I just finished reading: Everything’s Eventual: 14 Dark Tales by Stephen King It took me a long time to get through this book, I threw a bunch of other books in front of it. I don’t know why, out of the 14 stories I really liked 10 of them.
Tales:
01. Autopsy Room Four - This story was written in 1997 but all I could think of was the plot for the movie Awake even though I’ve never seen it. Still the end was pretty funny.
02. The Man in the Black Suit - “King described the piece as an homage to Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story “Young Goodman Brown”. He also states that the story evolved from one his friend told him, in which the friend’s grandfather had come face to face with Satan himself in the form of an ordinary man.” — Wikipedia
This was a creepy story, very detailed, I could see the fish, smell the creek and the sulfur of the man.
03. All That you Love will be Carried Away So very very strange.. I liked it, it felt very real. So many strange thoughts.
04. The Death of Jack Hamilton - “The story is written in the first-person. Homer Van Meter, a member of John Dillinger’s gang, tells of the slow, painful death of fellow gangmember Jack Hamilton. Van Meter begins by describing Dillinger’s death outside the Biograph Theater at the hands of Melvin Purvis’s men.” — Wikipedia
I didn’t care too much about this one, it was well written and certainly not boring, but not very interesting personally.
05. In the Deathroom - “Fletcher, an ex-reporter from the New York Times, has been captured by members of a South American government. The story begins as he is brought into the titular “deathroom” as he realizes that his captors, after interrogating him about a Communist insurgency he has been supporting, due to the government’s killing of a group of nuns which included his sister, will not let him leave this room alive, despite their claims that he will be set free.” — Wikipedia
This story was pretty cool. A nice twist on the torture scene. The ending was smooth.
06. The Little Sisters of Eluria - “The tale features Roland of Gilead, whose quest for the Dark Tower is in its infancy; its events precede those of the body of the Dark Tower cycle, but occur after Roland’s experiences in Mejis as chronicled in Wizard and Glass. At the time of telling he is accompanied by a horse and is already following Walter o’Dim, the Man in Black. He plans to eventually buy another horse, or perhaps a mule; which ties in with the events at the beginning of The Gunslinger.” — Wikipedia
The reason I bought this book was to read this story which ties in to the Dark Tower Series. I was not disappointed! It’s the best story so far and I’ll grab any piece of midworld that I can get.
07. Everything’s Eventual - I liked this story too. I wish it had been a bit longer and explained his power.
08. L.T.’s Theory of Pets - “Except getting mad at Lulu never did any good. Most times, if you had the king, she had the ace. If you had the ace, she had a trump. Also, the woman would fucking escalate. If something happened and I got irritated, she’d get pissed. If I got pissed, she’d get mad. If I got mad, she’d go fucking Red Alert Defcon I and empty the missile silos. I’m talking scorched fucking earth. Mostly it wasn’t worth it. Except almost every time we’d get into a fight, I’d forget that.”
Very good story, I loved this paragraph especially! Still I wish I knew more.
09. The Road Virus Heads North - Felt very short but right to the point I guess. No beating around the bush, no real history.
10. Lunch at the Gotham Cafe - “Before entering the Cafe, Steve impulsively buys an umbrella. Upon entering, he finds that the maître d’, eventually revealed to be named Guy, is talking senselessly about a dog.” –Wikipedia
A nicely laid triangle of crazy! It was all earthly crazy too, which is different from the other stories so far.
11. That Feeling, You can Only say what it is in French - I really dislike “groundhog day” type stories. They frustrate me for some reason and I don’t like it. This was bearable though, because you don’t know right away that it’s a groundhog day situation, and it’s a short enough story that it ends before it repeats too many times. It was more like a groundhog day going down a sink drain.
12. 1408 - I never saw the movie, I didn’t think I’d like it and I still don’t have a scary movie buddy. I was quite surprised when I really really felt creepy while reading it. For a short story it had the big and complete feeling of a full-grown novel.
13. Riding The Bullet - This was a very good creepy story. So vivid even I could see the smoke.
14. Lucky Quarter - Kinda out of place for the last story. I would have rather read Riding the Bullet last.