Doctor Sleep
Hi. I woke up this morning and wound up scrolling through Goodreads. I realized I hadn't marked Doctor Sleep as a book I've read. I then felt compelled to review it. So, from 6am this morning:
Doctor Sleep woke me up. The only other Stephen King book I had read was The Shining, and I admit I'm not meant for horror. I read The Shining about five years ago as an adult, and I had to skip a page of text at one point, terrified by Danny running back from the shrubberies, just to be able to finish reading the book. My imagination can't usually handle that excitement. The Shining was worth the stress, though, and Doctor Sleep is worth it even more.
To observe the adult life of Danny Torrance: Oh! I wanted him to be a good person. To watch his conflicted life bleeding out pained me. Yet, the character that weaves through both these books, that I like the best, is the Shining itself: the supernatural ability to connect with other people. The Shining points to a capacity for community, whether that capacity is used for good or evil.
I loved this story very much. I read it as an audiobook, and would gladly read it on paper as well. For the audiobook, the author himself reads his prologue and epilogue, and mentions in the epilogue that the man who wrote The Shining and the man who wrote Doctor Sleep were very different people. King self-identifies that the author of The Shining was "a well-meaning alcoholic". I found that illuminating. It makes me love Stephen King a bit more, to show his audience that much of himself.
I would recommend this for anyone who has chased their own demons at some point, and likewise for anyone who claims the word survivor. I recommend it for everyone, as a story of hope, and of creating family, calling it out of the ether. My heart sings for Doctor Sleep!
Doctor Sleep woke me up. The only other Stephen King book I had read was The Shining, and I admit I'm not meant for horror. I read The Shining about five years ago as an adult, and I had to skip a page of text at one point, terrified by Danny running back from the shrubberies, just to be able to finish reading the book. My imagination can't usually handle that excitement. The Shining was worth the stress, though, and Doctor Sleep is worth it even more.
To observe the adult life of Danny Torrance: Oh! I wanted him to be a good person. To watch his conflicted life bleeding out pained me. Yet, the character that weaves through both these books, that I like the best, is the Shining itself: the supernatural ability to connect with other people. The Shining points to a capacity for community, whether that capacity is used for good or evil.
I loved this story very much. I read it as an audiobook, and would gladly read it on paper as well. For the audiobook, the author himself reads his prologue and epilogue, and mentions in the epilogue that the man who wrote The Shining and the man who wrote Doctor Sleep were very different people. King self-identifies that the author of The Shining was "a well-meaning alcoholic". I found that illuminating. It makes me love Stephen King a bit more, to show his audience that much of himself.
I would recommend this for anyone who has chased their own demons at some point, and likewise for anyone who claims the word survivor. I recommend it for everyone, as a story of hope, and of creating family, calling it out of the ether. My heart sings for Doctor Sleep!