Duma Key (Paperback) by Stephen King - Reviews, Discussion, Bookclubs, Lists

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01/15/08

Alex rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: books-read-in-2008

Read in January, 2008

DUMA KEY BY STEPHEN KING: Most Stephen King fans will admit that the last couple of novels by the international bestselling author, while selling well, have been somewhat lacking coming from the renowned horror writer; one might even go so far as to use the term “mediocre,” and don’t get me started on Cell. Thankfully, with the arrival of Duma Key, the slate has been wiped clean and the master of horror is back! King’s first novel set in his alternate home of Florida weighs in at over ...more DUMA KEY BY STEPHEN KING: Most Stephen King fans will admit that the last couple of novels by the international bestselling author, while selling well, have been somewhat lacking coming from the renowned horror writer; one might even go so far as to use the term “mediocre,” and don’t get me started on Cell. Thankfully, with the arrival of Duma Key, the slate has been wiped clean and the master of horror is back! King’s first novel set in his alternate home of Florida weighs in at over six hundred pages, and while it reveals a more laid-back and matured author, with the terrifying days of The Tommyknockers and It perhaps over; Duma Key is nevertheless an incredibly well written novel with some wonderfully deep and complex characters, and a world that is just as complicated but in many more ways real.

Enter Edgar Freemantle. An entrepreneur who started a construction company and developed it into a multi-million dollar business; loving husband of two adult daughters; until he is involved in a freak on-site accident that should’ve killed him, but leaves him missing his right arm, a couple of slowly healing broken ribs, and a damaged mind that results in outbursts of anger and violence. The strain becomes too great and Freemantle’s marriage falls apart, leaving him an angry, empty shell. Seeking escape, he leases a beautiful house on the island of Duma Key. While watching the breathtaking sunsets, Freemantle decides to try his hand at some artwork, having sketched a little throughout his life. He discovers the more he works, the better he gets, soon switching to paints and canvasses; he also discovers that painting satisfies the seemingly insatiable itch in his missing right arm. Freemantle’s work is of the sunsets and the beautiful coastline, along with the occasional abstract object added in to offset it; he is eventually tagged as an American Primitive, but as more and more people discover his work, they are amazed by it and at his first gallery showing all works listed for sale are sold.

But beneath the art, there is a sinister plot at work, because this is after all a Stephen King novel. Freemantle discovers a psychic ability in his work, painting items he should know nothing about, as well as the eventual power to paint events that come to fruition: whether it be the restoring of blindness, or the forced suicide of a serial killer. And then there’s something wrong with the sold paintings: death follows them. The plot thickens, deepens, and becomes darker as the enigmatic history of Duma Key is discovered. It seems Freemantle isn’t the only person in its history to come to the island with a fragile mind and a special ability expressed through art. Then there’s the south side of the island which has become an overgrown and seemingly impenetrable jungle. The last time Freemantle and his daughter, Ilse, took a trip headed in that direction, Ilse immediately felt nauseous and horrible sick, while Freemantle felt the insatiable familiar itch that grew to an unstoppable buzzing; upon driving back north, they mysteriously found their ailments disappearing. Clearly something evil and powerful doesn’t want them getting to the south of the island.

Duma Key is not just a novel for the fans, but a cathartic response from King over his near-death accident in 1999; no doubt he relived his agonizing recovery while writing about Freemantle, and yet it is because of this firsthand experience, that Duma Key feels much more personal and empathetic. Also being King’s first foray into his new sometime Florida home, one might think his fellow Floridians a little unhappy on this introduction, or being Stephen King, they may feel the opposite and expect this. Regardless, Duma Key is a welcome return of the great horror writer, with an extra development of character and setting that King seems to have discovered in his later years, making this book one of his best, and one of my personal favorites.

For more reviews, and writings, or to buy yourself a copy, please visit www.alexctelander.com.(less)

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04/04/08

Howard rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: never-finished-comma-sucked

Awful. Cloyingly sentimental, forcedly folksy, sloppily written. At first I was hoping that he was doing this on purpose, using the unrealistic dialogue and the instant bonding of the characters to turn it around on us, make us look back and see it as creepy eventually, but it's just bad writing. The characters don't act like people, they act like characters in a Stephen King novel. When they develop psychic powers, nobody even blinks, and everybody immediately understands how they work...becaus...more

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03/03/08

Lisa rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

Read in February, 2008

recommends it for: Just about anyone

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

I suppose firstly, I should admit that Stephen King is the man who has shared my bed the most after my husband. That got to the point where, right around "Black House" hubby made a complaint about having to share me in bed with Mr. King and I never brought a book to bed again unless I was all by my onesies. Since I was a preteen Mr. King has always been there for me in his own weird existential way. Through marriages, births, deaths, moving, depression, great highs of life and every...more I suppose firstly, I should admit that Stephen King is the man who has shared my bed the most after my husband. That got to the point where, right around "Black House" hubby made a complaint about having to share me in bed with Mr. King and I never brought a book to bed again unless I was all by my onesies. Since I was a preteen Mr. King has always been there for me in his own weird existential way. Through marriages, births, deaths, moving, depression, great highs of life and everything in between he's been right there sitting on the shelf or on my lap. The silent witness to everything I've ever experienced. Always ready and willing to offer me an escape when I needed it just like a good pal should.

