Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Story- It's not horror, get over it!
Review: I'm not going to make this review very long, it would be tedious in that while scrolling through the other reviews, it would seem that everyone who didn't love the book seemed confused that it wasn't horror. With Stephen King being my favorite author, of course I'm partially biased to like nearly everything he writes, but to prove that I'm not, I found Rose Madder to be completely boring.Hearts in Atlantis accomplishes the goal of what a novel should: it envelops the reader into a different world, a fantasmic place that seems to be real, forcing you to drop reality and live in this world. The related stories are all excellent, with my favorite being the first, "Low Men in Yellow Coats." I could see the world through the eyes of Bobby Garfield, and shared his experiences. The 60's came alive for me, a time occuring long before I was born, but taking on a new tangibility. The title story was also great, a faithful display of college life (from what I've been through so far) taking place in the late 60's. A character study with an invigorating plot is more than I could have hoped for, and was pleasantly surprised. The final story in Hearts in Atlantis, "Heavenly Shades of Night Are Falling" evoked such feelings of fulfillment and wonder as to make me unable to let go of this touching story. I recommend this book to everyone with the repeated warning that it's not, by nature, a horror novel. Simply put, it's a great story from the greatest storyteller of our time that shouldn't be missed.
Rating: 
Summary: Excellent Read
Review: To summarize this book bluntly, it took me 24 hours to read the 500+ pages of this book. The first of the five stories is by far the best mixing elements of horror and teenage love with expertise. The rest of the stories gradually start to fade a bit, with 'Blind Willie' being the complete bottom of the barrel. All in all though, another excellent edition to the King library.
Rating:
Summary: A tearjerker - One of King's best
Review: This book has some of King's best writting. Anybody who grew up anywhere can relate to the events that occur in the stories. This one was from the heart!
Rating:
Summary: Emotion-filled evocation of childhood
Review: Whenever I recommend this book to somebody and they ask me what it's like, I always reply, 'Remember how you felt when you read 'Catcher in the Rye'?' I have only encountered a few books in my life that filled me with so much intense emotion. (A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving is the only other example I can think of right now). King's evocation of childhood friendship and long-ago summers and innocence lost is so rich and deep and real that when I finished this book the only thing I wanted to do was go back to the start and read it all through again. I have read all of Kings books and I think he has succeeded on this level a number of other times...It, The Body, Apt Pupil, etc...but never to this extent. This book is epic in depth and scope and range of characters yet he never loses track of those bittersweet moments that make your spine tingle and push you to the brink of tears. While the first story is undoubtably the best, I don't agree with other reviewers who consider the rest of the book to be 'mediocre'. It's true that older characters can't bring about the same emotions as the eleven year old characters, but they are fascinating nonetheless. This is not only one of my favourite Stephen King books, it's one of my favourite books of all time.
Rating: 
Summary: Hearts in Atlantis
Review: This book was some what of a let down after reading Bag Of Bones and The Green Mile. Stephen King said "He was a child of the sixties and wanted to write about it",I grew up in the fifties and sixties and I could not relate to anything in the book. I got half way through the book and just put it down, it just wasn't going anywhere.
Rating:
Summary: Could NOT put it down
Review: Classic King! I did NOT want it to end. Of course, my age being about the same as the characters - it brought me back and made me remember those times. I hope he writes more - I also wish he would finish the Dark Tower series!
Rating: 
Summary: A true fan
Review: Hey - you have to give S. King a break - he's pumping out a book every 6 months. I gave the review section three stars, but just between you and me; it's only a two on a good day. I love Steven King and I own every one of his books in hard cover. I'm the reason why this guy's making the big bucks, but I have to say that there's a lot of books out there that blow this one away... many of which are mentioned in the first story in this book. If you just finished the Tom Gordon book, then don't worry - it's not half as bad, but if you just finished The Shining, It, or anything written in the 80's, then maybe you should try The Talisman, The Tommyknockers, Insomnia, or the brilliant series of The Green Mile. Sorry Steve...
Rating:
Summary: Very Good King Read!
Review: If you are expecting vintage King, you may be disappointed. However, over the years, it has been exciting for me to see Stephen King's style grow and evolve. Starting with Bag of Bones, King's finger on horror has matured from stock-shock gory to a deep psychological terror. In HIA, King explores some dark little places that nobody likes to go, and does so with incredible insight and sensitivity. Even if you don't like the novel, enjoy it for the pure pleasure of how Mr. King puts words down on a page. With this novel, he has certainly proven he's no longer the "Big Mac and Fries" of the literary world.
