It's been a good 10-12 years since I've read this one, and it was long overdue for a re-read. Especially considering the fact that the only story I could really even remember in even the vaguest way was "The Long Walk". So I picked it up to give it another whirl. Not disappointed at all, but of course, that's no surprise."Rage" slipped through the cracks in my mind, big-time. I was browsing around online, and seen an article about this book of SK's about a school shooting that was no longer being published. I was like "huh?" Didn't remember it at all. Good thing I've got this edition for my collection. It's the story of boy (Charlie Decker) reaching his breaking point. Mentally unstable, he's got this deep, hateful rage toward his father going back to when he was a toddler. Due to his mentality, he has some trouble in school, especially one time when he gets called up to the blackboard to do a problem, and the teacher makes fun of him. So he busts the teacher in the head with a big wrench. That sets in motion more problems for Charlie, with the principal, with the guidance counselor, and with his father. So one day he decides to use the gun he's been carrying around, and after lighting a fire in his locker, he proceeds to kill two teachers, and holds his classmates hostage. But not with the intention of killing them. Sure, he threatens it, but mostly he just wants to teach them a lesson of sorts. Through the day, the kids learn things about each other, and themselves, culminating in some revenge taken out on another student. Charlie ends up in a mental hospital, and that's probably for the best."The Long Walk" is so far my favorite in this collection. I love the characterization, the boys on this walk, Garraty, McVries, Stebbins, poor, sweet Scramm... I definitely wanted more information on what kind of world they were living in, how had this walk come about, what was going on with the Government, what and why was this Squad-ing? I can't imagine having to walk like this, endless, no stopping, no resting. I'd die for sure! I like how the boys handled it differently, and I liked how SK depicted the encroaching madness. The only thing I didn't like was the ending. What the heck? He made it to the end, his mind had been slipping, but mostly seemed to be holding in there, then when he finally reached the end and won, I guess it was too much for his mind to handle? I don't know, I didn't like how he just took off running. Stop, man! You won, you're done, lay down and rest, y'know? Otherwise an excellent story."Roadwork" was another one I didn't really remember, but now I'm really glad I read it. It may even be the new best in the collection. I thought it was quite a good story, if a little slow in the beginning. It's a day by day tale of a depressed guy, Barton Dawes, who just decides he can't take it anymore. By all outward appearances, he's happy, good marriage with a pretty wife, nice house, a long-time job at an industrial laundry. But the city has plans underway to build a freeway extension that will go right through his neighborhood, destroying his home, and the plant he works at. So inside, sort of subconsciously, he's freaking out. He's supposed to be handling the deal on the new plant where his company will move to, and his wife thinks he's handling the finding of their new home as well. He's balking at the idea of over 20 years of memories being bulldozed and paved over, especially when he thinks of his son who passed away. That plays a big part in his breakdown/rebellion. He starts talking to himself, he spins a ton of lies, and eventually ends up losing his wife and job. In place of going to work, he begins traveling up and down the freeway every day, and even stops to pick up a hitchhiker one day. She ends up being a good part of his thoughts, and I liked her character (though I really liked his wife Mary too). He finds Sal Magliore, an Italian mobster type character, a little stereotypical, but easy to envision in my mind, and even sort of likable in a strange way, so not a terrible thing I guess. Bart has a plan to make his point and go out with a bang, and it works, if only for a short while. I almost am surprised at how much I liked this story. Reading the short little description on the back of the cover, I didn't think this would be one I would be real into, but it was an excellent surprise, and it's now a story I'll think about for a good while."The Running Man" took me by surprise. This was a great sort of dystopian story, where America has been sort of taken over by a TV (Free-Vee) Network, and poor people are just fodder for the "entertainment" machine. The main character, Ben Richards is poor, unemployed with pretty much no chances of getting a job, sort of angry and down in the dumps, his baby daughter sick with an awful case of the flu, and no way of getting medical help for her. Their meals consist of a food pill for him and his wife, maybe some fake coffee, and fake milk for the baby. On the Free-Vee, there are game shows, brutal and even sort of sinister. For example, "Treadmill to Bucks" where the contestants all have heart or respiratory problems. They are put on a treadmill, and for every minute they walk while keeping up conversation with the show host, they win ten dollars. Every couple of minutes, they'll be asked a question, and if they get it right, they'll get fifty dollars. If they get it wrong, fifty dollars is deducted from their winnings so far, and the treadmill's speed is increased. Contestants frequently have heart attacks and/or strokes. And that's just one of the tamer day-time shows. The prime-time ones are even worse. So Ben, with no other options, decides to go to the Network headquarters and sign up for a show. He's just one of a long line of poor people waiting to sign up. Finally, he gets in, and is put through a barrage of physical and mental tests, and is selected as a contestant. He's one of six that get called up to the upper offices, and 3 of the six are led off on way, while Ben, a guy named Laughlin, and another guy get led off the other way. Turns out, Ben has been selected to be the new man on the hit show "The Running Man", a show where two guys (in this case Ben and Laughlin) are introduced to Free-Vee audiences nationwide, and given exaggerated profiles of being anti-social and anti-establishment. They have a 12 hour headstart before Hunters start coming after them, and citizens everywhere are encouraged to call in and report sightings, they get rewarded $100 for a proven sighting, and $1000 for a sighting resulting in the contestants death. For every hour the men stay alive, they earn $100, and if they happen to kill a law-enforcement official, they earn a $100 bonus. Ben's desperate for the money for his family, and he has to trust that the people in charge will give it to his wife. So with everyone on the lookout for him and hating his guts, he's released back into the city. And oh yea, he has to mail in two 10 minute video tapes to the Network per day, or he'll forfeit the money, and the hunt will still be on. Too bad the Network uses the postage stamps to locate Ben, despite saying that they wouldn't. Ben meets up with some more of "his people" (the poor from the inner-city) and gains an accomplice who helps him elude the Hunters, if only for a short time. But someone reports him, forcing him to make a run for it, getting him injured in the process. He starts to take desperate measures, taking a hostage, and bluffing his way through roadblocks and onto a plane. Here, towards the end, the story was really flying, I couldn't read fast enough, it was like barreling downhill toward a river. Ben discovers some terrible things on his last flight, and makes a dramatic last stand, with a fiery conclusion. I loved the ending. Loved it! I won't give it away, but it was excellent, I was left with a big grin on my face, saying "Hell yea!"All of these stories were great in my opinion, and having finished, I don't know if I could pick a favorite between "The Long Walk", "Roadwork" and "The Running Man". A great collection of some early work by SK, and his younger style definitely is represented well here.
