|
|
Post by dem bones on Jun 18, 2009 17:23:37 GMT
Stephen King - Misery (New English Library, 1988) Blurb Mouth-to-mouth, the woman had forced him back to life, pumping great sickly-sweet gusts of bad breath into him. Sickly-sweet, she smiled down at him, pushing the painkillers into his dry mouth with her big, work-coarsened fingers. Coyly, smilingly, she pillow-plumped and nursey-talked and made sure he finished up every last little scrap.
He was a writer. She was his Number One Fan. She'd pulled him out of the car-wreck, brought him home, splinted and set his mangled legs. All he had to do in return was to write a very special book, just for her, all about her favourite character from his novels. One he'd killed off and now had to bring back to life.
Because if he didn't, if he was Bad and Didn't Do What Nurse Told Him, she would be cross - very cross - and do things that would make him scream and scream ...Author Paul Sheldon's most lucrative novels are the Misery Chastain romances which, despite their adoring public, he despises, convinced he has a more important book in him if only someone would commission it. His legs smashed and body broken in a car accident, Paul is dragged from the wreckage by former nurse Annie Wilkes, the original Colorado Beetle, who just happens to be his number one fan. Deciding not to burden the hospital with another patient when she has the situation under complete control, Annie tends her patient in between catching up on the brand new Misery novel. That's the brand new Misery novel which concludes on the heroine's death ... It takes a very long time for Annie's rage to subside, by which time Paul is in a worse physical condition than ever and his manuscript for his 'serious' novel, Fast Cars is no more. Utilising the huge supply of drugs she's stockpiled down the years, an axe and a blowtorch, Annie convinces Paul to resurrect Misery for a new adventure dedicated to the saintly woman who saved his life. Once he settles down to the task, Paul actually gets to relish his task even after he's discovered Annie's scrapbook and her dark and terrible secret .... A claustrophobic, sporadically nasty, page-turner, Misery (brilliant title) reads suspiciously like a catalogue of Stephen King's personal nightmares and contains an amputation scene as horrifying as anything i've read of his. King has compared his novels to happy meals - fine while you're doing 'em but half an hour later you'll want something more substantial. He's doing himself a huge disservice, of course, but now he's put it into my head, Misery really is a bit like that (and so are Christine and Gerald's Game for that matter). I still prefer it to the film.
|
|
