Shining and wildly satisfy anyone new to the territory of this icon in the King canon.

MY THOUGHTS:

A masterpiece as usual Mr King.
I am always so sad when your books end – I want more!
What is going to happen to Abra?
And Dan?
What happened to the True Knot members who left?
Have they reconvened somewhere else?
So many questions……..
One very satisifed reader.

I hope that when it comes my time to die,  Doctor Sleep is there.

This review and others are also published on my Goodreads.com page. For an explanation of my ratings please refer to my Goodreads.com profile page or my ‘about’ page on sandysbookaday.wordpress.com