Christine

I love how Stephen King is able to embody the voice of a teenage narrator in this novel. The story makes you very uneasy. I never find King novels actually scary, but this is a horrifying concept and a delightful read.

Stephen King is a genius. CHRISTINE is a masterpiece. It is the most traumatic, shocking, horrific, frightening and yet unequivocally brilliant piece of fiction that I have ever read. It is a horror novel. It is a love story. It is a tragedy. That is a review in its own right, but I choose to continue. Because this is fun. The story goes like this: A young lad by the name of Arnie Cunningham is cruising the streets of his hometown with his pal Dennis ... When Arnie just happens to catch a glimpse of a vision of something that he never knew that he wanted. A 1958 Plymouth Fury sedan. The problem is, the car is a wreck, it is a rust bucket which shouldn't be on the road. And there is no way in hell that our Arnie can afford to fix it up. Dennis can see it for what it is but he cant make his pal Arnie see the wood for the trees. But Arnie buys it anyway. Because when Arnie looks at this particular Plymouth he doesn't see what everyone else sees. He sees a stud bucket on wheels. He sees success. He sees easy living. He sees everything he has ever wanted without ever realising he wanted it. In other words, the devil has come to Libertyville and he has set his sights on Arnold Cunningham as his first victim. Stephen King has always been a delight to read. In CHRISTINE, his writing is suspenseful, compelling and at times down right addictive. Given that the book was written back in the 1980s it still holds up remarkably well today. At times, CHRISTINE is shocking, but in a good way. You switch on the kindle (or open your book) and see an innocent and innocuous looking chapter introduction that (so my kindle tells me) will take me 15 minutes to read but once you read this chapter you are faced with the choice of re-reading it for the simple joy of it, or rushing straight on to the next chapter even though it is a work day and it is well past your bed time. Personally, i tend to re-read them. His "shocking" chapters are classic Stephen King gore fests, which are gruesome, highly enjoyable rides of absolute terror and completely unexpected. Hence the shock factor. They can also be quite moving and emotional once your heart beat and blood pressure drop back to normal levels. And also once you have regained your grip on reality and your own sanity. Reading CHRISTINE is like attending a master class in writing sophisticated horror fiction. As always with Mr King, his characterisation stands out like high powered fog lamps on a brand new 4WD motor vehicle. His plot is sufficiently complicated and complex that the book never seems long despite its 746 pages. I have already mentioned its gore factor, the shocks and the unremitting terror in the second half. And so to the ending. It is perfect. It is brilliant, shocking and yet, heartbreakingly sad. The perfect (horrific) ending to the perfect horror novel. Brilliant stuff. BFN, Greggorio.

This novel follows the story of a young man named Arnie Cunningham and his car, Christine. Along for the ride is his best friend Dennis and girlfriend Leigh. It seems that Christine is no ordinary car. This haunted automobile has a habit of killing people who have crossed Arnie and the spirit of the car's former owner slowly takes over control of Arnie himself. How his friends react to all of this is what forms the meat of the story. Regular readers of Stephen King will probably not be surprised to hear that the greatest strength of this book is its characters. Dennis narrates most of the tale and he is a very likable young man. Leigh is another good character and is very easy to root for. Arnie basically represents the tragic victim here. He was victimized by school bullies and his domineering mother before buying the car and then is placed in peril of losing his entire existence. The former owner of the car, Roland LeBay, also looms large and his sheer malice makes him compelling in his own right. The story moves along at a solid pace for the most part but does sag a bit in the middle. The book is less terrifying than it is creepy. The suspense keeps you tingling with interest but don't expect truly intense scares here. There is some light humor peppered in to help break the tension from time to time and it works fairly well. Probably the weakest part of the book is that the beginning of every chapter is marked with song lyrics that pertain to cars. They don't relate even loosely to the story so they appear to be there solely for the sake of nostalgia. The problem is that they are so old and/or obscure that I've never heard the vast majority of them so they end up serving no purpose at all. It's obvious that King put a lot of effort into digging these up but the effort was wasted on me and most readers under the age of 55 or 60 will probably have the same reaction. In summary, I enjoyed reading Christine. The characters are interesting, the suspense worked for me, and I definitely wanted to see what happened next. The book has flaws but they are pretty minor and did not detract in any major way from my enjoyment. This is not Stephen King's best novel but it is well worth reading.