The title of the book; for those of you wondering what kind of a key that is….it's one off the coast of Florida. As in the Florida Keys. Not a special key to a spooky door or something like that. It's the masterfully told story of Edgar Freemantle, one-time construction company owner turned artiste. It's also the story of Jerome Wireman and Elizabeth Eastlake, two very wonderful characters. Edgar and Jerome have more than just a shading of Red and Andy in them and I love that.

If you've never read a Stephen King book before start with this one, if you've read them all get this one because you'll love it even more. It's not King at his terrifying horrifying best. Not the King that keeps you up all night wondering what's going to happen and worst of all, what's that moving in the corner of the bedroom? As I said, more like the King who wrote "Shawkshank Redemption", "Green Mile" and "Stand by Me" (a/k/a "The Body" original short story title). That's not to say it doesn't have its creepy parts, most of it is pretty creepy/odd/weird but not overly so not like, say, Pennywise or Cujo. This is a really good Camp Fire Story—not that I'd know, I've never been camping, but had I at least once sat around a camp fire and heard a tale spun out for me, I imagine it would be a lot like this one…but shorter. It's like…it's like…it's like walking out a local convenience store and seeing someone you haven't seen in years sitting there smiling at you, as though they knew you were there and they were waiting for you to come out. When you do he slings an arm around your shoulders and says; hey, long time no see. How the hell are ya? I know it's been a while but look, I got something to show ya. You're gonna love it. C'mon walk with for a little bit, it's just up the road, right up there and around the corner…in the dark.

I have to say that I love him most when he tells a story that involves one of two things or both; 1- an creative person as the central character; a writer or as in Edgar's case a budding painter and 2- a child/children as main player(s). He's always good for having kids in his stories and I think he uses them masterfully because no matter how bad it gets, how scary or creepy or outright gross! That underlying air of innocence always remains it is there just as surely as the crazy clown, rabid dog, and pets raised from the dead are there. The juxtaposition is genius and he uses it better than anyone I've ever read.

Back to that first one; the writer, the artist, the creative individual. I love those characters best because I identify with them and not just because they're a writer but because he puts so much of himself and the Creative Process into the character. Only someone who truly gets way far into the Zone can know what that's like. Only they know the hunger, the absolute ravenous hunger that comes after. Only they know the bone tiredness of it that settles over you with the crash. He talks about them openly. Sort of like I do here from time to time. The Truth, my friends and neighbors, the Truth. Above everything else, no matter how hard it gets or how ugly it becomes always tell the Truth of the story or paint the Truth of the picture. You will be greatly rewarded in the end. This is a major lesson I have learned from him over the years and which was reinforced in this latest novel with such ferocity and tenderness that it often brought a tear to my eye as I read or I found myself nodding my head saying; yep, you got it, Steve, you got it. Over the years there have been many times when I swore he looked into my head, plucked something out, said; that looks interesting, and put it into a story. Then I realize I'm not unique and neither is whatever the experience was, it's probably just something we've all gone through in one way or another, something that binds us all together as human beings. Good old Common Ground. That's another he's great at finding and weaving into the tale he's telling.

There are a few things that are hard for the Reader to take in this book but then again Life is full of bitter little pills that we have to swallow, like it or not. It seems that no one is more acutely aware of this than my old buddy, my pal. With most he does a very good job of preparing the Reader beforehand…kudos, Steve especially where a certain daughter is concerned. Even though you know its coming and you don't have to experience it.—he's kind enough to spare you that and just tell you about it after it happens—it still stings, a lot. I kept hoping he was going to find a way to reverse it even though after all these years I know that's not really his style.

Hope is a dangerous thing, so sayeth Red, so sayeth we all.

Then, of course, there's the last little twist of the knife. It's only about six words long but I bawled my eyes out at the end of this story and I'm misting up now just thinking about it. Ah, the hallmark of a well told tale; the emotion lingers long after the second cover has been closed. I sat there with it, hugging it tightly for a while and thinking about all the characters I'd just met and the things I'd gone through with them.

As with most King stories there is also that last little ray of hope, that glimmer, that shimmer, in the dark that tells you no matter what happens, no matter how hard or how bad it gets it will get better, the sun will shine again eventually and we'll all be ok in the end.

I learned a new saying with this story and I kinda like it. Do the day and let the day do you. I might adopt that as my new attitude.

What more can I say except….read this book! Don't wait for the paperback. Go. Now. Get it. Read it. What are you waiting for?(less)

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01/28/08

Jake Kern rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: fantasy, favorites

Read in February, 2008

recommends it for: anyone who's ever been broken.

Every single page is like a lover touching my cheek...sometimes it's a caress, and sometimes it's a slap...but every page, every word, has a profound impact upon me. I'm in the middle of the book, and I'm terrified to finish it, but I can't stop turning the pages...

...Just finished it. I heard one reviewer state that it was the best book King had ever written. While reviewers have short memories and liberal use of hyperbole, I must admit that this was one of his best he's written....more Every single page is like a lover touching my cheek...sometimes it's a caress, and sometimes it's a slap...but every page, every word, has a profound impact upon me. I'm in the middle of the book, and I'm terrified to finish it, but I can't stop turning the pages...

