Carrie by Stephen King
Carrie may be picked on by her classmates but she has a gift. She can move things with her mind. Doors lock. Candles fall. This is her power and her problem.
To be invited to Prom Night by Tommy Ross is a dream come true for Carrie — the first step towards social acceptance by her high school colleagues. Until an unexpected cruelty turns her gift into a weapon of terror and destruction that no one will ever forget.
For the Reading Challenge(s):
The Stephen King Constant Reader Challenge
The Reason
For the The Stephen King Constant Reader Challenge and my online bookclub was having a Stephen King buddy read extravaganza during Halloween season!
The Quotes
“People don’t get better, they just get smarter. When you get smarter you don’t stop pulling the wings off flies, you just think of better reasons for doing it.”
“High school isn’t a very important place. When you’re going you think it’s a big deal, but when it’s over nobody really thinks it was great unless they’re beered up.”
“Nobody was really surprised when it happened, not really, not on the subconscious level where savage things grow.”
“This is the girl they keep calling a monster. I want you to keep that firmly in mind. The girl who could be satisfied with a hamburger and a dime root beer after her only school dance so her momma wouldn’t be worried . . .”
The Narrator(s)
Sissy Spacek, and Margaret Atwood. I can’t think of better narrators for this book. Love them!
My Thoughts
This is a reread, and although it isn’t one of my favorite Stephen King books, I find that I like it more this time around and appreciate it for the story it is. Carrie is such a fascinating character; she’s not really the bad guy here and yet, she caused hundreds of deaths and a whole town’s destruction. Stephen King has always been the master of writing about regular people who are monsters, and it’s interesting when you realize he’s been doing this since the beginning.
Carrie isn’t the monster here, she’s just a scared little girl pushed to the brink of what she could handle emotionally. Her mother, her school bullies, they are the true monsters. I also read this right after reading Frankenstein and I thought it was interesting with the whole “who’s the real monster” theme. There are some real parallels here that I’m not sure I would’ve realized if I hadn’t read them back to back, especially with some of what I said in my Frankenstein review about bad parenting. I also mentioned about how it was great that Frankenstein was focused more on the father as the parent, while here, we see the mother being the focus of bad parenting.
Maybe I liked this book more this time around precisely because I read Frankenstein right before, but honestly, I find myself noticing a lot more this time too about the rest of the characters in the story, the way they behave, their thoughts processes, and I’m amazed once again by Stephen King’s character study. This is why I love his books.
My Rating
⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 stars.
Have you read this book? Would you read this book? Did you like the book or do you think you would like it?
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