whoischels's Reviews (116)

This is the first Stephen King book I've read. Thematically, it tries to do a lot and doesn't quite pull it all off. Themes of alcoholism, how children deal with trauma, race, hints of dealing with gay feelings (these last two are where it really lacks cohesion). The way I see it, if you're going to write with the general bluntness that King uses, you don't really have the leeway to hint at so many disparate themes. On the one hand, I understand the desire to introduce a lot of heavy ideas into your work even when you are writing for as wide of an audience as possible, but on the other, I prefer to rate books on how well they pull off whatever it is they're trying to do. The mix of heady psychosexual themes and pulpy blunt writing sort of turns me off. 

I read this because I really like this guy's productivity app. Good book full of short ideas for hacking your tendency to procrastinate. Quite useful.

Never read this when I was supposed to. I was mainly surprised by how damn funny it is. Just chapter after chapter of characters being catty to each other. Great stuff.

Really enjoyed this. A wonderful balance of speculative fiction with the deep character work you find in literary fiction. A breeze to read because of the short-story structure, with clever updates to the fate of early chapter characters in asides in later chapters. Full of thought provoking ideas about how a capitalist society might handle a pandemic of gargantuan proportions like this, and a varied dive into the Japanese-American diaspora with incredible character work.