...Just finished it. I heard one reviewer state that it was the best book King had ever written. While reviewers have short memories and liberal use of hyperbole, I must admit that this was one of his best he's written. While not epic like The Stand, It, or The Dark Tower, it is powerful, insightful, and terrifying. Also, the fact that the book is not epic is one of its greatest strengths. One of King's self-indulgences in the past couple of decades has been his ability to use 1000 pages to write a 500 page story. Remember that Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption and The Body were both just novellas. In Duma Key, King uses each of the 607 pages with power and efficiency.

Another of King's self-indulgences has been his treatment of Bryan Smith, the man who hit him during his walk and nearly killed him. That same man died a year later from a prescription drug overdose. I remember being especially uncomfortable of King's incorporation and depiction of the accident as a key element in one of his stories. (I HATE spoilers, so either you know what I'm talking about or you don't.) It got to the point where I really started to dislike the man, Stephen King. I mean, c'mon, let the dead rest.

But in this book, King delves into the aftermath of being broken and how being broken made him act and say things that simply were not of his character. Noticeably in this story, King only refers to the crane that causes the accident that crushes Edgar Freemantle and sets everything in motion, and he never once speaks of the driver. Later in the story as Edgar tests his newfound talents, the test results in the death of a child molester. Now, while the bastard certainly had it coming to him, Edgar is overwhelmed with a sense of power, horror, fear, and guilt. In this narrative, I believe that King is trying to work through the aftermath of his own brokenness and how it changed him, most noticeably in his treatment of Bryan Smith. And an interesting thing happened...I found that I had forgiven King's spite and nastiness during this period of pain and healing.

Finally, King puts to words so well what it is like to be broken...what it's like to not be yourself and be the monster and victim at the same time...and what it's like to look back on the wake of relationships that will never be the same again. Having gone through this myself (and I'm not out of the woods yet) I found myself weeping in sections where King's script perfectly put to words the hopelessness, frustration, and loneliness of a broken person. In this book, I found a bit of my own healing realizing that I'm not the only one to have dealt with this and coming to terms with the fact that it's not my fault.

Was this Stephen King's best book? I honestly don't have an answer. All I know is that it has had a bigger impact on me than any other work of fiction I've ever experienced.(less)

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07/28/08

Trevor rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

Has a copy to sell/swap — Read in May, 2008

recommended to Trevor by: King's reputation
recommends it for: Artists, Loyal King fans, and anyone who has time to become a loyal King fan.

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

The experience of horror is relative to each individual experiencing it. Whether it’s clowns with razor-sharp teeth plucking little boys’ arms off, or a rabid dog spraying foamy spittle all over the windshield of a broken-down car as a mother and child cower inside, or even the American landscape in the aftermath of a pandemic, Stephen King has probably scared each of us in some form or fashion. After all, he’s good at scaring us. He’s also evolving, and some enthusiasts of his early wor...more

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01/31/08

Salma rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: stephen-king

Read in February, 2008

So I finished this today. (Feb 2). Wow. This reads like some sprawling, wrenching Greek tragedy. Just when you think nothing can get worse for the narrator...it does. The tale is of an ex-tycoon named Edgar who's been damaged, wrecked both emotionally and physically in an accident. Marriage breaks and he sets off for Duma Key in Florida. Spending time there recovering, making friends with Jerome Wireman and Elizabeth Eastlake, who've got disturbing secrets/stories of their own, Edgar discovers a...more

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01/23/08

Pam rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

Read in January, 2008

recommends it for: anyone

I've finished the book -- I think it's one of the best he's done in a long time. King blends a ripping good supernatural story with what must have been his own experience in recovering from a horrific accident. It felt very personal without being self-indulgent. I think King is getting some distance from his accident, but he's seeing clearly.

The parts of the book where Edgar talks about the artistic process are beautifully written and insightful. King's written about the artistic...more

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04/28/08

Imogen rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

Read in April, 2008

More literal magical negros than we usually mean when we use that phrase (although this one shows teaches white people things too), more classic-rock-oriented tragic heroes than you see in Sophocles, and arche/stereotypes so predictable and effective that you're totally sucked in even as you're laughing at the dialogue and the plot twists: you know when you are reading Stephen King.

I'm glad I started reading him when I was little and I liked everything, instead of now that I am old ...more

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02/18/08

Brandy rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: 2008reads, family-drama, library, speculative-fiction

Read in February, 2008

Eleven thousand "literary" books waiting and I pick up the latest Stephen King tome. Eh, c'est la vie.

Irony alert: in this lengthy review, I accuse King of writing far more than necessary!

On balance, this is a pretty good book. I'm not sure I'd give it a full 4 stars if it weren't Stephen King--this is a 4-star book for him, definitely, but I'd probably be a little more harsh about its flaws if it were (say) an unknown, or someone whose style I didn't enjoy. ...more Eleven thousand "literary" books waiting and I pick up the latest Stephen King tome. Eh, c'est la vie.

Irony alert: in this lengthy review, I accuse King of writing far more than necessary!

On balance, this is a pretty good book. I'm not sure I'd give it a full 4 stars if it weren't Stephen King--this is a 4-star book for him, definitely, but I'd probably be a little more harsh about its flaws if it were (say) an unknown, or someone whose style I didn't enjoy. As a King book, this suffers his usual flaws (overwriting) but still has his usual flairs (character- and scene-building).

