I found a healthy way to lengthen my scifi manuscript. It’s still on the short side, but I think it’s solid, story-wise. I’m working on querying, now.
My last post mentioned editing an older project for self-publishing, and that has gone very well. Hopefully I’ll have something substantial to post in the next two or three weeks. I’m pretty excited.
I have another review, this time of 11/22/63 by Stephen King.
11/22/63 is probably my favorite non-Dark Tower Stephen King novel. I say this loosely, as almost every one of his books ties into that series in some way, and this one is no exception. It’s not a horror novel, although the elements of it are there. It’s a gripping story, and a heavy one.
We live in a world that all too often demands a happy ending. I admire King’s ability to ignore this demand, but for the right reasons. It’s easy to write a tragedy for the sake of being contrary, but King doesn’t do this. Instead, his story is tragic, but hopeful, and shouldn’t it be? How often does life tie up all the loose ends, pack them into a gift-wrapped box, and send them to us on a sunny day, with all of the “good guys” alive and unscathed and all of the “bad guys” locked up or dead? More likely, the outcome of an event is apt to be a little good and a little bad (and usually a little more of one than the other), as are the people involved.
11/22/63 tells a fantastic tale that, because of the way it’s told, could just as easily be about real people and real events. Few authors do this as well as Stephen King, and while some of his craft decisions leave me scratching my head or even rolling my eyes, I always walk away grateful to have read the book and spent that time with his characters and stories. This one gets five stars from me.
As a side note, this is my first experience with an audio book. I think I prefer the print, but Craig Wasson’s reading was superb. Each character came to life in a unique but not over-the-top way. Sometimes he read things differently than I would have, but I could hardly call the different perspective a bad thing.
Check out more of my reading activity on my Goodreads page.
Faded Pages 