Doctor Sleep, Stephen King's sequel to The Shining

I read The Shining and Doctor Sleep back-to-back. I was shocked to find that I liked Doctor Sleep more than The Shining--which I loved.

Just finished it! I was obsessed with The Shinning when I was a kid, and was actually hesitant about reading Dr. Sleep, because I didn't want it to taint my memory of one of my all time favorite books. Insanely, I thought, hey, hasn't Danny Torrance been through enough?
Well, I loved it! So glad I bought it! Hats off to Stephen King!

I am only about half way through it. I put it down for a while and just recently went back to it. For some reason it didn't keep my attention.

So far my favorite parts were the tie in with Joe Hill's NOS4A2 and Dick's childhood. I think I would have enjoyed a whole book about Dick more than one about Danny at this point.

Well I've read Joe Hills book and loved it. The fact that it shares a character in kings doctor sleep has me intrigued. I'll have to check out. Thanks all. I think I'm a bit king-ed out though but we'll see.

Furious Deep said:

So far my favorite parts were the tie in with Joe Hill's NOS4A2 and Dick's childhood. I think I would have enjoyed a whole book about Dick more than one about Danny at this point.

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I must be out of it, because I had never even heard about Joe Hill or NOS4A2. I guess it's because I'm not usually a horror reader. I'll have to check it out!

I liked DOCTOR SLEEP pretty well, even if the meaning of the title doesn't add up to much IMO. And I haven't read much King for over ten years, having been turned off by some of his 90s work.

I agree with Penguin Factory that King's weak on children, but Abra had a few good moments, even if she failed as a fully rounded characters.

Liked this book a lot, but favourite King book is Lisey's story ...which a lot of people don't seem to like much. Any thoughts? Think its a love it or hate it number!

MaggieMc said:

Think its a love it or hate it number!

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That seems to be true of a lot of King's books. Of those I've read, I like The Gunslinger best. The rest of that series deterioriated, for me as reader. I was defeated by The Shining. Just couldn't get through it, for reasons I can't exactly articulate. But maybe I need to give it another go, and read Dr. Sleep after.

caw

blacbird said:

That seems to be true of a lot of King's books. Of those I've read, I like The Gunslinger best. The rest of that series deterioriated, for me as reader. I was defeated by The Shining. Just couldn't get through it, for reasons I can't exactly articulate. But maybe I need to give it another go, and read Dr. Sleep after.

caw

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Perhaps you should have read The Shining as I did -- sitting by the fire, alone in a ski lodge closed for interim (between summer and winter seasons) with the only access road closed by an early snowstorm and the electricity threatening to go out at any moment.

Then the telephone rings and an automated alarm system warns you in a synthesized voice of a problem in the East Wong boiler room.

This is not fiction.

I really really loved Doctor Sleep.

I think it was one of the few times where King went in a totally unexpected direction, and I LOVE the development of Danny's character, which feels right to me.

Apologize for the late entry; just saw this thread.

Penguin_Factory said:

The last big flaw was Abra. King continues to insist on writing about children even though he's terrible at it. I can almost picture him writing that character thinking, "what should Abra do now? How about if she cries? Little girls cry all the time write? Yeah that works."

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I think the flaw isn't that he's writing children so much as modern children. I read his books in the 70s (I read Carrie in 1975, when I was four years old and Salem's Lot not long thereafter - yeah, I had a great set of parents) and remember thinking he got children down pat, the thoughts, fears, loves, hates we all had during that time.

I think now that he's in his (60s? 70s?) he may have missed the boat on how modern children think, simply because their experiences growing up are so foreign to what he experienced growing up.

That said, he's a great writer, and I think the Abra character wasn't as off as you indicate here.