The overwriting is the biggest problem I have: if all the extraneous sentences were taken out, all the little details that never come back to mean anything (in many cases I can see the parallels he was drawing but he never bothered explore them, really), we could probably trim this book a good 150 pages. But even with all that extra writing, none of it feels like clutter. For someone so verbose, he writes reasonably tightly--all the extra narrative sets up characters and scenes, really pulls readers into the world he's created. The words don't feel wasted.

Because this is Stephen King, and it does eventually turn into a ghost story (more or less), I'm flagging this as speculative fiction--but he could have easily chopped out the whole ghost portion, the memories of the past and supernaturally-guided painting, and turned this into a 350-page family drama. (I was more interested in that part, anyway.)

Lastly, King has been in pretty good form lately. Lisey's Story was still better than this, but this is on par with Bag of Bones. Arguably, it's a very similar book--a man escapes to a deserted beach area to come to terms with the sudden life changes (death of a spouse/accident + divorce), is haunted by ghosts and the weight of local history, and has to come to terms with what that history means to him. King isn't blazing any new ground here, but he's still doing better work than I'd have ever expected in the Rose Madder days. Thank god those days are behind him, and let's hope they stay that way.(less)

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01/25/08

Robert Beveridge rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: cuy-co-pub-lib, finished

Read in March, 2008

Stephen King, Duma Key (Scribner, 2008)

Once a decade or so, Stephen King goes through a terrible writing slump, and I inevitably find myself wondering if King is finally past it. It happened in the early eighties (Christine, Cujo, Firestarter, et al.), the early nineties (culminating in the grandly awful Insomnia), and the late nineties (in which he went from the brilliant The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon to the... not at all brilliant... Bag of Bones). In the midst of this last batch c...more Stephen King, Duma Key (Scribner, 2008)

Once a decade or so, Stephen King goes through a terrible writing slump, and I inevitably find myself wondering if King is finally past it. It happened in the early eighties (Christine, Cujo, Firestarter, et al.), the early nineties (culminating in the grandly awful Insomnia), and the late nineties (in which he went from the brilliant The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon to the... not at all brilliant... Bag of Bones). In the midst of this last batch came the accident, a couple of announcements of retirement, and a bunch of mediocre writing-- but then came “Blind Willie”, perhaps the best story King has written, and the final two Dark Tower novels, which heralded a possible return to form. Now, there is Duma Key, and it looks like King is back on his feet. Not that Duma Key is one of King's deathless novels like The Stand or Misery, stuff that should be pressed on visiting alien races as examples of what we do down here, but something that is solid and worth reading. In other words, it's King's best standalone novel since The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon.

The story centers on Edgar Freemantle, a building contractor from Minnesota who loses his arm in an accident with a crane, and soon after loses his marriage. His therapist suggests a change of venue as a possible cure, and he resettles on Duma Key, an isolated island off the Florida coast, where he discovers a previously unknown talent for art and some rather odd characters. Soon he realizes, with the help of the island's doyenne, that his art may be something more than he had at first taken it for...

One thing that King always does well, even in his bad periods, is characterization. King is one of the modern masters of drawing a character in a few broad strokes and having the reader know as much about the character as is necessary (and, frequently, a great deal more). When he's on his game, his characters are some of the best to be found in modern fiction. And while Edgar Freemantle himself is, surprisingly, a pretty stock character from the King arsenal-- you could pick him up and drop him whole into any number of King novels and he's be right at home-- it's the supporting cast who really make this book tick. Freemantle's younger daughter Ilse is fantastic, as is Elizabeth Eastlake, the senile landlady who, in her moments of clarity, gives Freemantle and his (equally wonderful) friend Wireman all the necessary clues to figure out what's going on with Freemantle's blossoming talent. They alone would make the book worthwhile. And there are times when they have to carry it-- King's depiction of Freemantle and his ex-wife's fumbling in the dark toward some sort of post-marriage understanding comes off as, at worst, horribly manipulative (and at best nothing more than a demon loosed to advance the plot)-- but when the book is on, it's on. King is also fantastic (when he's not dropping the ball, as in the relationship above) at setting things up without the reader realizing those things are being set up, and much of the book works in this vein; King, who has repeatedly stated in interviews that he starts his books without much idea of where they're going, has either changed the way he writes or has allowed his subconscious total control when writing, because the setup starts in the first few pages and never lets up; half the fun of reading any King novel is in getting through a big revelation and saying “hey, that scene back on page twenty-six...”. You know the drill.

