Revival by Stephen King

King's latest novel is dedicated to a list of writers who, King writes, "...built my house." Among those listed is H.P. Lovecraft, and a couplet from a Lovecraft poem is referenced several times in the novel. For anyone familiar with Lovecraft's Gothic horror novels, the images described in the climax of King's book will seem very familiar, but King's horror falls far short of the power he is emulating.

For one thing, the entirety of a Lovecraft short story or novella always carries a tone of dread and near madness throughout, so greatly has the first-person narrator been affected by his experience. In contrast, more than half of King's novel is a very mundane and straightforward coming-of-age story which begins in the '60s, somewhat repetitive of several of his earlier works, such as the short story "Stand By Me." The protagonist's descent into drug addiction and subsequent recovery has also been covered by King in earlier works, often more convincingly, as in Dr. Sleep. Neither the tone nor the content of the first two-thirds of this novel prepare the reader for the ending. We have little rising tension. The two parts just don't seem to fit together.

Another thing: Lovecraft's sentence structure and word choices reinforce his atmosphere of horror; he wrote in a consciously archaic style and was a master of using descriptive words such as "eldritch" and "putrescent" and "writhing of worms." King's style is much more simplistic and much less evocative. His scene of horror is, consequently, never as horrific as it should be.

Obviously I am not a big fan of this King novel, even though I am generally a fan of his. He has done better; I hope he will do better in the future.

One disturbing thing: the endings of previous King books seem to carry the message that good can overcome evil, though perhaps not forever, because the evil may rise again to be confronted once again by the good. That pretty much corresponds with my world view, so I find it comforting. The ending of this novel carries the much bleaker message that evil will win in the end. The most horrifying aspect of this novel to me is the thought that the writer of The Dark Tower series has decided that the dark will defeat the light in the end despite all best efforts.