Fairy Tale

Fairy Tale by Stephen King (2022) Another story with a kid whose mother is dead. Can someone direct me to a good essay about why this is so prominent, from Nancy Drew to this book and about half of them in-between? The poor moms! I don’t know why I’ve struggled to connect with Stephen King books—after all, his memoir is my favorite book On Writing. This one was great fun—but the longer the protagonist wore on me, the less I liked it. Maybe just because he’s a 17-year-old regular dude. There are other troubling things—the focus on virility, beauty, bravery, and gun lust—which I guess is just the real world (as well as a lot of fairy tale world)—but still, the author is inventing this world. But, overall, the tale of the other world is so vivid I felt like I was there—S. King is the guy you want on the other side of your campfire. Maybe books are like friends—it’s hard to say why you connect, or don’t connect—and harder still to say why you grow apart. But I have respect for all books, same as all people—at least the ones whose foundation isn’t hatred. As you might expect with this title, it’s constantly self-referential, something that sometimes bothers me and sometimes delights me—I guess depending on how it’s done—same with the constant allusions—I’m more receptive the ones I know. Too lazy to go back and revisit most of the fairy tales, or the Bradbury that I missed. Speaking of which, my favorite Ray Bradbury is that most grounded in the everyday—and I also liked the calmly drawn-out and fascinating regular world first half of this book, most. On the other hand—there’s nothing I like more than a story about a deep, mysterious hole, or well—no disappointment there. And I can use a happy ending once in a while, as well as the love of a dog, and a reprieve from senseless tragedy. Though, I’ve got to say, I would have covered that well with more than concrete and sheets of steel. There are probably people out there looking for it right now. And some of them are sequelists.

4.2.24