I liked this one a bunch. It's good to see that Mr. King is back again and firing on all cylinders, even if one or two miss now and again. ****
(less)

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01/21/08

Meg rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: 52booksin52weeks-07-08

Read in January, 2008

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

I powered through this in just under 3 days, and MAN. I was all, "one last chapter" last night, and I literally had to keep a light on when I was going to sleep because I was actually really creeped out. AWESOME. When I was describing it to one of my customers, I called it a slow burn of a ghost story, and it is in a way. Stuff builds and builds and builds and then King takes the top of the pressure cooker and the last 175 pages or so is a whirlwind of awesome. The thing is, in th...more I powered through this in just under 3 days, and MAN. I was all, "one last chapter" last night, and I literally had to keep a light on when I was going to sleep because I was actually really creeped out. AWESOME. When I was describing it to one of my customers, I called it a slow burn of a ghost story, and it is in a way. Stuff builds and builds and builds and then King takes the top of the pressure cooker and the last 175 pages or so is a whirlwind of awesome. The thing is, in those first 400+ pages, King is also doing some really excellent stuff with his characters. He's got 4 main characters or so, but a pretty large cast of people that are important to Edgar in some way, and King never short changes them. His 4 biggies though, Edgar, Wireman, Jack, and Elizabeth are all fantastic, and my love for them reminds me of how I felt reading Cell.

And a bit of space before the spoilers:

**

**

**

**

**

Here be spoilers:

* Dude, I am so excited Jack got to live. I was SO not expecting him to make it out.
* According to Bookgasm, there's something around 450 pages in that you'll either accept or you won't. It's right around the time that Tom has been taken over by Perse and is on his way to kill Pam... is that what is hard to accept? I totally buy that Edgar's paintings/sketches have a certain sort of sway, or rather, act as a conduit for Perse. I *really* liked that Mary Ire was the one to kill Ilse.
* As much as I didn't like the lead-up to Edgar walking in the house when the twins and the brother-in-law have appeared and left footprints and YEAH THIS PART WAS SO CREEPY AND AWESOME, when I turned the page and saw that scrawled "where our sister" I literally stuck my bookmark in, turned on 3 more lights, and then went back to reading. I'm not sure what it was about this one scene, because I think King has written scarier stuff, but it freaked me out and I loved it.

To sum up: It might not end up as part of the "canon" like Salem's Lot and The Shining and The Stand, but it holds up to his earlier work and it's about 8 million times better than Lisey's Story. So: A++, you go Stephen King, you go.(less)

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01/27/08

Mike rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

Read in February, 2008

recommends it for: my 13-year-old self, who was perhaps a more patient reader

Just started this. I think I keep reading King the way I keep buying Bowie albums. May often enjoy for more nostalgic than new reasons . . . but so be it.

400 pages in and pretty much out of patience. The stuff I've always dug--the sense of dread in the every day--bubbles up now and again, and I am pretty fascinated by Edgar's barely-contained rage following his accident.

But I've always hated when King's characters banter. (I don't want everyone to sound like 13-year-o...more

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03/21/08

Sacha rated it:

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Read in March, 2008

Stephen King has grown. The characters in this novel are fleshed out, deep, and poignant. The story is compelling, but the real triumph here for King is character over plot. As he enters a mature phase of life, his writing is just better than ever. he is underrated by the literati and Duma Key is his best effort in decades.

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01/19/09

Alan rated it:

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Read in January, 2009

It must be nice to be Stephen King. Everything you write is automatically a bestseller -- no editor or publisher will ever tell you "no." But the flipside of such omnipotence is also evident in this book.
A building contractor from Minnesota has an awful accident in which he loses one arm and also suffers brain injuries from which he slowly recovers. His wife leaves him so he moves to an almost deserted Florida key and begins painting strange works of genius. It turns out that evi...more

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11/06/08

JP Seabury rated it:

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I'm not a big fan of Stephen King, but my entire family is -- especially my Aunt Joanie. I thought this book was "ok", but it really dragged in the middle. It's more than 600 pages, and I think that's about 200 page too many.

My reviews always include the section of the book where I said, "Ok, I'm gonna like this book". For Duma Key, that didn't happen until p.204. Edgar is trying to prove to his ex-wife that he has developed psychic powers, through his paintin...more I'm not a big fan of Stephen King, but my entire family is -- especially my Aunt Joanie. I thought this book was "ok", but it really dragged in the middle. It's more than 600 pages, and I think that's about 200 page too many.

My reviews always include the section of the book where I said, "Ok, I'm gonna like this book". For Duma Key, that didn't happen until p.204. Edgar is trying to prove to his ex-wife that he has developed psychic powers, through his paintings and drawings:

"Hi, Pam, it's me again."
"I don't want to talk to you any more, Edgar. We finished what we have to say."
"Not quite. But this will be short. I have an old lady to look after. She's sleeping now, but I don't like to leave her long."
Pam, curious in spite of herself: "What old lady?"
"Her name's Elizabeth Eastlake. She's in her mid-eighties, and she's got a good start on Alzheimer's. Her principal caregiver is taking care of an electrical problem with someone's sauna, and I'm helping out."
"Do you want a gold star to paste on the Helping Others page of your workbook?"
"No, I called to convince you I'm not crazy." I had brought in my drawing. Now I crooked the handset between my shoulder and my ear so I could pick it up.
"Why do you care?"
"Because you're convinced that all this started with Ilse, and it didn't."
"My God, you're unbelievable! If she called from Santa Fe and said she'd broken a shoe lace, you'd fly out there to take her a new one!"
"I also don't like you thinking that I'm down here going insane when I'm not. So ... are you listening?"
Only silence from the other end, but silence was good enough. She was listening.
"You're ten or fifteen minutes out of the shower. I think that because your hair is down on the back of your housecoat. I guess you still don't like the hairdryer."
"How --"
"I don't know how. You were sitting in a rocking chair when I called. You must have gotten it since the divorce. Reading a book and eating a cookie. A Grandma's outmeal cookie. The sun's out now, and it's coming in the window. You have a new television, the kind with a flat screen." I paused. "And a cat. You got a cat. It's sleeping under the TV."
Dead silence from her end. On my end the wind blew and the rain slapped the windows. I was about to ask her if she was there when she spoke again, in a dull voice that didn't sound like Pam at all. I had thought she was done hurting my heart, but I was wrong. "Stop spying on me. If you ever loved me -- stop spying on me."
"Then stop blaming me," I said in a horse, not-quite-breaking voice. Suddenly, I remembered Isle getting ready to go back to Brown, Isle standing in the strong tropical sun outside the Delta terminal, looking up at me and saying, You deserve to get better. Somtimes I wonder if you believe that. "What happened to me isn't my fault. The accident wasn't my fault and neither is this. I didn't ask for it."(less)

