Stephen King is actually a talented writer, read The Shinning

>cocaine
and?

The characters being fleshed out in the Shining is well done, especially for airport fiction, he’s definitely a cut above Michael Crichton on characterization. But his prose is definitely not great

>>24563055 (OP)
The movie is better (I haven't read the books)

>>24563055 (OP)
>The Shinning
What happened to the shins?

>>24563516
the chutes were too narrow

>>24563516
space aids

>>24563055 (OP)
Agreed. He's engaging and fun to read. It's never a deep reflection on the human condition but sometimes you just want an interesting story

His non-horror novels are better. I liked this one.

I like Stephen King. He puts out enough books that there are naturally going to be a few stinkers in the pile. For every Shining there's a Hearts in Atlantis.

>>24565354
The self insert in Story of Lindsey is fucking cringe.

What would you guys considered the strength and weaknesses of Stephen kings writing?

>>24565956
Coke

>>24563055 (OP)
The Shining is crap. The movie was way better.

>>24565956
Weaknesses:
>doesnt edit his stories so they end up reading like first drafts
>doesnt edit his stories so they end up being 2x, 3x, or 4x longer than they need to be
>he reuses the same plot elements over and over (group of friends discover ancient evil / aliens, kidnapped by a cult / secret society / deranged person with psychic powers, long road trips, split personalities, characters struggling with alcoholism, 1950s nostalgia, bullies that are legitimate psychopaths and practically serial killers just terroring the entire town)
>his endings always suck
>random boomer music lyrics thrown in like they're Bible verses or something. Ah yes, King, it's very important I read the chorus to Margheritaville, or else I may miss out on the true meaning of act 2.
>every protagonist is a self insert and he doesnt even try to disguise it.
>when you find something that is good, and you're like, holy shit, this is why people like King. You find out that he's just recycling something from a book he wrote 50 years ago.

Strengths:
>

>>24565956
Strengths: His characters feel realistic. He mentioned this in his memoir "On Writing" that he tries to avoid melodrama and keep the characters acting as realistically as possible. Plus, he's also good at different genres of horror in general. Salems Lot isn't the same as The Mist, since one is North Eastern Gothic, the other is Lovecraftian, and those two aren't the same as The Shining, which is a haunted house. He's also has a knack for Fantasy with the Gunslinger (though Im only up to book 3 and i hear it gets to shit soon after). Overall his stories are varied, and a lot of them are fun.

Weaknesses: He tends to ramble, like a lot. He mentioned - again - in "On Writing" that he looks down on writers who use an outline and plan their novel out, but I really think for him it would be better since he tends to add unnecessary shit in his stream of consciousness. As an example, in "1922" there's a whole segment with Wilfred being haunted by his dead wife, Arlette, who whispers "prophecies" in his ear and goes off on a whole tangent about his son Henry "rescuing" his girlfriend, whom he got pregnant, from some religious house and their cross-country crime spree. That whole part goes on and on about every little crime Henry and her go on, all the way to his death. It could have been condensed from the 20 pages it went on, to maybe 2 since it has nothing to do with moving the story forward, nor the themes in the story. This is just one example, but he does this in almost every single story he does and I often find myself skipping pages just to get back to te main plot a lot of times.

>>24565962
both the movie and the book are top notch, but they are trying to achieve completely different things

>>24565956
Strengths
>Fun-to-read dialogue (ties into weakness though)
>Very inventive spooks. I'm re-reading The Regulators right now and it's nuts
>Good world-building, just the right amount of detail about surroundings and characters. His super-long books (The Stand, It) aren't tedious for me

Weaknesses:
>Really doesn't do endings
>Dialogue, while fun to read, is also corny and unrealistic
>Non-supernatural bad guy characters are cheesy strawman stereotypes

In general he's gotten consistently worse since the 90's but in his coke-fueled heyday he made some great stuff

For every Stephen King book, someone already wrote a better version of It, see:

>Burnt Offerings > The Shining
>Swan's Song > The Stand
>Floating Dragon > It
>Jerusalem Man series > Dark Tower series

>>24566236
Floating Dragon was dogshit imo, what about it did you like more than It?

>>24566236
>Jerusalem Man series > Dark Tower series
What do these have in common besides
>post-apocalyptic setting, gunslinger main character
Reminds me of when people say The Lion King is the same as Kimba the White Lion because they both have lion kings

>>24566242
It's shorter and has a better ending.