Wednesday, March 16, 2011

#71 A note on Stephen King

365 Blog Challenge: Post #71

I'm currently reading "Firestarter" by Stephen King, one of his books from the early '80s which was later turned into a film staring Drew Barrymore (pre-rehab).  Reading this book reminds me why writing is so multi-faceted, and that a writer's individual strengths are what make them so incredible.  The first book I read by Stephen King was "Under the Dome", his recent best-seller that totals over 1,100 pages, and while reading "Firestarter", I can see how much King has matured in his story telling.  In his early work, he still has a knack for creating likeable, endearing characters, as well as characters who make your stomach turn.  He knows how to keep you reading, how much to tell you without ruining anything but also keeping you interested.  It's as if he honed his talents throughout the years so that as a veteran author, he can hold together an incredibly complicated book with numerous important characters and plot lines.  He matured enough as a writer to create an epic.  King is described as a master story-teller, and although his writing isn't elegant or beautiful or lyrical, his stories are so great that those things don't matter.  Why clutter a good tale with pretty language when a plainer language allows one to appreciate that tautness of the story?  King seems to know his strengths and weaknesses as a writer, and he doesn't try to be something he's not.  Perhaps this is a key to his success.

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