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08/01/08

Jamie rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

Read in February, 2008

In preparation for doing this review of Stephen King's latest, I did some poking around and read some other reviews on the 'net and was surprised to find that a lot of people like it. I, despite being a King fanboy, didn't care for it that much. It's gotten to be that King barely writes what you can fairly call horror books anymore. That's his prerogative, of course (roaring, scarcely imaginable success has its privileges), but between this, Blaze, Cell, Lisey's Story, and The Colorado Kid it's ...more In preparation for doing this review of Stephen King's latest, I did some poking around and read some other reviews on the 'net and was surprised to find that a lot of people like it. I, despite being a King fanboy, didn't care for it that much. It's gotten to be that King barely writes what you can fairly call horror books anymore. That's his prerogative, of course (roaring, scarcely imaginable success has its privileges), but between this, Blaze, Cell, Lisey's Story, and The Colorado Kid it's just not been the King I grew to love.

Look, it's not that Duma Key is a bad novel. In fact, it's pretty well written and refreshing in its setting. Instead of yet another everyman cum hero from a xenophobic town in rural Maine, Duma Key tells the story of a successful building contractor from Minnesota named Edgar Freemantle. Our hero is maimed in a work site accident, and when the resulting physical and mental damage wreck his marriage, he retires and moves to a small island in the keys of Florida to recuperate. Part of his therapy involves taking painting up again, and he turns out to be very good. Supernaturally good, in fact. The stuff he paints is very surreal, and the paintings seem to have sinister lives of their own that are tied to an old and evil somethingoranother on the island. It's the kind of "artist/creator as a magician or god" ground that he's covered in other works, like later Dark Tower books and the short story Word Processor of the Gods, but here it's pretty fresh in its presentation.

And King does a good job of what King often does well: He builds character. Edgar Freemantle and the friends he makes Duma Key are interesting, nuanced, complex, and flawed. They're good literary characters, in short, not Mary Janes or cliches. The thing is, though, that the book is ALL character development and setup, to the point where it languishes over those actions. We get to know a lot about Edgar Freemantle, but honestly, I thought I had ENOUGH after a couple hundred pages and was ready for the plot to develop. Instead, we get long scenes about beach walks, art shows, and father-daughter chats that are nicely done except that there are too many of them and they drag.

Then, literally in the last 100 pages of the 600 page book, King seems to remember that he's got to do something that makes the book fit in the "Horror" section of the bookstore and drags out some extras from the first Pirates of the Carribian movie. Dead, squishy sailors walk in from the surf and oh yeah there's some kinda monster in the woods that Edgar and his ka-tet (to use The Gunslinger's term) have to figure out how to best. That part was cool, but it felt forced and like it was part of another book.

I know I'll keep buying new King books as long as he makes them, but I think I'm gonna have to go back to some of the older stuff to remind me why he's one of my favorites for a good old fashion page turner.(less)

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07/29/08

Becky rated it:

(review of isbn 0743569741)

bookshelves: --2009--, 5-star, audiobook, fantasy, fiction, hauntings, horror, mystery-and-thrillers, reviewed, tnbbc-spring-challenge-09, _author-king-s

Read in April, 2009

I've read a lot of King. I read a lot of King, and this is among his best. I know some people feel that after his accident he lost his touch for the creeping horror that made him famous, but I assure you that is not the case. This book proves that King not only still has it, he's still improving.

I listened to this on audio, and I'm sure that lent something to the suspense, but I'm very glad that I did. (I downloaded from Audible, and each part was preceded by music that is creepy on...more I've read a lot of King. I read a lot of King, and this is among his best. I know some people feel that after his accident he lost his touch for the creeping horror that made him famous, but I assure you that is not the case. This book proves that King not only still has it, he's still improving.

I listened to this on audio, and I'm sure that lent something to the suspense, but I'm very glad that I did. (I downloaded from Audible, and each part was preceded by music that is creepy on its own. I'm not sure if the audio CD's are the same way.) Listening to this made me pace myself, and made sure that the build-up was properly built up. I have a tendency to speed-read when I get excited, when I know I hold something great in my hands and want to experience it as quickly as possible. I couldn't do this with the audio, and so the anticipation piled up until I had to finish, regardless of the fact that it's now 4:19a and I have to work tomorrow.

