From a Buick 8

Rating:
Summary: Great Book!
Review: I've read a ton of books, but interestingly enough I had never read a Stephen King until this past month. I saw this at a local store and thought it looked interesting, especially because I drive an older car myself.

This book drew me in from the start. I thought the characters were very well-developed and I felt connected to them in a way. When this happens to me you know it's a good book.

Once I finish the book I'm reading now I'm definitely getting another King. This one got me hooked for life.

Rating:
Summary: Not Good At All
Review: I love Stephen King.....at least I used to. I have read a lot of King's works and loved most all of them. But, recently it seems that his novels are starting out well and captivating the reader, but by midway through it leaves you wondering why you are reading this. This book is no exception. It doesn't hold the reader enough to make them want to finish the book. Unlike King's earlier works that the reader simply cannot put down or the reader has ngihtmares about! This is not one of those books.

If you are reading King for the first time...DO NOT read this one. Try Dolores Claiborne, Carrie, or Everything's Eventual instead. The last is the best sample of true King works.

I gave it 2 stars, but if it weren't King writing it would have gotten less than 1. Sorry Stevie, I love ya, but we need to get back to the good stuff!

Rating:
Summary: King has written much better, but also much worse
Review: I've had this book since it was published a few years ago and finally got around to reading it. The cause for my delay -- bad word of mouth from reviews and friends. I was very glad to discover that most of it was not correct -- although, it wasn't totally incorrect.

The story revolves around a mysterious car held in a shack behind a police station in a small quiet town. The story is told in flashbacks through the eyes of several characters in the novel. After the first half of the book is over, you realize that you feel as if you're reading about watching a slide show. Each episode lasts a chapter or two and the following chapters have little to do with what happened previously other than the fact that the book still revolves around the car.

Unfortunately, I have to give a warning that if you're expecting classic King, you'll have to search elsewhere. I'm not kidding when I say that very little happens in this novel. It is nearly 100% character development and very little plot. In the hands of someone not as skilled as King, this novel would probably have gotten 1 star. The intriguing narrative and King's amazing ability to flesh out characters and keep their speech mannerisms consistent is the only strength of this novel.

If you haven't read anything, by Stephen King, I suggest you do not start with this book -- try Christine or 'Salem's Lot. From a Buick 8 would prove to be a very poor introduction to a great author. If you're a Stephen King fan, you won't be disappointed, yet I'd be hard-pressed to imagine you every wanting to pick it up again for a re-read as a lot of fans do with King's earlier works.

Rating:
Summary: Somethings to think about, life, death, etc.
Review: A story without a goal really, more of a thinking exercise, in lessor hands this novel would probably have been a failure. It's hard to have a strong novel when so much of it is told in the past tense, by several different viewpoints, with no strong antagonist (or protagonist either, really) and seemingly no present danger. Near the end, there is some present action and danger, but it comes late, almost too late, and is quickly resolved.

Normally a story moves along with the protagonist getting into trouble as he travels towards a goal of some sort. Finding the killer, figuring out a mystery, blowing up a bridge, getting the girl, that sort of thing.

King decides to tackle some unanswerable questions about life and that becomes the strength of the book, however, if your looking for a scary story or lots of tension and worse, for a strong resolution, you're going to be disappointed. With that warning, I'm not saying I don't recommend this book, however, be forewarned, it's a bit slow and doesn't really have a totally satisfying ending.

Rating:
Summary: Fun read
Review: Loved it! Couldn't put it down. Totally fun read. Its the suspense more than the horror that gets to you on this one (although there is lots of yuck factor). King's deceptively easy writing style breezes you right through a story that actually has quite a bit of depth.

Rating:
Summary: King's best book
Review: I don't understand the disappointment from some other readers who've written reviews. I see the point that this book is very much unlike most of King's work, but I found it to be yards better because of it. The focus on the psychology of the characters, the differing voices, the ever-present past which never really dies away (a theme in all of his stuff) are what makes "8" a great book. There is very little plot adjenda here and what anyone who reads this book should realize is this will allow you to see just how good King has become line for line, a forced attention that much of his earlier stuff did not demand. I agree with those who hope this isn't King's last book. His prose here is more evocative than ever, hints of which were contained in "Dreamcatcher" (which I am 100 away from finishing as of now), and in "8" are fully realized.

