Rating: 
Summary: For me - this is the scariest book ever written
Review: Different people have different ideas about what is "funny" - same with "scary". If snakes or spiders or great-white sharks scare the peedoodle out of you, then your reaction to a story about them might be different than it might be for, say The Crocodile Hunter.Stephen King is prolific beyond belief. He is sometimes redundant. In Pet Sematary he wrote a story so compelling that I literally could not put it down, yet at the same time so horrifying that I practically screamed at myself NOT TO TURN THE NEXT PAGE!!!! King knows a thing or two about humans and human relationships, and in Pet Sematary he creates a realistic family that you care about.... then he does absolutely TERRIFYING things to them. Without giving anything away - I have to say that one of the reasons that this book affected me so deeply is that I had recently become a Dad back when this book first was released, and this book hones in on a new parent's worst nightmares, then just gets worse and worse and worse. If you like being scared by a book, and you can't think of anything worse than seeing your child killed - this book might hit you like it hit me. I repeat: This is the scariest novel I have ever read. As an aside: The "scariest book ever" was turned into a fairly cheesy movie. I give the book a solid 5 stars, but wouldn't rate the film any higher than 2 or 3. Another aside: My personal choice for "scariest movie" is "The Exorcist", while I found the novel of "The Exorcist" fairly bland and not paced well enough to scare me.
Rating: 
Summary: King has done better.
Review: Well, I've got to say that I think Stephen King has done a lot better. Although the characters thoughts and reactions to death are very interesting, the book seems to drag on for a while and the ending wasn't really all that scary to me (although I know other people who were terrified by it). Granted, the first few hundred pages give good characterization, but any plot twists are explicitly stated well before they happen (e.x. "his nightmares started with the death of Pascow" or "he had only two months to live", both occurring well before the actual events do). If the book hadn't repeatedly stated exactly what was going to happen next, it would have been much scarier and interesting to read. Another minor problem I had with it was that all the characters were really well characterized except Gage. Given that he is ressurected from the dead to effectively become a monster at the end of the book, it would have been nice to have had more characterization of him throughout the first half of the story to make the final change more startling and scary. Apart from the scene with Louis and Gage flying the kite, these scenes seemed somehow absent for me. Lastly, the book seemed remarkably predictable to me (and I had only read the description of the book on the back page when I read it): a guy finds out about a place that brings dead animals back to life from a neighbor, brings back his daughter's cat so that she won't have to deal with its death when it gets runover, then his son is killed and he of course brings him back too, leading to the death of his wife and friend and to him becoming insane. That's about it in terms of plot twists. I guess that's what bugged me most; everything that takes place seems pretty obvious, even when it isn't explicitely told to you. On the other hand, I'm sure that different subjects are scarier to different people, so other readers might find this book to much scarier than I did (like many other reviewers seem to think). Personally, I found The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon and Salem's Lot to be much scarier and intense than Pet Sematary, especially as the plots were much harder to predict and the story remained dark throughout the book, rather than just the last 200 or so pages. My recommendation: if you like Stephen King go ahead and read this, but otherwise check out one of his other books.
Rating:
Summary: Animal Ghosts and Human Experiments
Review: A charged high concept with added change, Pet Semetary is a must read from King, a true 20th century horror story delivering on the same moral dilemmas that are faced by characters written into 19th century horror literature, a classic tour-de-force notion, here King takes a doctor through journey of ancient animal burial grounds, resurrection of dead pets and what happens to the good doctor when the local highway wins a member of his family.
That is the synopsis. No more needs to be said or done because King does it better within these pages.
Rating:
Summary: Stop whatever it is that you are doing and read this book!
Review: Stephen King's books are never disappointing. Some of them seem to drag on and on until getting to the meat of the sandwhich. This book is different.
This book had me wondering in the first hundred pages, but then things start picking up. The characters make what seem like mistakes, but are really just mini plots for a higher power.One mistake, involving a cat, has consequences that lead on to the last page. This book is a book that all 562 pages are worth while.
The last sentence sends shivers down my spine. With an ending that pushes you over the edge of your seat, this book is worth 7.99. This is a must read for Stephen King fans.