John Slattery's reading was just about perfect. He had this great tone, a feeling for the story, and a subtle way of lending personality to the characters that makes them come alive. King obviously gives him a lot to work with and build on, but I don't know if another reader would have done the book justice the way Slattery did. I could tell exactly who was speaking at all times, even before he got around to telling me who it was, yet he didn't make the characters HIS characters, if that makes sense. He just gave them life. His reading of Perse (this is how I'm assuming it's spelled, as I haven't seen it in print) gave me goosebumps, and I think will haunt me for a long time.

This book contained more than a few of the things that creep me out the most. But I couldn't stop listening. I loved the aspects of Elizabeth's childhood history. That part of the story fascinated me. I also felt that the book brought back pieces of other books that King has written, making it a part of the larger universe that links his stories together.

-Perse's red robe, and the mentions of red throughout the story brought the Crimson King to mind. Could she be the Crimson King's consort, maybe?

-Perse speaking to Ilsa from the drains and toilet obviously brings IT to mind.

-Edgar's ability to create (and uncreate) through his art. King does this with every story he writes, but I kept thinking specifically of Peter Rickman from Kingdom Hospital and Patrick Danville from The Dark Tower series and Insomnia.

-Edgar's accident and injuries acting almost as a muse/catalyst for his artistic ability, as Peter Rickman's did, as King's own did, if you consider the shift his stories took after his accident. How the ability seemed to flow through him, but was not invented BY him. (Maybe I'm reading too much into this, but these are the things I was thinking of...)

-Wireman not only mentioning that he's a gunslinger, but actually being a gunslinger, if only temporarily. I have no doubt that had he made his way into that section of the SK Universe, he'd have found 5 missing members of his Ka-tet.

Anyway, I found much to love in this book, and I have a feeling it will become a favorite. I would highly recommend it. (less)

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04/22/08

Joe rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: stephen-king, top-20

Read in February, 2008

This has become my personal favorite.
Many of King's fans have been upset with some of his later work because of the lack of true terror. Others were pleased because there was a bit more variety or literary quality. Me, I feel that I can't say his books ever got better or worse.

Stephen King writes so many different kinds of stories that everyone is going to be happy with some and disappointed with others. For me this has had very little to do with when he wrote them. It wa...more This has become my personal favorite.
Many of King's fans have been upset with some of his later work because of the lack of true terror. Others were pleased because there was a bit more variety or literary quality. Me, I feel that I can't say his books ever got better or worse.

Stephen King writes so many different kinds of stories that everyone is going to be happy with some and disappointed with others. For me this has had very little to do with when he wrote them. It was all about how he gained more and more fans over the years. What makes Duma Key one of those few that works for almost all of King's fans is that it had more of a balance instead of focussing on one end of the spectrum. And he was also able to keep both sides of the coin well polished in this one. The characters, plot, terror, themes, haunting scenes, etc. all had a unique, slightly different twist to them.

Duma Key could seem slow at times. Some people could complain about how slow the first half of the story is. However, it is not constant. There are many places where the pace picks up for a little bit to keep the reader interested.

The other complaint that I have heard is that it gets too weird at the end. Yes, I usually don't like King's weirder stories as much as the others, but in Duma Key the bizarre is never allowed to go too far. It had to go somewhere because of how the whole story was slowly building up to it. So give me a way King could have ended it without bringing a little more paranormal into the equation, and you will probably give me an entirely new book.

In the end, I found it to be amazing because of the characters. I've heard many say that they're more developed. I felt that the difference was in how well the reader got to know the protagonist. Most of King's characters are very complex or well developed, but it's when the reader truly gets to know the character that it stands out. For me, the one thing that puts it as my all time favorite is how personally I felt connected and similar to the characters and how closely I could compare the story to my life. This is not something that I can say everyone, or anyone, else will see, but that is when literature will be most significant.

(less)

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03/19/08

Sezin rated it:

(review of isbn 1416552510)

bookshelves: horror, spirituality

Read in May, 2008

As ever, Stephen King's work is brilliant and insightful. It seems as if every new novel he produces becomes more and more spiritual, and I loved how the main character in this novel went through a horrifying trauma only to develop magical, yet totally realistic, powers.

Unlike many of his earlier novels, King has been focusing on delving deeply into the mind and subconcious of his main character and this is done to perfection here. I also thoroughly enjoyed the little anti-Bush and ...more

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03/14/08

John rated it:

(review of isbn 0743569741)

Read in August, 2008

recommended to John by: Flea
recommends it for: Stephen King fans, surrealist readers, magical realism readers, modern Fantasy readers

If Stephen King had died fifty years ago and left all these books for us to read whenever and in whatever order, I wouldn’t have placed this one in the twilight of his career. This would have gone in the “good and thoughtful” pile. I guess being hit by a car helped him write Edgar, the man who lost an arm, mangled a leg and lost part of his mind to a construction accident. Edgar is our sympathetic narrator, who stumbles out of a marriage that couldn’t survive the accident even if he did,...more If Stephen King had died fifty years ago and left all these books for us to read whenever and in whatever order, I wouldn’t have placed this one in the twilight of his career. This would have gone in the “good and thoughtful” pile. I guess being hit by a car helped him write Edgar, the man who lost an arm, mangled a leg and lost part of his mind to a construction accident. Edgar is our sympathetic narrator, who stumbles out of a marriage that couldn’t survive the accident even if he did, and moves to a quiet beach in Florida (the eponymous Duma Key). It's a place that draws broken people – not fixing them, but empowering them. Giving strange abilities to the physically or mentally handicapped is a theme in King’s fiction, and it’s one of the most fascinating. It never levels the playing field, rather making the game much more interesting to watch. Mixing the pure supernatural with a real medical condition like phantom limbs makes this one of the more interesting cases of the theme in his fiction.

