Good Story, but...

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Chuggs

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Feb 6, 2012
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...I just can't get into it. I like it, I really do, but for some reason it just doesn't grab me like so many of Sai King's stories do. I'm over half way finished with it, but can't read it for more than a few minutes at a time.

On the flip side, I read Desperation in a few days. I absolutely loved it.

Anyone else have this issue?
 

blunthead

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Aug 2, 2006
80,755
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Atlanta GA
Bachman wrote the novel, but he "adapted" it from King's screenplay, The Shotgunners, which was intended for Sam Peckinpah to direct.
But Peckinpah wanted total control (as per usual), and both Bachman and King refused to grant it. Stanley Kubrick then showed interest, which was fine with Bachman, but King would have none of that.

I read Desperation, then Regulators. I had assumed Regulators would be a kind of sequel to Desperation. I was taken aback; but I think disappointment sometimes happens upon first reading of a story. I think I need to reread The Regulators.
 

Chuggs

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Feb 6, 2012
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Arkansas
Don't get me wrong, I like the story. I don't know, something about it just doesn't grab me. I think maybe the little interludes, such as the journal entries, are a bit too long or something. I like them, but some of them drag a bit. Plus, and I usually don't mind this, but they take me off of the main story, or maybe its just that they take me off main story too long. Who knows. Once I finish the tale I'll probably realize the point of it all and love it. :)
 

Walter Oobleck

keeps coming back...or going, and going, and going
Mar 6, 2013
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Don't get me wrong, I like the story. I don't know, something about it just doesn't grab me. I think maybe the little interludes, such as the journal entries, are a bit too long or something. I like them, but some of them drag a bit. Plus, and I usually don't mind this, but they take me off of the main story, or maybe its just that they take me off main story too long. Who knows. Once I finish the tale I'll probably realize the point of it all and love it. :)

There are things to like about the interludes...that I can't explain without bringing in other stories...Misery, Lisey's Story, others...but in The Regulators, related to the others mentioned
Audrey Wyler's...Mohawk Mountain...as I recall the special place...is like Annie Wilkes's Laughing Place, Scott's Booya Moon...so it was interesting reading The Regulators the first time, and again, to see how Audrey's special place worked for her. And the interludes are like the proverbial story within the story and King dose this allatime, allatime...Audrey's writings are a variation on that theme. I'm sure you can think of a multitude of examples from the stories.
. I grew up with Bonanza, Spaghetti-Os...although the...what were they? Turtles? That was new...I knew the basics but that was it. Too, there have been more recent variations on the special place...in Dreamcatcher...Dr. Sleep. Or even the Smoke-Hole. Camp David. So forth so on.
 

Chuggs

Well-Known Member
Feb 6, 2012
3,777
6,426
Arkansas
There are things to like about the interludes...that I can't explain without bringing in other stories...Misery, Lisey's Story, others...but in The Regulators, related to the others mentioned
Audrey Wyler's...Mohawk Mountain...as I recall the special place...is like Annie Wilkes's Laughing Place, Scott's Booya Moon...so it was interesting reading The Regulators the first time, and again, to see how Audrey's special place worked for her. And the interludes are like the proverbial story within the story and King dose this allatime, allatime...Audrey's writings are a variation on that theme. I'm sure you can think of a multitude of examples from the stories.
. I grew up with Bonanza, Spaghetti-Os...although the...what were they? Turtles? That was new...I knew the basics but that was it. Too, there have been more recent variations on the special place...in Dreamcatcher...Dr. Sleep. Or even the Smoke-Hole. Camp David. So forth so on.
I see where you are coming from, and usually I like them fine. Its just something about this story. I don't know why this bugs me so much...I guess its kind of like a movie that is good, but you just don't really get into it that much.
 

Walter Oobleck

keeps coming back...or going, and going, and going
Mar 6, 2013
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Maybe the town is too secluded...where was this? Some place in Ohio? Maybe it was that obnoxious little kid, Seth...annoying until you realize the force at work behind him. Maybe because the bad is conjured out of thin air, materializes, then disappears, whereas in Desperation it kept coming at you, possessed but always a step behind. Maybe there was as much humor at the forefront in Desperation, I feel GREAT! although there is humor in Regulators. Customer of mine gave me...after showing me and I expressed an interest in it...a shotgun shell. Still have it in the drawer...said it is used somehow in...smelting? Something to do with furnaces...not for shooting birds or intruders. Western Super X No 8 Industrial...slug in the paper-wrapped brass-headed shell...I just put a 12-guage shell on top of it...a big eighth inch of the larger showing around the perimeter with the twelve resting on it nose to nose.
 
Nov 15, 2014
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Wichita Kansas
Regulators is an awesome book... if you have not read Desperation read it right after you finish Regulators. I have read these 2 books twice and listen to them probably once a year. I often do this start with Desperation then move on to Regulators, for some reason I am then driven from Regulators to the Thief of Always (one of my all time favorites) its like the perfect triple feature for me.
 

Sunlight Gardener

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Jul 22, 2013
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I love, love, love The Regulators and I know a lot of other people don't care for it at all. I'm not exactly sure what it is about it but I enjoy it a lot. I think a lot is the setting (I live in Ohio). Warm, beautiful summer day, quiet suburban neighborhood and then everything goes haywire. Reading it makes me happy every time...go figure.

I also love Desperation though. Complete opposite setting, but I love the desolate, isolated feel of it as well. Ghost towns are creepy and interesting to me, so I like that. Also the creepy ass ore pit, mine, whatever it was.