S.R. Tooms

Oh ... Let me take this foot out of my mouth... I guess I completely misunderstood. All this time I've been thinking of the wrong plot! However, I'm still a bit skeptical with this one. King, for me at least, seems to be a big hit or miss. Is this the kind of book where you'd recommend running right out to snatch it up? Or more of, ehh, well if you've got the time...

Personally, I can't stand many of the "classics"! The Jane Austen types... Proper romancin' and such. Although this probably extends to modern works of romance as well! Other than that, the classics are wonderful. Turn of the Screw, Island of Dr. Moreau, Candide, Don Quixote -- timeless! I was not overly enthralled by the many modern "classics" such as Gatsby, Catcher, and the like. Of Mice and Men... I've tried rereading them after they were blundgeoned into my head during those joyous school days; still to no avail. Overall I'd say I keep about the same ratio of likes/dislikes, regardless of whether the book is classic or not.

I'm rereading through the classic Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Number #162, here we go!

While true -- some people WISH they could read more books. These are the "if I only had more time!" kinds of lads n' lasses. Or for anyone who doesn't have the time to spend hours and hours gripping the pages of a book/getting lost in fantasy. In which case I whole heartedly recommend learning to increase your reading rate. It is a skill like any other.

Woah ol' boy! Sounds like you already read along at a good clip. That's really moving! With the longer sessions... it seems you either really get into the swing of things and tear through the pages, or kind of meander and dawdle your way along. This is an example of an RSVP reader http://accelareader.com/

I really agree with your sentiments. That flowery, overwrought prose style drags on and on! At times it can be nice, but often I find myself just wanting to skip over all that crap! I would recommend books by Roald Dahl (as always!), James Thurber, Carl Hiaasen, Fight Club, Hank the Cowdog series, Candide by Voltaire, and short books by David Haynes (such as Ballet of Bones).

They sure seem to be pushing this quite heavily over on amazon! My concern is where would he go with the story? The Shining takes place at his lowest point it would seem. Is King just fabricating some wishy-washy material here?

I remember back in high school I used to think my reading rate was pretty decent. This claim being based on the rates of those students around me... A few years later I really began to investigate the matter. Was I actually that fast? I whipped out the ol' stopwatch and timed myself reading on several occasions. Turns out... I wasn't that fast! This sent me on a tirade, a real tantrum! I set about searching for techniques to improve my reading rate, while maintaining a high comprehension. Speed reading and the like... The answer, for me at least, came in the form of RSVP readers (confined to e-reading). A book that used to take me 6 hours to read was cut down to 2. I'm not sure what the exact reading rate for myself currently is -- as you well know, readers, it varies quite a bit depending on many factors such as mood and the subject matter. But I like to hover around 500-650 if I can, on average. How fast do y'all read? Do you care? Does it matter? I thought so! Faster speed means more books! I wrote a little piece on the topic with a few suggestions if anyone is interested: http://thecomplainerscompendium.wordpress.com/2013/10/06/rsvp-cutting-your-reading-time-in-half/

That is often the case. The author thinks "boy wouldn't that be cool if--" and they have the ending scenario all mapped out... The question now becomes HOW DO I GET THERE! Not all stories start out with "It was a dark and stormy night..." In fact another valuable piece of information spoken by a writer of some note, says he rarely if ever has writer's block. When a scene is giving him trouble -- he simply skips along to another area that he is comfortable writing. Whether it be the middle, beginning, ending or anywhere in between. Don't get trapped -- just get it written!

Read Roald Dahl! If you think you're too old (hah!) for his children's stories... give his short adult fiction a go. For some zany humor try out Carl Hiaasen.