Rating: 
Summary: Ahmed El Genedi
Review: To start with English is not my mother tongue so sorry for all the mistakes. The stand is one of the greatest books I have read. I loved the development of characters. They way they moved in to the story space. The way the book sucks you in page after page. With out losing interest, is just unbelievable. I may have some problems with the king perspective of Arabs. as being an Arab my self. not a terrorist. And they are not the two words are not related if you ask me. But never the less this book is just great.
Rating:
Summary: long but great
Review: The Stand is the longest book I have ever read that I needed no help in understanding. The book goes over 1,000 pages, and is a saga of the end and beginning of the human race.There are times when the book seems to be going into too many details, and it feels dragged out, but later you enjoy and savor in the details, and the richness of the story telling. I don't understand why it's considered horror. Near the beginning of the book, I was spooked by the idea of the superflu, a virus that has the potential to wipe out the human race, but after awhile, I got used to it. The superflu isn't what the book is about. The plot wasn't set out simply to scare people. If it was, it didn't work very well. Just like Buffy: the Vampire Slayer wasn't about scaring people with the demons; it focused more on the people trying to stop the demons. Just like the Sixth Sense wasn't intentionally scary; it was about a little boy with a gift that he needed help using. The Stand focused on the people struggling to survive. It showed the sides of both good and evil without becoming overtly religious. The opinions of the skeptics were shown. The Stand was an adventure in story telling, and I recommend it to anyone with the patience to read it all the way through.
Rating:
Summary: Long but Exhilarating!
Review: Whew! What a read. Honestly, I think that this is the longest book I have ever read. But, I savored each and every word. A Stephen King fan I was not before, but I definitely am one now! It took me approximately 7 nights to read this huge piece of work, but it certainly was worth the time. I think what I enjoyed most out of Kings book, was his unique way of storytelling, the many characters, which at first, seem to overcrowd your mind, but then become such loved friends. Kings accurate description of ordinary Americans, their conversations, their feelings, their life. Splendid. The Stand begins with Charlie Campion, a simple security guard for the Defense Department Laboratory, whose reckless and undetected escape sets off a cataclysm of events that brings the world as we know it, crumbling down. We are introduced to this "Superflu" very early in the story. The horror of its destruction seems all to real. A virus, similar to the flu, yet different, that once absorbed into the human body, it is constantly changing, never the same, never the chance for the body to adapt and fight it off. Deadly. Mass hysteria everywhere. Then suddenly SILENCE. Few survive. Why? No one knows. The only thing in common all survivors share, is their dreams and nightmares. Dreams of old Mother Abigail, and nightmares of the "Dark Man". Alliances are formed, Good vs. Evil. The age old battle once again. Who will win, who will survive? Who will be triumphant in the end? This is a great book to sink your teeth into. Don't be awed by its immense size. Time will fly, and then you will be wishing there was more. Plus, this makes for great conversations, with all of the "what ifs".
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting concept but unbelievably bloated
Review: I like Stephen King and this is a great idea for a novel, BUT here are the facts: this book is in desperate need of an editor who isn't afraid to tell Mr. King (no such person, I'm sure) that his book is WAY too slow. If you like reading novels that unfold with all the speed of growing grass, this book is for you. I got half-way through and had to put it down. These characters are not nearly interesting enough to sustain 1000+ pages! A frustratingly slow read that is both self-indulgent and ultimately uninteresting. I would have given it one star, but it did keep my attention for a little while. The Shining is so much better.
Rating:
Summary: A fantastic Epic as only Stephen King an tell!
Review: With the world in the grips of advancement of the world we rarly look at the consequences. THE STAND is a frightening tale of what happens when a small plauge made by man is the same thing that distroys humainty. In this Epic (and that what it is), King creates a world where just going from point a to point b is a jorney frought with terrors so simple that it makes our world now look like giant cushion. Just breaking a loeg could be the determining factor of life and death. This world is not just a place where simple terrors are, it is also the play ground of a walking terror more powerfu;l than anything ever faced. THE STAND is a testiment to King's craft and an insperation to all who read it.
Rating:
Summary: King at his best
Review: An awesome epic tale of good vs. evil. I've read almost every one of King's books, and this is my #1 favorite.
Rating:
Summary: The end of modern society has lessons to teach...
Review: This is most assuredly not a happy-go-lucky story. When you are talking about a virus that ravages the world, you are not in for too many good times. However - that does not mean you are not in for a good read. In traditional Stephen King style, he really goes to town on characterization. With the size of this book (particularly the expanded edition), you have no trouble understanding the survivors in this story, from all their motives, imaginings, and desires. What may detract from this novel for some people is the inherent religious overtones that exist within it. This was not just a battle of man against nature after a terrible tragedy. This was a battle for the soul of mankind itself. However, if you read between the lines a little bit (or just exercise your own creative reading license) you can interpret this "light and darkness" battle as a polarization of the human condition and how people would react during a globe-spanning disaster. Personally, the first 250 or so pages of this book (when the virus is making its rounds) is perhaps the scariest thing I have ever read as well as the most poignant when the survivors realize that the old world has left them behind and they have to rebuild. Certain concepts underlie the whole story that serve to highlight the allegorical themes of the work in terms of the battle between "good and evil." Can man rebuild his culture without bringing back the same problems again and again? The answer would seem to be "no." Is mankind perenially going to do things that will potentially bring about extinction? The answer would seem to be "yes." And, perhaps most importantly, is it possible for groups of people to make a stand against this apparently ingrained nature? As King says: "The place where you made your stand never mattered. Only that you were there ... and still on your feet." Read this book and you will enjoy it. However, read between the lines of this book and the inherent sociological comments on our society and you will enjoy it at a deeper level.