It was crazy, it was WILD, I loved it. I was apprehensive about starting Christine because the movie scared me to pieces when I watched it as a little girl (much too young, probably). I still remember seeing movie-Christine bending and twisting herself back into shape, making repairs to herself after each murderous drive she took. I was horrified but I couldn't look away! That's exactly the way I felt while reading the book, too. I added the audiobook so I could listen while driving and snort-laughed when someone told me it was brave to listen to Christine while driving, HA! Stephen King's nonhuman villains are probably my favorite. He has a knack for making appliances murdering machines. He's made transfer trucks, laundry ironing machines, and lawnmowers evil, and he did it again with a red Plymouth Fury. Dennis' narration of the story reminded me a lot of Red's narration in Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption--a secondary character telling us a story he once lived thru. Not trying to draw any parallels here, but both are narrated in the same way and both are stories told by the greatest storyteller out there.

A portrait of life in the '70s, with all the angst of teenagers - one who has never fit in, one who has always been his friend and protector, and the car that crushed their world. I love the way Stephen King is able to portray all the characters in this supernatural feast. Somehow, he makes you believe the unbelievable.

I must confess I haven't read the novel itself yet, but for those who want to curate a decent King collection, this is the version of this novel to get. Well manufactured, with a sturdy spine, nice pages, and just the right size to hold and leaf through. Great retro/vintage cover design by designers who actually had a clue, unlike the majority of King's mass market paperback designers. I wish Scribner Vintage was in charge of *all* of King's classic reprintings.

As a long-time King fan, I've read every major thing he has written. I probably read Christine when I was in my late teens, early twenties, over thirty years ago. No one writes characters or makes them personable better than King, and this book illustrates that he was a master at it even back then. This is a fun, but eerie story if you've never read it, and if it's been a while, give it another go around. I don't think you'll regret it.

This one is Stephen King’s first evil car story: Christine. I don’t know why (I know a lot of people will disagree with me on this), but I have to put this book in the top ten of my favorites. I’ll get arguments, but to each their own. Here we go. The Ugly: The elephant in the room is the fact that in 1958 Plymouth only made the Fury in Beige. The reason this is “the ugly” is because of the change. I know why he made it red, and someone could have just as easily painted the car, but still. It kind of bothers me. Something as trivial as that as “the ugly” shows how much I like the book. The Bad: I have to struggle to think of things I don’t like about this book. As I know it is anything but perfect, it is still had for me to think of what I don’t like about the book. If anything, I would say this. Not really a spoiler to the end of the book, but there is a point in the book when a few of Arnie’s enemies are destroying the car. If the car can rebuild by itself and drive by itself why didn’t it just destroy the greasers’ right then? I know it’s because of the suspense and horror of the story, but still. The Good: See, I had to struggle to think of something bad about this book. Now, for the good. And I don’t even know where to begin. The characters: they could have easily been one dimensional from the start, but they weren’t. Arnie’s slow change the typical nerd to the greaser was told through the eyes of others, and it only helped. Dennis could have easily been considered the dumb jock. He wasn’t. And the fact that he was still friends with the awkward Arnie all the way through high school tells a lot about him. Leigh was the typical pretty, new girl of the school, but once we started to get to know her we find out that isn’t all there is to her. The car was the best part of the characters. It is its own character. It has its own character development. Final Thoughts: Mind you, King wrote this book while he still had a few monkeys on his back. And yes, I do see the semblance of the story to what his personal demons were at the time. All the same, I strongly recommend this book. I absolutely love it.