Book Review: The Mist

My review of The Mist by Stephen King (via Goodreads).

I'll be short with this one because it's been a while since I've read it. Anyway, here goes.

I had not encountered Stephen King as novelist before this book. Before now, King has always just been the originator of some of the most frightening movies that have come out of Hollywood to date. I barely made it through my first viewing of IT, and I love rewatching the old TV miniseries that he has penned over time -- particularly The Langoliers. It's just so wonderfully terrible. And don't get me started on The Shining. One of the best, scariest movies that I've ever seen. Obviously, if you consider King the mind behind the fears that I and millions of other people have encountered over the years, his hype is unparalleled. 

So, having not read anything by King, and knowing that I loved The Shining, the film, I probably should have started off with that novel. Instead, I went with a used bookstore find, The Mist, which sat on the shelf just begging me to pick it up and take it home -- as all of my used books have done before it. 

Diving right into the review: It started off very... very... slowly. I waded through nearly fifty pages before getting into anything worth the effort. Too much backstory that ultimately didn't add to the experience. The setting, ironically, seemed undeveloped in my mind, left behind in favor of the psychological development of the narrator and a few "key" characters. However, this development came at a price: I almost let the book go. But it's short book -- novella, actually. So I persisted.

And I'm happy that I did. After trudging through the repetition of internal monologue about pasts and present situations that did little to affect my understanding of the situation, I found the crux of the matter. In a sleepy coastal town in Maine, a mysterious, thick, milky-white mist rolls into town, bringing paranoia, and creatures that no one has seen before. They appear without cause, reason, or any other apparent motive than to kill everyone.

I'll pause here. I was under the impression that King was the king (pun intended) of psychological terror. I didn't know anything about The Mist before diving into it, so I expected the true terror to be internal. Bumps and mysterious sounds that terrorize the psyche of the main characters. Instead, they're aliens, or monsters. Whatever they are, they're too real. I suppose I was expecting more Poe than "Aliens," but it left me unsatisfied.

The narration, however, is quick, easy, and engaging. As I mentioned before, I almost gave up. But it's a testament to King's ability to move the events along naturally that I did not. I kept at it, and was rewarded at times with real moments of terror -- even if it wasn't the kind I was expecting.

So, if you want something like The Shining, or Tell Tale Heart, then look elsewhere. But if you like natural -- but not necessarily literary -- narration that moves quickly and offers a few startling moments, then this will work for its length.

3/5

-JJ