Review: The Shining by Stephen King. 3/5

Today, after over twenty years of trying, I actually got through to the end of The Shining. It has been a long and difficult journey. On a number of occasions - and I really couldn't give you an accurate count, but let's settle on half a dozen as a ballpark figure - I have picked up this book from my favourite author, started to read it… and never made it to the conclusion. In fact I had never made it halfway into the second act before.

Why? Why have I had such trouble getting into this book, and such trouble holding interest in it so that I get to the final conclusion? I'm not really sure. And perhaps another question to answer now that I have actually made it is… why did I not enjoy it once I DID finish it?

Part of the problem I guess is that I have always known that Jack Torrance was not going to be around come the final pages, and I guess that was always a difficult thing for me to overcome; that this character was definitely going to meet his demise at the Overlook Hotel, and that it wasn't going to be pretty. Still, that hasn't stopped me getting through other King novels that appeared to have a similar fate awaiting the main character. Having said that, those books are the ones I don't often pick up again

Perhaps it is the case that there are parts of this story that cut too close to the bone. No, I am not an alcoholic, but I can relate far too closely to some of Jack's thoughts when he comes under the influence of the Outlook, such as when Jack feels as though he is being interrogated by his wife Wendy, and his anger begins bubbling to the surface, and it either comes out as annoyance or full blown shouting. King portrays these feelings by Jack too well not to have felt them himself, and I can only agree that at times in my own life I have felt almost the exact same thoughts. The fact that it made this uncomfortable to read, given these came so close to my own truths, certainly added to the difficulty I felt in getting through this novel.

In the long run, this just isn't a very nice story. All of the characters to me are unlikable. I could find very little in any of them to like, even the eternally suffering Danny. The fact that I couldn't invest myself in any of the characters meant that the story itself never really bonded with me. The difference between his first two novels and this one, for me, came down to the fact that those first two books had characters that you could empathise with within a larger cast of players, whereas here I found it difficult to find anything within the major three players that dominate this story. Also, the evil here is ghostly and unseen, lurking within the walls of the Outlook Hotel itself. It didn't work for me. We had already had deaths in the hotel, and the unexplained deaths of the Grady family that had been in the same position as the Torrance family were put here again. Even in a fictional world it seems unlikely. I had trouble getting around that. It just felt like hard work to slog through to discover what indeed was happening throughout. Even the ending felt predictable from the very start of the book, which meant when I got there and found it to be pretty much what I expected to occur, it was the icing on the cake.

Don't get me wrong. It was written well, and certainly the description of each character through the first two parts of the book, where each player was given their chapter to explore their thoughts and memories, made you feel as though you knew each of the main protagonists and how they were the people they were to the point when they reach the Outlook Hotel. It's just that the end game was unsatisfactory, or at least very unsatisfying.

Rating:  Having finally completed this book, I find it hard to believe I will ever pick it up once again.  3/5

Stephen King: The Shining pp. 47-78

By the time Part One of The Shining has reached its conclusion, we have firmly established the pattern of behaviour that the Torrance family has been operating under for the past few years, and where the mindset of each family member is at as they prepare to head for the Overlook Hotel for the winter season.

Jack is still dealing in secrecy, having made a special trip to the store in order to use the payphone to call his old friend Al Shockley, who not only got him the caretakers job at the Overlook, but was his partner in crime in going sober at the drop of a hat. It is during this section that we finally discover the reasons why their drinking stopped cold turkey, and that it coincided almost perfectly with Wendy's desire to talk about their future, or lack thereof.

“Danny said he dreamed you had a car accident,” she said abruptly. “He has funny dreams sometimes. He said it this morning, when I got him dressed. Did you, Jack? Did you have an accident?”

“Something had changed him. She didn’t believe it was just her getting ready to ask for a divorce that had done it. Something had happened before that morning. Something that had happened while she slept uneasily. Al Shockley said that nothing had happened, nothing at all, but he had averted his eyes when he said it, and if you believed faculty gossip, Al had also climbed aboard the fabled wagon.

"Did Daddy have an accident?"

That Jack had stayed sober is how the glue held firm on the marriage, and the relationship between husband and wife appeared healed for the moment. But Danny and his strange powers could still feel something below the surface, something that wasn't quite right.

