Later

by Stephen King

I read this in less than a week, which for me these days is saying something. After my disappointment with his last Hard Case Crime book (The Colorado Kid), I got this one from the library. It was much better.

There’s not much I need to record about it. Jamie, the narrator sees dead people for a while after they die, and something more is alluded to, along the lines of demon possession. But it’s kept murky enough that you really do get the feeling of the numinous a few times.

I don’t think SK tries to be too literary for these Hard Case books. Whenever he wants to use a weird phrase, he puts it in the mouth of a character, but often not even in dialog. This starts on the first page of chapter one, when Jamie refers to his literary agent mom selling books. “‘Flogging the product,’ she called it.” I don’t know if people really call it that, and it sounds weird, but the way he writes it, SK isn’t the weird one. It’s this crazy character! He does that all the time. I wish I’d kept a list of examples. I’ve noticed this in his other writing, but he did it a lot in this one.

p. 25, “My life was like a Dickens novel, only with swearing.” (Because of their financial ups and downs, and his lack of a father.)

p. 132, “The worst part of growing up is how it shuts you up.” There’s something to this. As I grow older, I notice having a harder time expressing myself. Usually, it’s when I want to express something positive to my wife or kids, something I love about them, but either it comes out sounding like a criticism, or I can’t manage to say anything at all. Guess I’ll express those thoughts… later.