Wednesday, February 6, 2013

11/22/63





I'm reading this month's Book Babes selection on an e-reader, a suspense story by Stephen King, and right in the middle of a murder scene, suddenly



the charge gave out.

Frustrating! This is a real page turner. Very ironic that a novel about time travel would just suddenly konk out.

I'm only 30% of the way through but guessing at how the plot twists this time-traveling suspense novel will angle and unravel. King first came up with the idea in the early 70's but abandoned it because he found the research aspects daunting. He admits the internet has made the task much easier.

Here are some predictions
  • Jake will get trapped in the past because something that he does or changes between '58 - '63 interferes with future events to such an extent that he doesn't discover time travel in the 21st century... something to do with Harry
  • One of the lives he 'saves' between '58 - '63 will actually be responsible for a terrible calamity 
  • The 'yellow card man' aka orange card man aka black card man is actually a fellow time traveler gone raving man, not a homeless alcoholic
  • Al, who dies of lung cancer in 2011 will somehow be 'saved' by being convinced to quit smoking earlier in life
  • Jake will adopt the Guardian Angel personae to his advantage (so far it is just a projection that two insightful players make to explain his interventions.
It's fun second-guessing where and when the characters will end up.

Although I haven't read a lot of Stephen King, what I have read, I've enjoyed. He is a great storyteller, prolific (50 novels. 400 short stories) and under-rated as a literary talent because of his astounding commercial success.

In a recent interview in the Wall Street Journal Stephen King confessed, "When i was a kid my mother used to say, think of the worst thing that you can and if you say it out loud that it won't come true, and that's probably been the basis of my career....."

Here he is on You Tube, reading selections from the novel at the book's launch held at JFK Library

He's not just scary, but funny. Entertaining. Confrontational. Thought-provoking.


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