The Stand

Good book

good

Back in 1978, Stephen King was well on his way to becoming the biggest selling author of all time. On the back of three great classics that were Carrie (1974), ‘Salem’s Lot (1975) and The Shining (1977), King had already established himself as the Master of Horror, a title to which, even today, he has become a bit tired with. He had now hit the big time, didn’t need to worry about money or work again – he had achieved his lifelong dream (becoming a full time writer). The Shining had become his first bestselling hardcover novel, perhaps influenced by the fact that Brian DE Palma’s 1976 adaptation of Carrie had become a box office success, allowing audiences to discover King in a new medium that they might not have done so had it not been for the movie.His first three published novels had been hard-core horror novels, all three contemplating his status as the King of Horror. King’s next novel would be a change of pace. It would still include elements of the horror genre, a genre in which he had spent his entire life surrounded by, even as a child, but his next novel would also have elements of science fiction and would actually become a sociological look at the human race. But first, he would have to kill them all.On the heels of the Shining, King had been inspired by the Patty Hearst case (a case that involved both kidnapping and terrorism), to write a novel surrounding these events, but not long into the novel, he gave up, after having seen on the news, a chemical spill that had happened in Utah. Not long after this, King’s mind started working overtime and he came up with a novel about something similar that would wipe out the human race, allowing only a few remaining characters to be left behind and deal with the tragic events that had been enforced upon them. Wanting to write an epic on par with Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, King went about creating a vast landscape in which he left nothing out, allowed nothing to bypass the story – this would become the ultimate epic novel.The Stand begins with this primary thought. The basic premise of the novel is that a government research facility, after having spent time creating a super flu bug (Captain Trips as it is known in the novel) to be used in biological warfare, is accidently released on to the base. Everybody dies except for one man, Charles Campion, a security guard, who grabs his family and evacuates that base, heading across Northern America, unaware that he has the flu like virus, infecting everyone he comes into contact to. So King weaves out his tale, introducing us to a multitude of characters, some good, some bad, showing us the effects of Campion’s actions, watching minor characters contract the flu, watching them suffer through the eyes of our main characters, all of diverse backgrounds. King is clever in letting us see how the virus takes hold, how it acts as a chain mail across all of America, letting us get to know the characters, watch the human race become extinguished through their eyes, letting us see their pain, letting us get attached to them so that we can go on the journey that they will inevitably have to take.King is a genius at creating a wide variety of characters, and not since Dickens, has any writer ever managed to capture a whole society of characters that all can be identified by the reader. Of the good, there is Stu Redman (an everyman from East Texas, the main character pretty much of this large epic), Fran Goldsmith (a young pregnant girl from Maine, who becomes one of the main heroines of the piece), Larry Underwood (a singer from New York), Nick Andros (a deaf mute who passes through Shoyo, Arkansas), Glenn Bateman (a retired college professor that taught sociology and is one of the characters that King uses to speak his own thoughts on society and bring about theories of what will likely happen now that over 99% of the world’s population is dead), Tom Cullen (a man who is more like a boy due to a very low IQ. He develops a great relationship with Nick, learning new things through Nick’s teaching. He spells every word M-O-O-N), Ralph Bretner (a farmer who always seems to see the lightness in everything, never thinking himself superior to anyone, he ends up becoming one of the main heroes of the peace) and Mother Abigail (a 108 year old from Nebraska, who still makes her own biscuit. The main characters dream of her, using her as a guiding force of help along the way. She is a prophet of God and for a short while leads them until letting them make it on their own). There are also plenty of main characters who are on the side of evil: Lloyd Henried (a killer/robber who ends up in prison as Captain Trips spreads across America, being left to die until he is saved by his new leader), Harold Lauder (a friend of Fran’s. Before the flu hit, Harold was the butt of jokes, hated by everyone, even his own parents. He has a crush on Fran and loves her, and becomes jealous and full of hate when she revokes this love and ends up with another of the main characters instead), Nadine Cross (a school teacher who has visions of the Dark Man, visions that they would become lovers and eventually married. She loves Larry also, but can’t allow herself to act upon this love as her heart and mind belongs to the Dark Man), the Trashcan Man (a psychopath who has developed an obsession of burning everything in his path. He is one of King’s most interesting and memorable characters. His loyalty to the Dark Man knows no bounds “my life for you”, yet he ends up becoming something of an anti-hero), Randall Flagg (the Dark Man, the Prince of Evil, the antithesis of Mother Abigail, he is gathering his troops to Las Vegas and trying to create an army that will eventually wipe out those that stand against him. He is one of the greatest villains in the King universe and has appeared in more than one of his novels).Had this been a book written by any other writer, the premise of the novel would probably have been the characters get together, stand against the Dark Man and his minions and save the day. But this is a King novel, a novel of epic proportions. We don’t just see the Stand that will ultimately take place, we see a large cast of characters coming together, creating a new world together, creating a new life together and King shows every single point of this. The world building in this novel is fantastic, on par with the greatest of fantasy novels (including Tolkien). You really get to know the characters, to love them and hate them, feeling like they have become a part of your family. You feel enriched by them, allowing yourself to be taken on this journey with them, fighting for your own survival as well as theirs.When King first wrote this back in 1978 and sent it to his publishers, they were shocked by the size and scope of the novel. They replied back to him, saying they would have to cut the book by about four hundred pages in order to sell it. King was distraught by this, but as he was still establishing himself as a bestselling writer, he felt he had no choice but to succumb to Doubleday’s wishes and so he himself cut over four hundred pages out of the book, missing out a lot of what made the book very important. The Stand was eventually published in 1978 and quickly went on to become King’s masterpiece, the book all fans seemed to love and say was his best. King has actually gone on record as saying “to some fans, I could have written nothing after The Stand, and they wouldn’t have cared.”Fast forward to 1991 – King was toying around with the idea of releasing The Stand as it was originally intended. After receiving permission from Doubleday to go ahead with this idea, King began working on an updated version of The Stand, changing the premise of the book from the late seventies into the early nineties, including new background like HIV/Aids, changing the sociological background of the characters, without allowing them to change in anyway. As he says in his forward to the new version, “you won’t find the characters behaving any differently or going down roads and on journeys that they never went on before”. It was the same story but it was bigger and it was allowed to become complete. And so The Stand: The Complete and Uncut Edition was released in 1991 and this is the version fans say is the one to read. Not having read the original edition, I can only go on hearsay that this is the version that is far superior and much more enjoyable. This is the one I have read four times.Is The Stand King’s greatest book? In my opinion, it isn’t. As far as I’m concerned, King would go on to write even greater books, but this is definitely one of his most memorable, most exciting works. It is also, along with The Dark Tower series, the one book that seems to have a lot of fans in such diverse thought – some say it is a book that is a work of genius, an epic masterpiece that flows high on every level (I am of this thought) and some say it is too long, not worth the hype, boring and they couldn’t get through it. Whatever your way of thinking becomes, it is most certainly a book you have to read at least once in your lifetime. Despite its length, I would go on to say that it is a perfect place to start for readers just getting into King. It includes all the elements that make him one of the greatest writers of all time – fantastic, realistic characters, a great premise of a story, writing that takes you in, grabs you and doesn’t let you go, and great world building that allows you to feel that you are actually there with the characters, going along with them for the journey.While this book is not my all-time favourite of King’s (that says more about the brilliance of his future works than about this actual novel), it is definitely in my top ten and one I enjoy coming back to again and again. For me this really is the perfect five.

