I finished The Long Walk about 3 days ago, and to say that I was completely infatuated with this story would be the biggest understatement. That being said having a book with 3 other Bachman novels I decided to read The Running Man which is arguably the more famous of the original Bachman works. After reading it I have to say it does not hold a candle to The Long Walk. Now the thing is The Running Man was not a bad book. In fact I found to be very entertaining and even had some useful commentary on poverty and exploitation. Had I read it first I probably would have praised it. It's not about what The Running Man lacked but more about what The Long Walk had.
To me The Long Walk was a story that was told on such a deep and intimate level that few books can ever compare to. It made me seriously think about the issues of death, and war and brutality that our society currently promotes as entertainment. The images that I congured up of the horrible suffering the boys went through will not leave my head. To me it felt like such an emotionally baring book that had the ability to disrupt my current mood an thoughts and continues to do so. Where as the running man just served as momentary entertainment. Did anyone else fell this special connection with The Long Walk? And that the book was just on a deeper level than most fiction? If so does King replicate this in any of his other books?
My special connection to The Long Walk was to pick it up this past summer at a used book store while on vacation. It was on sale for 4 dollars. I hesitated and decided against it.
Duh!
I found out later that the copy I could have purchased for 4 measly bucks was worth around 60 to 80 bucks!
Anyway - sorry, as I have not read it, I cannot comment.
But I WILL find another copy somewhere and after reading your glowing review I look forward to reading it

A girl in the book store seemed to think the concept was somehow similar to the book Hunger Games?
Never having read Hunger Games, does anyone around here have an opinion?