Rating:
Summary: King at his most extreme
Review: Want a great set of elements to kick off a tale of horror? Look no further.
A Chicago family moves into a small town in Maine. Near their home, there is a patch of land that even the Native Americans used to think was evil, and which brings about a sense of foreboding even now. Near that land, there is a "Pet Sematary," where the children of the town traditionally bury their pets. There's an older neighbor who warns that the cursed land is best avoided. There's also a lonely highway that goes past their new home, upon which massive trucks build up dangerous levels of speed.
These elements are scary in their own right, but the kicker is that when living things are buried in the cursed ground, they come back. And when they come back, they are different, and different in a bad way. Depending on how much time has passed between their death and their burial, they might be near-normal, or completely evil. In all cases, they bear a whiff of the grave about them like an earthy shroud.
This is just a great scary book, and we really come to love the characters, and agonize over the decisions that they are confronted with. It is depressing, even shockingly depressing in parts, but I still have to recommend it wholeheartedly.
King employs one of his trademark devices here to great effect, and that is that he first gives you some second or third-hand accounts of supernatural phenomena occuring that sound very believable. This not only sets the reader up to believe in the supernatural phenomena as they are happening, but it also enhances the sense of wonder as we personally come into contact with something that we have heard about before in legends.
I would say that this book is almost too brutal and heartbreaking for it to serve as an introduction into King's work. In so many of his works, we are treated to a battle between the forces of good and evil. But in Pet Sematary, good seems to have taken a vacation, leaving us with a battle between evil and not-up-to-the-task.
If you've already gotten used to how terrifying King can be, then I recommend this book to experience the depths of his depravity.
Rating:
Summary: Greg Taylor Greg Taylor
Review: this is a great SK book but it doesn't get going to very far in the book. in all honesty the horror of it didn't dtart until the last fifty pages. But it still has a good plot and i recomend it to anyone who enjoys reading.
Rating: 
Summary: dead is sometimes better. HOW?
Review: Steven King! Another masterpiece in my full honest opinion. It kept me awake for nights because i allowed myself to think the unthinkable.The most outrageous thought abstracted from the book crossed my mind and i found it frightening and full of awe. It has an aura of death that won't make you want a second read.
The story:
Aman named Louis Creed moves to a town anmed Ludlow, Maine from upstate Chicago. He has just been promoted to Head of the medical department at the University of Maine. He finds friendship with an old neighbor named Judson Crandall who lives with his sick but strong wife. At the beginning we sense that Jud is an energetic character and we have warm feelings towards him. But in the Second chapter we begin to dread him.
While his wife and two children are on vacation he is left home alone with his daughter Ellie's cat, Church. He is phoned by a shaken Jud who tells him Church the cat has been run over. Louis is devastated because he does not know how to tell this to his daughter who still does not accept death. JUD has an idea. A very bad one.He escorts Louis to the burial ground beyond the pure ,child created Pet Sematary beyond his yard.The Micmac burying ground. Believed to be a place of pure evil. It is here that they bury Church and Jud does not give reason to their actions.The is something wrong with Jud, his face has a look of unbelievingly pure joy. Like something is igniting him to proceed on.The very next morning Louis awakes to find Church alive and well, but something is different. He smells of death. There is blood on his muzzle! He has an urge to kick the cat but he withdraws. The mission is accomplished.
Soon later his son, a mere toddler, is hit by a truck and dies. Thoughts overwhelm Lois, surely he could bring back his son and his wife and daughter will be joyful. He does not allow the thoughts of Church's change in atmosphere distract him and he easily thinks he could play God. What a fool. We cannot blame him though, he has to carry on the mission. The burying ground is taking over his being.
We already know the proceedings but what will Gage's return influence?
Rating:
Summary: super good
Review: i only recently discovered stephen king books. but, i read quite a few already. this book is really good. it doesnt deal with lame antagonists like monsters or something like that. it deals with real world fears, such as losing somebody you love. this book is not that scary, but it still is scary. it is hard to find an even remotely scary book. if you want to read an excellent and scary book, i truly recommend this book. it is awesome.
