Monday, September 23, 2013

Doctor Sleep Read Along

Doctor Sleep, Stephen King's sequel to The Shining, will be released tomorrow, and starting October 1, Tiff @ Tif Talks Books and Charlene @ Cheap Thrills will be hosting a Read-Along.

If all goes as planned, I'll be participating in Twitter chats (hashtag #sleepalong) and posting updates and answers to discussion questions on the following dates:


Monday, September 30:  Doctor Sleep Read-along Kick-off!
Monday, October 7:  Discussion #1 (approx. pages 1-180)
Monday, October 14:  Discussion #2 (approx. pages 181-360)
Monday, October 21:  Wrap-up Discussion (total 544 pages)


I read The Shining soon after it's publication in 1977, at the age of 16 or 17, and have not reread it since.  A recent interview with with Mr. King, published in The Guardian, included this insight:
King notes with some amusement that he has been around so long that kids who read and loved him in the 1970's now run publishing houses and newspapers; he is revered, these days, as a grand old man of American letters. The experience of reading King young – "Under the covers with a flashlight at summer camp," as he puts it – doesn't leave one, and although he says, casually, that "it's pretty easy to scare a 14-year-old", the pleasures of his books endure.
I don't think the experience of reading King young has left me.  The Shining and Carrie helped shape my reading preferences, but I wonder now what other lasting traces the experience left, so I will be focusing on the experience of reading the sequel in "real time".  In the 36 years since I read The Shining, Danny Torrance and I have aged together.  I've changed, my reading preferences have changed, my perspective has changed.  Will it  still be as easy to scare me?  Will I understand Danny's changes?   I think it will be a fascinating read.  Join me if you dare.

4 comments:

  1. Great post! I grew up reading SK as well (my parents' copies smuggled out of their nightstand), and I'm interested to see what he has in store for Danny this time around. I will be blogging with the #sleepalong :)

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  2. My oldest son devoured King at a young age. I tried once to read one but just couldn't get into it. I did love all of his books as movies though, go figure. I think the foul language in the books put me off them. I should revisit one now and see if I would like one now. Hope you enjoy the book!

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  3. I am so glad that you are joining in on the #sleepalong!!!! I am so very excited to read this book, especially considering I just finished re-reading The Shining. I loved the original on my first read so many years ago, and this time it only got better. I can't wait to see where King will take Danny now!

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  4. Thanks for joining us! I'm so looking forward to it!

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