I loved the cover! I loved practically everything about this book. King's newness to Florida came thru via Edgar, as well as his feeling damaged from his accident. The big novel unfolds at a very leisurely pace, and still by the end you'll likely wish it would go on & on. He even got his love of boloney on white bread with mayonnaise in there! About my "
practically everything about this book" from before, *sigh* if I have a gripe about the book I'd say it's that King once again, created an almost mystically saintly black lady character. The book was so good, that digression can easily be forgiven. Then the other shoe dropped. If there is an overtly masculine, handsome, Hemingway-esque character, who is admired and tends to succeed at whatever he turns his hand to, in a Stephen King book they must always be revealed at the moment of truth to be a coward, or at least utterly wrong, close-minded & largely useless. Wading into the confrontation between the father and Nan Melda against the wraiths, the text swimming before me, I closed my eyes and hoped against hope that this would not be the case. (
That was largely for dramatic effect. I doubt I actually closed my eyes.) But of course, that
was the case! And at his dropping the n-bomb, I think I probably exclaimed,
"Oh come on!!" out loud. If not out loud, certainly mentally. That scene deflated me for a bit. Even more so because I saw it basically marching down 5th avenue twirling batons! Do you suppose being physically thrown out of a bar and called a girl because of his long hair at 21 gave Stephen King a lifelong hatred of testosterone cases? I don't know. Some overtly masculine types are okay guys. (
GNTLGNT, for example) I'd much rather have seen the aging, going to fat, amateur scuba-diver who was adored by his girls, go down swinging.