by Monnie

Created on: September 10, 2010   Last Updated: September 11, 2010

When Stephen King wrote his third collection of stories, titled aptly Nightmares & Dreamscapes he brought a nice variety of scares and chills to the table. For the most part the tales fall into two categories: the good and the great. Stories such as the creative spin on taking a wrong turn like “You Know They Got a Hell of a Band” is fantastic. So is disturbing tale of a dastardly child snatcher who gets his comeuppance in “Popsy”. Other stories such as “The Moving Finger” and zombie tale “Home Delivery” or entertaining as well. There are very few duds in Nightmare & Dreamscapes. Unfortunately “It Grows On You” doesn’t live up to it’s title.

“It Grows On You” is a weak story which is the predecessor of a much stronger story King would write later in his career. This tale tells the story of an eccentric couple, Joe and Cora Newell, who moved into a Castle Rock house in the early 1900’s. Those living in the town gossip about how strange they are. In particular, a collection of old men gather at the general store to discuss the comings and goings of the small town. On this day particularly they have noticed Joe is adding onto the house yet again. The men sit around and describe odd events happening in relation to the couple, but other wise nothing really happens.

It’s a boring story.

Except for the couple who are only passive characters in the story, there are no memorable characters to speak of. This lowers the investment a reader has in the story considerably. The house sounds interesting but while it was the focus of the story readers never learn any more about the house after some of the initial discussion. Towards the end a few interesting tidbits are revealed about the mistress of the house. Unfortunately, this happens in the very end and leaves the reader with a puzzled expression asking “And?”. The story fails to materialize.

Later though Stephen King would write a far more interesting story about a similar house called Rose Red. It seems like he took some of the under developed ideas in this story and revamped their for a bigger story. This doesn’t change the fact “It Grows On You’ is a snoozer of a story. In fact, out of all the tales contained in Nightmares & Dreamscapes it’s the only one which could be described as completely forgettable. So if one is planning on reading Nightmares & Dreamscapes and feels no need to read it in its entirety this would be the story to skip.

Learn more about this author, Monnie.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.