Rating:
Summary: He says "No 3rd Act," then he gives us a 3rd act
Review: I don't know, I struggle with Stephen King. On the one hand, his prose is filled with unbelievable characters--I immediately hated Sandy, the main narrator, who seemed at the same time just the "average cop" and a wise and prescient observer of human nature. I think this is an example of Stephen King trying to have it both ways--he wans his main character to be both the everyday guy who's been dropped into an extraordinary situation and a demi-god (read: author) who knows the motivations and actions of far too many people. It just doesn't ring true.
On top of this, the characters themselves are cliches: The dark, grieving boy-man; the unwilling but honorable leader; the cop who never got over being the fat, unpopular kid and tries to drink his way through it; the middle-aged but still sexy female dispatcher who's "married to the precinct." Sure, King's narrator recognizes he's a cliche, but is that enough to counteract the unimaginative renderings?
And one more thing: Ned is told more than once that sometimes stories just end. "No third act, kid," says Sandy. "Story's over, kid," says someone else. "You just don't know it yet."
But then King can't resist--he gives us a third act, as if he doesn't trust the reader to understand and accept what the narrators do (maybe because they're little demi-gods and therefore understand and accept the world in ways that mere humans can't).
Here's what I will say about Stephen King, though: I started From A Buick 8 one evening and couldn't stop until I had finished. He tells a good story, despite his laziness and technical flaws. The fear lingers beyond the last page--and it's not the jump-out-of-the-shadows kind of fear, either. It's the kind of fear that comes when you start thinking about how fragile the body really is, and how easily it all could end. Drunk drivers, malevolent automobiles, strange men with misshaped faces: It all equals How Soon We Will Die.


Rating:
Summary: Good, not great
Review: While this particular Stephen King story is neither as strong nor as compelling as his best books, it's eerie that the central theme so closely paralleled my own thoughts in recent months. On the surface, this book is about a strange Buick; it looks like an ordinary Buick, but only if you don't examine it too closely, because then you'll see that it is like no car ever imagined. Abandoned at a western Pennsylvania gas station by its equally weird driver, the Buick is impounded by the State Police and kept out back of the barracks in Shed B, where it occasionally shows signs of life. Sometimes things come out of its trunk, and sometimes people go in.

That's the plot in a nutshell -- a basic King yarn. But this book is not about a Buick from another dimension, not really. It's about the senselessness of death. It's about how we, as human beings, try to impose some sort of pattern and meaning on our lives, when everything really is just random chains of events. There are no easy answers to all those questions each one of us asks when we can't get to sleep at two o'clock in the morning, all of which really come down to one question: Why? We can't ever hope to understand these questions of life or death, no matter how much science we apply to them, no matter how many frustrated emotions we throw at them, no matter what we do.

So, while FROM A BUICK 8 is not the intricate, suspensful epic that characterizes my favorite King books, there is a lot going on here -- a lot more than in many of King's more ordinary horror tales. Perhaps that's why it feels so unsatisfying at the end -- because that's the point. The reader -- like the character of young Ned, who lost his father in a traffic stop gone horrifically wrong -- will never get any satisfying answers, adn in the end, the reader -- like Sandy Dearborn, the boss who has lived with the weird Buick for two decades -- will just have to accept that.

Rating:
Summary: An exercise in writing and nothing more...
Review: If this book were not written by Stephen King nobody would read it except his creative writing instructor. Skill in characterization, metaphor and dialog plus an unusual narrative structure don't add up to anything more than an experiment gone wrong. It probably should never have been published. 2 STARS for skill in composition, nothing for story or motivation.

Rating:
Summary: The Pennsylvania State Police Have Problem
Review: Where did this weird replica of a Buick come from? Was the portal made by the same characters in "Hearts of Atlantis"? If it was, why didn't they have a problem breathing our atmosphere? Will King eventually tie it all together like he did with the entire "The Gunslinger" series? The whole point of the book is, sometimes you have to accept the fact that you aren't going to find an answer.