This is the first post where I dump thoughts about the current book I am reading. I’m currently around two thirds of the way through Stephen King’s The Stand. Okay, I admit, I would probably have been better off starting these posts with a new book, but I like to live life on the edge…
Be warned, though, there will be spoilers in this post for those who have no read the book! Because I am starting this so far in, I will only be doing a very brief intro as to what has happened so far.
For those who do not know, The Stand is a horror/fantasy book by Stephen King. I bought it second hand on a whim for a princely sum of £1, and I’m glad I did – it’s not what I was expecting at all and I am enjoying much more than I would have thought. Anyway, it’s set in a post-apocalyptic America where most of the population (presumably world-wide as well) has been wiped out by the accidental release of a really nasty super-flu bug (nick-named “Captain Trips”). Think “man-flu” on steroids, and we all know how bad man-flu is, don’t we, lads?
At the start we follow the pre-flu lives of several groups of survivors and follow their journey where they (and later many others) congregate and start to build new lives in Boulder, Colorado. The only problem is Randall Flagg AKA the “Dark Man”, the embodiment of evil on earth who is building an army to crush our good guys.
In the good guys corner, we have Abigail Freemantle, also known as “Mother Abigail”. She’s kind of an apparent conduit for God and Flagg’s direct opposite. Only she’s 108 years old and has just kicked the bucket. Oh dear. For some reason, I wasn’t that upset by her death – maybe because she was so old and it was obvious she wasn’t going to be around that long. I was actually more saddened by Nick Andros’ death than anyone’s so far – possibly because I thought he would make it to the end. In fact, I am wondering if he is dead (he was killed in an attempt to assassinate the committee members who now run Boulder) as his whole body was not found.
However, Mother Abigail has passed the word on to four of our heroes that they have to drop everything – that means leaving the committee, lovers, new homes, and more – to go to Las Vegas and face the Dark Man. And to top it off, God (if He exists) has said (Via Mother Abigail) that they must go on foot and not take any food or water with them, because they have sinned. Lovely.
Yes, well, a very brief posts, really. There’s so much I should have added, really.
I’ll try and post as often as I can with this, then it’s on to book five of Stephen King’s Dark Tower, which I will do from the start of the book. As a side note, the Dark Tower series does briefly cross over with The Stand where the characters end up in this world.