Review - Firestarter
Mar. 13th, 2009 11:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
wilderthanI really liked Firestarter. It's not a plot I've read Stephen King doing before (yet, anyway), although I suppose there's shades of Carrie. It's more science fiction/thriller than horror, definitely.
It's much denser than the books I've been reading lately by King -- Cell and From A Buick 8. More description, more stopping and starting, a longer time frame. It worked, for me, I got caught up in the story, I didn't want to put the book down, I got close to the characters and worried about them. Or steadily got to loathe them more, in the case of John Rainbird.
I liked Andy a lot. I liked the fact that he was trying so hard to save Charlie, but he was just an ordinary guy, and I liked that he didn't lie to his kid. I also liked that he couldn't just use his powers however he wanted, that there was a price both for him and for the people he tried it on, that things could go wrong.
Charlie herself is a sympathetic figure, too. I don't think I really got as close to her as I did to Andy, because she's a little scary, too. Her powers are, after all, barely held back a lot of the time. Her conflict about using them was well-written, though.
Worth reading, if you like Stephen King's writing and you don't mind looking outside the horror genre. Maybe not quite as fast-paced as some of his others, but it also doesn't do too much in the way of slow build-up -- the minute you meet the main characters, they're already on the run. The flashback technique is unsubtle, but hey, it works.
It's much denser than the books I've been reading lately by King -- Cell and From A Buick 8. More description, more stopping and starting, a longer time frame. It worked, for me, I got caught up in the story, I didn't want to put the book down, I got close to the characters and worried about them. Or steadily got to loathe them more, in the case of John Rainbird.
I liked Andy a lot. I liked the fact that he was trying so hard to save Charlie, but he was just an ordinary guy, and I liked that he didn't lie to his kid. I also liked that he couldn't just use his powers however he wanted, that there was a price both for him and for the people he tried it on, that things could go wrong.
Charlie herself is a sympathetic figure, too. I don't think I really got as close to her as I did to Andy, because she's a little scary, too. Her powers are, after all, barely held back a lot of the time. Her conflict about using them was well-written, though.
Worth reading, if you like Stephen King's writing and you don't mind looking outside the horror genre. Maybe not quite as fast-paced as some of his others, but it also doesn't do too much in the way of slow build-up -- the minute you meet the main characters, they're already on the run. The flashback technique is unsubtle, but hey, it works.
