by John Carruthers

Created on: April 29, 2009

Stephen King is one of my favourite and most revisited authors. I am a bit of a speed reader and an insomniac so this satisfying combination means that I get through a lot of books through the course of the year. So usually every couple of years I revisit all of his books.

Carrie is the first book that Stephen King had published (I am sure it's not the first one he wrote but that's not important right now) and is probably my least favourite of what he has to offer. That's not to say that it's not a good book. To be honest, I think that the worst thing Stephen King has ever written is probably comparable to the best written by anyone else in the horror genre.

The book tells the tale of a girl by the name of Carrie White who discovers after starting her period a lot later than her peers (at the age of 17) that she has telekinetic abilities. Apparently some strange events have always centred around her but nothing in comparison to what happens once she starts her period.

Carrie is very much bullied in school and controlled by her mother and events in the book drive her over the edge - in particular a specific event that spirals out of the control of all the people involved. It is a horrifying tale of revenge and a bit of an emotional roller coaster. I have to admit that there are times I feel sorry for Carrie while reading it and other times I think she almost deserves the treatment she receives. An absolutely shocking admission but if you have read the book then you would probably know what I mean.

I think one of my main bug bears about the book is the structure. It is a very short story by Stephen King's standard and as well as a continuous storyline, there are excerpts from newspapers, letters, interviews, court hearings, books and magazines about the horrifying events that unfold. I reckon that if he had written this book a lot later in his career it could be one of his best and most interesting but because of the way he approaches it here, he does not give us the depth to his characters that he does in his later stories. I always walk away from this book thinking I do not really know any of the characters at all.

Ironically, since I am a much bigger fan of novels than I am of movies, I have to say a lot of the events I associate with the book are executed (or in some places completely replaced) by events in the movie version in a much better fashion. Not wanting to give too much information away about the book (I am not a fan of spoilers) but the scene in the prom and the final scene in the movie being just two of them. It is made all the more ironic by the fact that most of the film versions of Stephen King novels are usually very substandard in comparison to his written version.

Basically, I would say that Carrie is definitely more of a book for someone who needs to read all of an author's work (it's a compulsion) rather than someone looking for his best. A good read but not great, an admission Stephen King has even made himself

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