Every time I re-read this, with my old, ragged copy that's falling apart at the seams with masking tape and hope keeping it from completely collapsing into a pile of loose pages, I fall a little bit more in love with it. I'm going to take it a novel at a time, because I love each and every one of them, even if it did take me a while to enjoy Roadwork as much as I do now, or at all, really, so let's get started.Rage, first of all - I've always loved Rage, and I love that it's the first one in the bindup because it's so interesting. I remember hearing a reviewer on YouTube describe it as 'Breakfast Club with a gun' once, and that's just about the best description of this book that I've ever heard. It follows Charlie Decker, who holds up his algebra class and they all have a lot of fun. It's got that definite 'early King' feel, and it makes me slightly angry and in-awe because he wrote the thing when he was younger than I am now . Like, God.Next up is The Long Walk, which is actually my favorite book. Like, I re-read this thing at least twice a year, that's how much I love it and all of the characters and everything. I love everything, to misquote Abraham on purpose because what he actually says wouldn't really work here. I just really love all of the characters you meet along the way, and how they're all broken down completely before being shot in the head. My favorite character fluctuates - I was a die-hard Barkovitch fan for the longest time, that kid's hilarious, but now I've finally accepted the fact that my favorite is Abraham and also that Stebbins is dumb and that he will never be my favorite and I don't understand why he is liked because I hate that kid. I could say a lot more about TLW, but it's time for Roadwork. See, I didn't like Roadwork the first time I read it. Or.... the second time. Or third time. Or for a while after that. But as I was re-reading this thing at least once a year, I ran into it at least once a year. And somewhere along the line, I really started to appreciate it. It's about this dude who's got a road ready to be built through his house and through his workplace, and he decides to take matters into his own hands and it's pretty fun. As of today, it's still probably my least favorite, but I do really love it. And last, The Running Man, which is honestly just a ton of fun. I just love this one, and I love how fast-paced it is and how the high the stakes are and even how interesting the world is. See, both TLW and TRM take place in a dystopian world, but the world in TLW is distinctly more similar to our own; the only real differences seem to be the Walk and the Major, neither of which we (obviously) have. But in TRM, King's created this almost entirely different dystopian world, and let me tell you how interesting it is to read this book in 2015, when most of the stuff in this book has already 'taken place.' Also, it's freaky to me that Ben Richards was 'born' a month after I was. Like that's freaky. I don't even know it's just freaky. But in the end, I really love these books, and I really love how all of the Bachman Books are told . I love how depressing the ends are - Roadwork and TRM have more satisfying endings than Rage or TLW, but they're still not happy endings, really - and I just love everything. Everybody. I love everybody.
What do You think about The Bachman Books (1996)?
Long Walk was Long, and for the most of the trek it was good. The best part was the inability to recognize the reality in which it was happening... With little hints of ultra-right United States, the bombing of East Coast by Nazis and the charge of Nazi nuclear plants. This idea forms a book I would love to read.Running Man was a dystopian vision of a world where capitalist machine resorted to bread and games, neat old trick used forever, with a little twist at the end which reminded me of a certain real event in the United States. Nicely written, but unrealistic.This collection got a five because of the Roadwork. I have read a lot of King's work, and Roadwork left me as breathless as The Dark Tower, It or Mist have. This is young King writing as best as old King can, with a disturbing insight at a deep sense of lost.
—Mlaad Fâkof
I gave this book only a three star because it isn't "typical" Stephen King. It is early Stephen King and a bit "sick"--He has taken this book out of publication, and I had to search libraries and use interlibrary loan to find it. Perhaps it is with good reason that he has stopped further publication of the book. It contains one story (Rage) which is about a school shooting--very disturbing to me, since I am faculty at Virginia Tech and was here for the 2007 shooting incident. It contains another story (The Running Man), where (spoiler.....) the end concludes with the main character flying an airplane into a skyscraper. I have too many disturbing visions from 911 and reading that surprising last part of the story (I didn't predict that was going to happen) left me shaking. I guess unless you are ready to be disturbed with stories that are a little too close to home, leave this old book in the library....
—Deborah Good
Thomas wrote: "Kimberly wrote: "THE LONG WALK is probably my absolute favorite by King..."Wow, really? I mean it's good and all, but it's a really hard read I think."It hits on a mental, physical, and psychological level. What more could you ask for? And the ending!!!
—Thomas Strömquist