Rating:
Summary: not his "normal" writting but it is still GREAT
Review: I have read sevral books by S.K. Each one of them are great, I'd give them all 5-stars. With his books you have to prepare your mind as to how he is writting. This book is a good way of talking about the Nam experince. No way is a great way but that's something else all together. The first story seems to be tied to the dark tower sieres. After that all the other stories are tied in to the first one. It relates to me on a more personal level. Everyone tells about what happened to them after their 1960's summer together. I enjoy books, movies, or anything else to gives us the "human" experince. Point of views change with people & time but I think we all enjoy seeing someone else's view to see what was really going on at that point & time. What the historians write down is awful boring. But what S.K. did with it is very lively. Keep it going on Stephen.
Rating:
Summary: A Book Worth Considering
Review: In his final novel of the 1990s, Stephen King has shut the door on his normal assortment of nightmares and created a series of stories that deals with another kind of horror. In Hearts in Atlantis, King writes about loss of innocence, struggles of conscience, and the Vietnam war. The first thing readers will notice is that Hearts in Atlantis is not a novel, but five stories. The first two are long novellas (which together constitute 400 pages), while the last story is a mere 13 pages long. But all of the stories are interconnected, spanning the lives of four Connecticut youths from their pre-teens in 1960 to 1999. The first story, "Low Men in Yellow Coats," is traditional King. In fact, the story is something of a companion piece to King's popular Dark Tower series. Here the reader is introduced to three kids, Bobby Garfield, Carol Gerber, and John "Sully-John" Sullivan. Although it doesn't deal directly with the Vietnam war, it helps set the backdrop for the stories that follow. In the summer of 1960, eleven year-old Bobby takes first steps out of childhood innocence. He begins to see the evil of which men are truly capable, a parallel to the book Lord of the Flies, given to him by his new neighbor Ted Brautigan. But the old man has another kind of evil chasing him. The "low men" are tracking Ted and want him to return to their world, a place where "All things serve the Crimson King." "Hearts in Atlantis," the second story, changes to a first-person narrative. Pete Riley, a freshman at the University of Maine, and his friends become obsessed with the card game Hearts. Many jeopardize their grades and thus their scholarships as a result, but the real threat is greater than flunking out. In 1966, leaving school means drafted to Vietnam. The story, although told from Pete's point of view, is also about Carol Gerber. She left Connecticut behind her, but has found a new life in protesting the war. The third story, "Blind Willie," deals with Willie Shearman, a minor character in "Low Men in Yellow Coats." Now a veteran of the Vietnam war, Willie is doing penance for his misdeeds, those from his childhood and the war. Sully-John attends the funeral of an old army buddy in "Why We're in Vietnam," set in 1999. In reuniting with his lieutenant, they discuss the war and the affects it had on the men who fought there. It is in this story that the most frightening, most vivid account of the war is relayed. If the other stories were preamble, this is the final climax where the whole book comes together. For Sully-John, haunted by the image of a dead Vietnamese woman, everything after the war has been about trying to "get over." Get over the physical pain, get over the trauma, get over the war. In the short closing story, "Heavenly Shades of Night Are Falling," Bobby returns to the town of his youth to pay his respects to one departed friend and discover the fate of another. I really liked the first story, "Low Men in Yellow Coats," but I am also a big fan of the Dark Tower trilogy. The fact that it tied together with the Dark Tower stories made me tingle. I hope to see more of Ted in the future. The others stories were also good, but not normal Stephen King-type fare. They didn't scare me or give me that creepy gooseflesh sort of feeling, but they made me think. My only complaints would be that "Hearts in Atlantis" (the second story) ran long, and "Blind Willie" has an unsatisfying ending. Is it good writing? Yes. Is it King's best? Probably not. But King tries something different in this book than in his last several books. For that alone he deserves a nod of respect. When Ted discusses Lord of the Flies with Bobby, he states, "[G]ood books don't give up all their secrets at once." And that's true of Hearts in Atlantis. At first, the stories appear to be a series of glimpses into American life, but there's something else going on here, something deeper. Atlantis becomes a metaphor for America, literally sinking beneath the feet of its people. The dreams and ideals of the 1940s and '50s become lost in the '60s, as the Vietnam war divides the country. Later, the hippies trade in the ideals of the '60s for junk bonds and cocaine. Now, that generation has nothing to show for it. "What have we done since Nam?" one character questions. We've created video games, trash television, and porn on the Internet. All we like to do is watch. "But there was a time... when it was really all in our hands." And there are moments in these stories when that is literally true. The image of one person physically carrying another is often repeated, showing heroism of the individual under extraordinary circumstances. Bobby Garfield carries Carol up the street when she is injured. Pete and his classmates carry a crippled student out of the icy rain when he falls. Of course, the quintessential moment of heroism comes during the war when Willie carries Sully-John to a waiting chopper in Dong Ha Province. In the midst of a story about the loss of a country, we have moments of hope created by acts of heroism of the individual. As we leave the 20th century, we continue to drift as a nation. But in the individual there may still be hope. Hope to carry on. As Ted Brautigan said, "Consider it. Good books are for consideration after, too."ΓΏ
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