Rating:
Summary: "The soil of a man's heart is stonier"
Review: Louis Creed wants nothing more than the best for his family, and with this in mind he takes on a new job as a doctor at a university health center, and moves the four of them (plus the family cat "Church") to rural Maine. Upon first arriving at the new house, Louis loses his keys, his daughter Ellie stumbles and scrapes her knee, and the youngest child Gage gets a nasty bee sting. Though some might consider these bad omens, Louis and his wife Rachel shrug these incidences off and get on with their lives. Little do they know that an ancient evil lurks within the woods beyond their new home.
When Ellie's cat Church gets hit by a truck in the road over Thanksgiving, the Creed's neighbor, Jud Crandall, divulges the secret of the Micmac burial ground and it's evil properties to Louis. In a desperate attempt to keep the pain of death and loss temporarily from his daughter, Jud leads Louis out to bury Church. Though changed in somewhat inexplicable ways, Church comes back from the dead and Louis's daughter Ellie gradually learns the lesson that "sometimes dead is better." However, this particular lesson will come much later for Louis himself and his wife Rachel.
I must admit that I'm not a huge fan of King. Pet Sematary, like many of his other books, is very predictable. King even divulges much of the plot well before it happens saying things like he "now had less than two months to live." In other words, little, if anything, is left to surprise. Furthermore, the prose is somewhat less-than-eloquent. Though that does make this an extremely easy read for those looking for something simple and fun. I also found Ellie's prophetic powers to be somewhat cheesy in this particular novel.
However, all of the aforementioned quibbles aside, this tale is tolerable in that the plot is intriguing. I also enjoyed King's inquiry into the human nature as it deals with the extremely real element of death. This seems to be somewhat of a "road less traveled" for many authors, even in the horror genre. Though many reviewers seem to think that this book would have been better without a good chunk of the first half, I would tend to disagree. The first half of the book sets the stage for the way these individuals deal with death and grief, and what their opinions are on the subject, which is all too human and realistic. It's an inquiry into simple human nature. In the introduction, King explains that he was concerned he "had finally gone too far." Perhaps that is because many people, like Rachel's character in the book, would rather pretend death isn't a part of reality and thus would not like to have it shoved in their faces.
King also notes in his introduction that "'sometimes dead is better' is grief's last lesson....That lesson suggests that in the end, we can only find peace in our human lives by accepting the will of the universe." All grudges with King's books aside, this is a worthwhile lesson to be learned, and I enjoyed reading his ponderings on the subject and the way in which they were presented in this novel.
This book is definitely worth a read. Though the movie adaptation sticks quite well to the majority of the plot, the intricacies are left out (as is the case with many movie adaptations). If you read one Stephen King book, this should be it.
Rating: 
Summary: Am I the only one who sees through this?
Review: Now don't just give me a non-helpful vote cause I didn't like the book, at least hear me out. I like King...a lot. He was one of best American authors in the latter half of the 20th Century, and has churned out thriller after thriller that are rightfully critically acclaimed. However, no matter how much I like a particular author, I judge each book individually, and this is not a good book.
Characterization is one of the things that makes King more than Dean Koontz: he develops his characters to the point where the reader really cares what's happening to them. In addition, if you pardon the cliche, his books are "tightly-plotted," moving quickly from situation to situation and keeping the reader involved. Both of these crucial developments are missing in Pet Sematary, none of the main characters are well developed, and so when terrible things begin to happen the reader remains more detached than involved. In addition, supporting characters are brought in at times when the plot calls for it and then thrown away, without ever being developed at all.
The plot is also surprisingly flimsy for a King novel, used only as a clothesline to hang scary and macabre situations on, instead of supporting the novel itself. The actions by the characters often don't make sense, especially at the climax of the book, and the wonderfully set-up "Pet Sematary" itself is inexplicably abandoned in favor of the place "beyond" the Pet Cemetary over the big dead tree.
Look I wanted to like this, I really did, but it's a poor piece of writing that people like because it's macabre and written by Steven King. 3/10
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