Carrie by Stephen King: A Book Review

In My Horror Era

Lately, I've been in a horror mood. To be more exact, in the mood to read horror.

Let me start from the beginning. I used to love to watch horror movies. Staying up until 3 am under a blanket by myself, watching a slasher kill everyone right and left. But then college came around and I watched less and less of it, the last being American Horror Story. Recently, I've been missing the complete nonsense the genre horror brings with it and realized, I haven't read much of it. Sure, I've thrown some thrillers and suspense novels into the mix of my latest reading, but horror is another class of it's own. So when I saw Carrie by Stephen King available on the Libby app, I snatched it up before anyone else could.

I'm in my horror era after all.

Overview of Carrie

After being bullied her entire school career and forced into ridiculous religious rituals by her delusional mother, Carrie's final breaking point comes to a head in the girl's locker room. Everyone and anyone must pay and at no better time then prom night. Newspaper clippings follow the night of events as the once quiet town is set ablaze in the wake of Carrie's wrath.

The Cons of Carrie

· Internal Monologue

For Stephen King's first book he nailed most writing elements with the plot and stand out scenes, but what he missed was the writing of the character's internal monologues. Following multiple POVs you jump from one character to the next especially when the dialog is flowing. Instead of writing the character's internal thoughts following a new sentence, he inserts it within the text(similar to this). Writing in this matter stops the flow of the text as you jump back and forth between what's being said out loud and what's being thought. I've read a few of his other books where he does this exact same thing and I can say I am not a fan. If you have to insert it, then maybe you need to figure out how to be able to write it into the story without disturbing the flow.

The Pros of Carrie

· Opening Scene

I'm going to get into some details here, because let's be honest this book, as well as the movie, has been out for like 50 years.

This opening scene is icon in the horror world. A girl starting her period and then being made fun of by her peers and getting tampons thrown at her is what writing is all about. Keeping the readers engaged from the beginning is what an author is supposed to do and King nailed it on the head. Kurt Vonnegut's quote, "Start as close to the end as possible," comes to mind with this scene. Throwing us into the action and immediately feeling sorry for the main character is exactly what we readers love. I couldn't think of a better way for him to start this story.

· Characters

Not only do we follow Carrie throughout the story, we follow her teachers, peers, mother, neighbors, etc. Even with all the jumping around to the different characters, you feel as if you are reading a real person. Each stands out on their own even if they only make a two sentence cameo. This brings the story to life as you get a feel of the town as a whole and the evilness some characters contain.

· Super Powers

Even with the realness of the book, Carrie holds powers of her own. Whether to name them super powers or a genetic mutation is nonessential to the story. Her being seen having this trait as a young child to then fully unleashing it due to her circumstance was portrayed well and not over done. If anything, more of it could have been included.

· Newspaper Clippings

Throughout the story you read the events of the main event before it even occurs. Through the eyes of witnesses you see the damage the town has caused to themselves after Carrie has unleashed her powers onto them. The uncertainty but consistencies they witness is seen in these clippings as the 'what' they are seeing cannot possibly be real. This extra element was something I wouldn't think would add to the story, but pushed it forward. King did a great job baiting the reader into seeing what was coming but getting all the actual details of who and when things occurred later in the book.

Overall Review Summary

I'm not joking when I say I read this book in one sitting. Just like back in the day when I used to stay up watching scary movies I couldn't put this down. King did an excellent job for this being his first novel in horror. Would I say this is the scariest horror content I've consumed, no. But it did the job to get me back into my horror era. Yes.

From the incredible opening scene, to the realistic characters, this story screams horror. Who would think that pig's blood and electrocuting students on prom night would be so popular.

Even though I would love to see more of Carrie herself within the story and maybe some more backstory with her incredibly insane mother, the 'super power' elements made up for it.

The overall flow of the story did get thrown off a bit when it came to Stephen King's writing style but even still I'm giving this novel a 5 out of 5 stars.

Have you read this book or seen the movie? If not, you should! If you love reading book reviews, check out my last two, Lightlark and Animal Farm. Don't forget to subscribe to the blog to get the latest updates. As always...