Dreamcatcher

Rating:
Summary: Definitely not his best work...
Review: The book almost lost me... but I believe in giving a King book the benefit of the doubt and kept reading. There was some great parts to the story, if you can get past the first 200 pages. Once I got into the heart of the book it held my interest, it was just tough going there for a while.

Rating:
Summary: Phoned It In???
Review: First let me say that I have been an avid reader of Stephen King novels for many years, with classics like Christine and Salems Lot being old friends to be reread ever few years.

I'm afraid the same can't be said about Dreamcatcher. If I was asked to summarise the style of the book, it would have to be as the literary equivilent of a B-grade slasher movie, with bad overacting and plenty of gore to try and keep the readers attention.

Earlier SK books have a depth that totally entraps the reader. The multiple layers and inter-twined stories of Christine, the charactor development within The Dead Zone, even the inner turmoil of Gerald's Game.

Dreamcatcher comes across to me as very shallow. The charactor development is minimal, the story line barely hangs together, and the bulk seems to be made of overly lurid descriptions of what blood and bodies look like. I understand you have a phrase in the USA describing this kind of offering... something about Phoning It In???

I will still buy his next book in the hopes he develops a bit more pride in his work, but this was disappointing.

Rating:
Summary: One of his best books.
Review: I have been reading the other reviews on this book and I was suprised because I thought it was great. I prefer his books that are written in more of a science fiction\horror catagory. "The Girl who loved Tom Gordon" is also good but it is very short (you can finish it in an afternoon).

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful read
Review: This was a great read. Its remeniscent or even connected to some of his other works, like The Stand, IT, and the Tommyknockers, but is unique from the three. The plot was rich and the characters interesting; the only drawback I found was the ending which seemed a little too neat and clean. I think King ended it leaving too many questions, although maybe he has sequal in mind? I was curious about how public the whole alien thing ended up, what the government was planning to do after, and the maybe psychic connection with Jonesy's child left me wondering.

I really liked the battle between Mr. Gray/the byrus and Jonsey in Jonseys mind. Wonderful overall and I would highly recommend reading this interesting book.

I am also intersted if King has an IT sequal in mind; to those who have read the book you know what I mean (what was scralled on the standpipe plaque made me wonder!)

Rating:
Summary: A Painfully Obvious Lack of Ideas and Suspense
Review: It was definitely good for Stephen King to write this book while recovering from his catastrophic accident, and he has translated some of his pain and agony in the book, especially in the form of one of the main characters, Jonesy, who has also been hit by a car. True King fans will send their best wishes in this regard, but unfortunately, "Dreamcatcher" is one of the weakest King books I have read (and I've read at least 22 of them). The problem here is a major shortage of ideas, believable characters, and suspense.

First, this book is basically a rehash of several earlier King works. Once again we get to sit through the concept of childhood friends with a special, psychic bond that lasts into adulthood. King has already beaten this concept to death in "It," "Stand By Me," and who knows where else, and here he destroys this tired concept once and for all (I hope). This book also displays one of King's longtime weaknesses - telling big chunks of the story through flashbacks. The main plotline of aliens attempting to take over humanity, but being thwarted by their own weaknesses and the unexpected resilience of humans, was already used in "Tommyknockers," and much better. The main characters here (except possibly Duddits) are very narrowly defined and stereotypical, and are hard to empathize with. Worst yet are the two useless bad guys, the military commander Kurtz (ridiculously insane and narrow-minded) and his assistant Freddy (completely devoid of independent thought). These two guys are completely impossible to believe, and their presence doesn't even make that much sense to the story line. It's as if King felt the need to add two bad guys just because he thought it was necessary, and their function in the story seems like little more than a weak afterthought.

This book is also annoyingly slow-moving and devoid of suspense, especially with the tedious and never-ending chase scene that makes up a large portion of the book. King attempts to add suspense by moving the action along very slowly. That sometimes works (in the King classics), but here it's just tedious and misguided. You will also be distressed by this book's reliance on gross-out tactics, with belching, farting, and puking being major parts of the plot. "Dreamcatcher" would be a presentable novel by most other writers. But as part of King's fearsome overall career, it's mediocre at best.

Rating:
Summary: No more space aliens.......please
Review: I've been a Stephen King fan since I read Salem's Lot as a teenager. That book scared me so much that I slept with a crucifix for months afterwards! I've read every book he's ever written; some I've loved, some I've liked. The TommyKnockers is probably my least favorite of all & I thought it was a better alien invasion story than "Dreamcatcher". The novel might have been redeemed if it had focused more on the relationship of "Duddits" & his four friends in their early years but that is only skimmed over in the briefest of flashbacks & I never felt that I understood what created such a life-long bond between the five men.I would have liked to know more about the bully that they murdered in their dreams too. I think that would have been scary in that subtle way that characterizes King's finest writing. Once the aliens enter the picture the plot seemed needlessly complicated, especially parts involving Jonesy's body being taken over by the Gray Man. I found myself skimming over most of those scenes. I don't think, as some other reviewers have suggested, that Stephen King has "lost it", but for me at least, I hope he finds inspiration for his next novel a little closer to home.

Rating:
Summary: What a waste of time
Review: I found that I couldn't get more than 200 pages into this book. The book made no sense. I like X-Files and thought that aliens would a good topic. It turned out that all I read was that a bunch of drunks and suicidals were meeting to go hunting. I read about them yelling and thinking, "f* this and f* that, and "dickweed this." It just reminded me of a bunch of R-rated adolescent junk. Nothing intelligent seemed to come of the story line. I am ready to send the book back to the publisher and demand my money back. What a waste of time!

Rating:
Summary: great beginning and then....huh?
Review: I am a big fan of Stephen King, and listen to his books on tape while driving to work. The Dreamcatcher was 16 cassettes, and took me a month to complete. What a waste of my time! The first half was great; Stephen King has a way of writing that makes me laugh out loud. His characters were real, and their thoughts and interactions were very humorous. The first half of the book flew by. Then came the second half......Slow moving and very complex. I think Mr. King tried to put too many different aspects into one book without considering some of the inconsistencies. For instance, did the weasel creatures hatch from eggs or develop inside a living host? I never quite understood the connection between the birus (forgive me if I spelled this incorrectly, but since I listened to this book on tape, I never saw the word actually written), the egg-laying "space weasels", Mr. Gray, the Dreamcatcher, Duditz, and the telepathy. It was like Mr. King couldn't decide what to focus on, so he put EVERYTHING in. The last half of the book moved so incredibly slowly with so many different layers of plot that I became bored. I finished the book just because I hate to start a book and not finish it, but when all is said and done, I wish I had stopped reading when it first started getting tedious. Overall, The Dreamcatcher left a sour (and bored) taste in my mouth. My recommendation is that your time could be spent much more wisely than reading this book.

Rating:
Summary: Is Stephen King loosing it?
Review: I understand the author was not going through his best time when he wrote this book but I was very disapointed: the characters are not specially well developed (I hardly got to know any of them at all by the novel) and the aliens did not seem at all interesting, or scary, or fun even. Hope Black House brings back Mr. King as I formerly knew him.

Rating:
Summary: King does it again!
Review: Stephen King's still putting out some of the best horror novels decades later...
Not my favorite King tale by any means, but definitely a worthy read... King's telling of the classic "alien invasion" story is very "X-File"-esque. Not to mention filled with his usual gore.
And any Simon and Garfunkel fan can't ignore the allusions.