There is nothing urgent about this book, and that’s going to break it for a lot of readers. It has more of a premise than a plot. We come in after the accident, and are served with a hefty recap of the things that happened before our boy moved to Big Pink (his house on Duma Key). Things happen, our one-armed painter develops, and the nights pass as they may. King might spend the next five pages talking about walking on the beach, or he may use them to experiment on whether Edgar can see the future in what he paints, or create the future by painting it. This is great to me, and will be to anyone else who enjoys King's sense of voice. It’s been years since I demanded authors, even those I go to primarily for entertainment, throw buckets of plot across my deck or rush me from action scene to action scene.

Few books have helped me unwind this much, and it’s in part because of that lack of urgency amongst so many interesting things. Edgar is proper parts sympathetic, amusing, humble, confused and struggling, and with King giving him a voice, he's a pleasure to sit down with even for the most trying anecdotes.

That's not to say crazy things don't happen. Edgar is a one-armed painter whose art predicts the future, after all. But does it predict, or can it force things to happen? Is Duma Key a strange attractor for such phenomena? It’s an odd coincidence that the half-blind man down the beach claims to have visions, and that the woman he cares for, stricken with Alzheimer’s, sometimes babbles things she shouldn’t know. Beyond the paranormal, Edgar’s relationship with his daughter (he has two, but only one plays a substantial role) is touching. She’s a great character for this type of story, made up of many stripes, including all of these we see in her mother, but also many more. That half-blind potential psychic, Wireman, is also a great balancing character – funny, philosophical, so suited to letting life and a book wash away on a beautiful beach, and giving perspective to the things Edgar experiences. That the majority of our handicapped cast have some positive nature about them (not always sunny, but at least given to moments that are utterly loveable) helped my spirits as I spent the last week struggling through some physical therapy. But better than sympathetic characters are the relationships. You see Wireman with his profound, pseudo-parental, pseudo-husbandly love for his charge. Edgar and his daughter have a clearly complex relationship. Like in Salem’s Lot, the setting itself has a character with a provocative relationship to anyone who stays. There’s plenty to ruminate over in this book if you have the patience.

One level this book works on very well is that of the mythological. Edgar was an architect, someone who took drawn plans and built physical reality out of them. Here, almost detached from time, reality seems to be forcing his pencils and brush, reversing his talents. It’s things like this, especially as they carry out experientially through the book, that make it spiritually engrossing – even if the deepest Mr. King forces his characters to speak is in guessing that maybe there is an afterlife or humorously paraphrasing Nietzsche. It’s the substance, not the style.

King uses the wandering prose to play more literary tricks than usual. The most common are Edgar’s mis-speeches. His accident took an arm and damaged a leg, but it also damaged his brain, taking some memories (though from some of the things he remembers and some of the things he can’t, one wonders how much was lost by chance and how much was lost by unconscious desire to be free) and leaving his speech habits broken. He’ll say the wrong word or the wrong phrase in a blend of oral typos and Freudian slips, in the middle of perfectly fluent sentences. Sometimes they’re pathetic, but other times they reflect on his character development, such as when he intended to tell someone, “I’ll never be even,” but instead says, “I’ll never be Heaven.” Word flips like that touch on things he’s thinking or truth about this story as well providing a quirk to dialogue. Sometimes this leaks into his first person narration, like saying he bore someone “no anus” instead of “no animus.” As neat as they would have been if such word flips arose in retelling his most emotionally sensitive scenarios, these last seem to have been random.

That kind of spirit bleeds into other things, as we slowly realize the saying, “God punishes us for what we can't imagine” doesn’t mean the Almighty attacks us for reasons we can’t understand, but that ignorance and lack of foresight gets us into trouble.

And those kinds of tricks lead to a certain way of thinking about his characters, which King had to have intended. We find that Edgar’s house was once inhabited by Salvadore Dali – for three weeks. The area might be magical, so has his newfound talent come from there? Later we learn he used to draw beautiful picture books for his daughters when they were sick – but he can’t remember it. Did the talent come form there? Despite being much longer, much less funny and of a wholly different tone and intent, the book throws several Nakokov Pale Fire scenarios at you, where you’ll have to figure it out for yourself, and your conclusion really is just as good as your professor’s.

This kind of wordplay is indicative of a greater attention to diction than normal in King’s infinitely readable casual prose. It fits the world of quirky characters, where the normal people only visit and curious conversations are legion. King plays with clichés and platitudes as always, but there’s more literal dueling going on here – and thankfully none of it gets in the way of a damned good tone. I don’t even know why I picked up the book that first day, but after three pages I knew I was going to be sitting for a while.(less)

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