Rating:
Summary: A tale of armageddon, you can't put this one down!!!
Review: The Stand is a amazing tale of how a massive plague nearly wiped humans from the planet. Only a few who were immuned survived and then faced a battle with the "man in black." The first portion of this book is fasinating because King goes through actual plague and how it runs its course through the population. If you ever wondered what it would be like if there was an armageddon and what the aftermath would be like for survivors this book is for you. The rest of the book tells of how the survivors come together to make a "Stand" against a evil that is trying to take over what remains of the world. This book maybe on the long side but you will never notice. I was left wanting more and wondering what happened to my favorite characters. You can't put this one down!!!
Rating:
Summary: Incredible and unforgettable
Review: This has to be the best book I've ever read. A plague sweeps the world, killing almost everyone, leaving only a few people to choose between the powers of good and evil. To beat the forces of evil, God's people must deal with traitors, sickness, injuries, pregnancies, sabotage, and worst of all, a psychic enemy, the Dark Man. The book is long, but it is well worth the wait in the end. It's one of the only books that have ever actually scared me. I read it a year ago, and to this day I can still remember every little detail. It's definitly King's best work ever.
Rating: 
Summary: Regenerating Concept
Review: I am not a major fan of King's literature, though I have read several of his books, rereading some. I can agree with the reviewer below who commented "This is the perfect diet book." I honestly lost about 100 lbs during one summer in my sixteenth year (having been grossly overweight at a starting point of some 270 lbs!) as I read and reread this book. I simply could not put it down and I had no appetite; I was that consumed by the book! (In retrospect-some eight years later-I felt immensely similar to the maligned but sympathetic portrayal of Harold Lauder, the gawkish and romantically irrelevant High School Nerd in all of us.) But I could embrace entirely Stephen King's own Dionysian revelry-expressed in "Danse Macabre"-that he felt in the original writing of this book, more than twenty-five years ago: the tearing apart of society. It is also eerie, as others have pointed out, that this novel was conceived before recognition of AIDS was brought to the world's attention. This novel is one of those long and tedious epics of massive character proportion and realistically relevant philosophical introspection and sociological/anthropological speculation (the type that I just love!)-"The Mists of Avalon" by Marion Zimmer Bradley being one; Jean M. Auel's Earth's Children series, beginning with "Clan of the Cave Bear" and John Jakes' "North and South" trilogy being others. I think King recognizes drastically the psychological-at least-truth of alternate realities and other universes and exercises intelligently that hypothesis-or "channeling," if you will-in his greatest works. "The Stand" is obviously one of them, maybe even "the" one-being a riveting portrayal of a world gone mad, a world very much like our own, recognizable and human, but just that much seperated on the dividing line to make an impact of horrific proportions. The Arcadian characters of Stu, Fran, Nick, Larry, Glen, Ralph, Mother Abagail-even their Machiavellian counterparts in Harold, Nadine, Lloyd, The Trashcan Man, Julie Lawry and The Dark Man Himself, Randall Flagg-are sympathetic, familiar, intrinsic counterparts of our American culture. You are there with them, a critical observer and a friend to them. They are your archetypes: your mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, lovers and children. It can be argued that they are stereotypical, and to a certain extent they are, but that is all the more useful a tool for King's thematic interweaving of the tale. He draws you in, in some cases spellbinding you, seducing you with the magnetic polarity of his white and dark magick. And then he repulses you, frightens you, wakes you up and tries to edify you. This might be the way the world ends, this might be "what we are headed for," this might even be what happened, or is happening still, in some way-not literally, but in a generalistic sense. However, I am finally forced to agree with what most of the other reviewers listed here have come to admit, even those who most forcefully propoound the book as "the greatest I have ever read." King's writing is a machine. He comes in like a whirling dervish and he finally peters out like a bad case of diarrhea. The "deus ex machina" ending, familiar to creative writing class critics, arrives with nary an excuse some 100-200 pages from the end, and is severely anticlimactic in that it has already been anticipated. The true climax of the book happens early on (in the Captain Trips flu) and is almost continually refueling throughout the whole book. King's portrayal of women and minorities is negligent and childish, to say the least, but I cannot agree with those critics who have complained of the book's limited world setting-America as an enclave. King accounted for this within his storyline, having characters speculate about the possibility that other countries and other societies globe-wide might also be reeling from the effects of the superflu, gathering haphazardly around their own "post-apocalyptic" representatives of divinity and dismay. However, those outcomes, whatever they might be, while interesting, would be irrelevant to King's theme and his closely-knit band of distinctly American survivors-just like most other cultures are to our present-day standards. Finally, I was disappointed with the ending of the book; I felt limited, but not by territorial boundary lines or possibility. I felt that there was immense possibility in King's concept, as millions of other readers from the days of the Bible to the present instictually have, with the ending, the restructuring, the regeneration of humanity. This is an ancient idea, and an ancient wheel, as King well knew in his demonstration of the "real end." The circle never ends; the cycle never stops. The world goes on. There was no "Second Coming" for King's band of survivors in the literal sense, or any Rapture, but they remained. Beyond Good vs. Evil, beyond the present-day, beyond Armegeddon even (for Christian afficionados) the message is: survive!
|
