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Review: The Shining by Stephen King – In which Johnny is nowhere to be found

Novel: Horror. Contains violence, obscenity, adult situations, and disturbing imagery. 

 This review contains spoilers. 

 Going into The Shining, on some level, it was spoiled for me. 

 A lot of the “Will this person die?” stuff is ruined because I *thought* I knew how The Shining ends. I didn't watch the movie, but our pop culture full of spoilers (Especially nowadays), and because I’m not scared easily and bit desensitized, so much of the tension is somewhat ruined. This is the fate of all popular things, to be hailed as incredibly original when it first comes out, and by the time it becomes universally known, it feels full of tropes, since everything and their mother has ripped it off since. 

 None the less I will try to be subjective, because the book does have scary moments, and I ended up being quite surprised at how it ended. So if like me, you think you know the plot, so you don’t think that you should read the book then think again.

Husband, father, and former teacher, Jack Torrance is hired to be the winter caretaker of a The Overlook hotel, but after he and his family have been there for a few weeks his psychic 5-year-old son Danny, begins to see ghosts and gruesome scenes. The parents discover their child’s abilities, and they suspect that the hotel is haunted.

I suppose the only question that most of you would be asking is “Does it live up to the hype?” after all, a lot of The Shining’s renown is built off of Stanley Kubrick’s legendary movie. I would say that in my opinion, it kind of does. The horror is okay, there are some pretty disturbing moments in the book, but in my eyes, they seem to go by too quickly. The much-awaited climax seems to be too short, I know that horror is best when you don’t string it out, but it seems to me that some of the best creepy moments only last two or three sentences.

Then again I haven’t written any horror books (I have tried my hand at it, though), so maybe King knows what he’s doing. But if you're looking for fast-paced horror, then this is not the book for you, it takes about twenty or so chapters before the good stuff really starts. King’s horror is basically getting you to love these character’s and then putting them in harm’s way, which is okay for some people and alright for me but if that’s not what you're looking for then I suggest you follow other conquests.

Once the horror picks up, though, it does a good job of keeping your imagination full of the disturbing pictures. Once you get to the last ten or eleven chapters I suggest you read the rest of the book in a dark room, alone. It also has a great ending, which I've heard King is particularly good at creating. And it has some inventive ways to keep you interested, with some pretty cool concepts. There is more than one idea in the book which is bordering on genius, but there seems to be a lag in certain areas.

So overall I wouldn't say that it is overrated, it’s just a more refined taste. If you like King but haven’t read The Shining for some reason then this is a book you should pick up, if you are just starting King then this is a good book to start you out, and if you don’t like horror that is built on a lot of suspense then this probably isn't the book for you.

I would rate it Good very close to Great

For those of you who haven’t read any of my previous posts, this is my reviewing system = Awful - Bad - Good - Great - Brilliant

If you liked this review then please drop a comment and check out my other posts. Thank you. 
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