If you know Stephen King then you know what you are in for with this, in my view his stand out piece of work. Lots of reviews criticise the first part of the book as taking too long to develop but I don't agree. I've never read 1400 pages so quickly and I think the extra detail he puts in over the original version only adds to the colour and texture of the storytelling.The book tells the story of the end of the human race as we know it, brought about by a deadly flu strain, developed by the US military. The social science is a bit simplistic but the quality of the storytelling​ and character development are both excellent.

The book has greater resonance given the Corona virus pandemic we are currently living through.A huge book but King manages to keep the reader interested for the most part. You have to wait quite a while before elements of the supernatural are introduced.There are many different characters introduced along the way - many for just a short period. An index of characters would be really useful as it is easy to forget less important ones.The plot boils down to good versus evil and it is ironic that one of the most destructive forces that man has created (surely an evil?) is used for good at the end of the book. However, King reminds us in the final pages that evil is never completely eradicated.

I always like the challenge of reading long books given that this book is around 1300 pages, just the feeling of accomplishment reading the book, so satisfying. That's the book only, not the content. The story is greatly astonishing, never expect guffs and meaningless pages from Stephen King. Stephen is the sort of person that likes to write alot but has a vivid and suspenseful story to his worldwide audience. Recommended for Heavy Reading ;)

This novel is well over 1300 pages, split into 78 chapters. I bought this having recently read another Stephen King novel which I enjoyed tremendously (I think it had been more than 25 years ago since I had read any of his novels when I had loads of them) so decided I would buy some of his other, highly rated books. I wasn't prepared for such a brick of a book so approached this with caution.Interesting to see that this book was first published in 1978 and, in the midst of a global pandemic, I was curious to see if it would hold up and still feel current.Stephen King is a master story teller and this is a fantastic story which is told in huge detail. There are an enormous number of characters. I'm not completely convinced they are all necessary although having to make the effort to get to know them all engages the reader into the fast moving plot.Many people will read this during the COVID pandemic and hopefully it will help to put the current crisis into some perspective. In the book, the virus is highly contagious and kills almost everyone. The description of the virus spreading is a great study into human behaviour and it is interesting to compare the panic to the current reaction around the globe - the main difference being that, in the book, the virus has already spread before most people know about it.From the start, there are a few main characters and it is clear that they are going to be immune but the rest of the plot is difficult to predict. The survivors wander around the US gradually meeting up - I had to keep a map of the US handy to give me some context and it might have been handy to have this at the start of the book.Many dystopian novels explore the end of the world as we know it but this takes a slightly different slant, in that nearly all the people have gone but all of the goods and food are still available. This is a clever move as life can be sustained for many years and it is the social implications that are explored without having to sorry too much about the survival problem.I found the story has very good pace and it was easy to read. Parts of the narrative were too wordy and it's not difficult to skim through them to pick up the plot soon after. I also found that some elements of plot were easier to accept than others - the deadly flu pandemic is feasible but I was less comfortable with the dreams/visions and found them more challenging.What is most fascinating is to see how quickly the society scatters then gradually begins to form again, using the knowledge of the world before the crisis and building on everything that has been learnt since.The big question for me is whether or not the book is too long and, of course, the answer is yes. There are too many characters and too many side plots. At the core of the novel, however, is a fantastic story that held my interest all the way through even when I got bogged down with details.When the ending finally comes it is satisfying and well formed.