More than this though was the dreams he was having, dreams of a house with large hallways, and of him being chased down those hallways by a madman, someone who wanted to hurt him. His were the final thoughts of Part One, and set up what is yet to occur.

"Danny… Danneee… 

"He started at the sound of that familiar voice and craned out the window, his small hands on the sill. With the sound of Tony’s voice the whole night seemed to have come silently and secretly alive, whispering even when the wind quieted again and the leaves were still and the shadows had stopped moving. He thought he saw a darker shadow standing by the bus stop a block down, but it was hard to tell if it was a real thing or an eye-trick. 

"Don’t go, Danny.."

Stephen King: The Shining pp. 1-46

It's amazing, the vast amount of information that comes at you in the first 46 pages of The Shining about the individuals and the family unit that makes up the Torrance family. All three members of this clan, father Jack, mother Wendy and five year old Danny, are quickly and thoroughly summarised for the reader as the story moves ahead without delay.

Jack is being debriefed for a new job, a caretaker role at a hotel, something far removed from the teaching and writing roles he has performed in the past. But that is in the past, due firstly to a major drinking problem, and then due to an anger problem. Combine those two together and you would have some serious issues one would have thought. And such is the case. The family unit has seen better times, and has come close on occasions to breaking up because of Jack's issues, and his mistake in taking it out on his infant son.

Wendy is at home, a home she is obviously unhappy with, and a life she has become concerned about. Her husband has had his down times, and though she may not be exactly enamoured with the job he is seeking, she knows it is better than no job at all. But can this all survive in their current state? Doubts remain.

Danny is waiting for his father to return, and we are privy to the fact that he has a surprisingly fertile ability, one that may not be completely developed at his tender age, but one that is there nonetheless. That he can know how others are feeling, especially his parents, and often what they are thinking, makes for interesting times ahead. His 'imaginary' friend Tony has already shown his head, and would appear to have a role to play as the story moves ahead.

This initial stanza does a great job of backgrounding the story and the characters that we will become intimated with. If there is one thing Stephen King can do, it is set up a story with enough information such that we learn a lot without being overly bombarded. The first passages here have given the reader enough to be intrigued as to what is to come, as well as come to their own conclusions as to how these relationships will survive the test of what is to come. Indeed, the final paragraph of this section of the book sums up the atmosphere.

"Everything was all right. Daddy was home. Mommy was loving him. There were no bad things. And not everything Tony showed him always happened.

But fear had settled around his heart, deep and dreadful, around his heart and around that indecipherable word he had seen in his spirit’s mirror."

Stephen King Book #3: The Shining

Book #3. The Shining. First published January 28, 1977.

I've got a confession to make. The Shining is one of Stephen King's most fabled books. The story of Jack Torrance and his son Danny is one that that has echoed through the years, some would say more notoriously for the Stanley Kubrick film that tears the narrative apart and is often referred to by fans, and King himself, as a stand-alone story that has little to do with his original vision. I have to admit here that I really have no idea, because... well... I have never finished reading The Shining from cover to cover. Oh, I've tried a number of times. I have on at least five occasions picked up the book, started reading, and having got about a hundred pages in I lose interest, and move on to other things. I even 'cheated' on another occasion, and just went to the last forty pages and read them, so I actually knew how it finished without having to try and go through the whole reading of it again.

The question I often ask myself, and which you are probably asking me now, is firstly, why have I had such a problem with the book, and secondly, if I've had that problem on so many occasions, why would I try and do it again? The answer to the first question is most likely a combination of the way the family of Jack, Wendy and Danny are so dysfunctional, of the difficulty they facing in remaining as one unit, and the obvious tragedy that is about to happen up there in the snow. It is a difficult start to the book, one that no doubt comes from King's heart, and the nature of storyline is lain bare for the reader. This problem is exacerbated by the fact that you know this isn't going to end well, and that this three person family is going to be mightily fractured by its conclusion. A lot of King's books have these storylines running through them, but my difficulty in closing the deal seems to hit a roadblock each time I try to push on through. The answer to the second part of that question is the reason I am doing this at all. I want to have read all of King's works, and by moving through chronologically, and reviewing as I go, I can't really back out can I? Thus this should ensure that I break my duck here with The Shining, and, for better or for worse, I should know the full story of the Torrance family's winter from hell by the end.