Misery
by Stephen King
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Book Summary Information
Author: Stephen KingEdition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1998-01-01
ISBN: 0451169522
Number of pages: 352
Publisher: Signet
Product features:
- ISBN13: 9780451169525
- Condition: New
- Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Book Reviews of Misery
Book Review: "It's classic, vintage King; one of his very best."
Summary: 5 Stars
This book is about Paul Sheldon, a best-selling novelist (from his Misery Chastain romance series novels) whom unfortunately gets in a car-accident in a nasty Colorado blizzard. Annie Wilkes, a fat woman who lives alone in her isolated cottage in the middle of nowwhere, comes to Paul's aid and rescues him from the rubble. And oh, I forgot to mention: Annie Wilkes is an ex nurse...and is Paul Sheldon's number one fan.
At first, Annie takes care of Paul in her cottage, feeding him, giving him pain-killers, tending to his shattered body, being all nice and gentle...but that soon changes drastically, with Pauls latest and last Misery Chastain novel: "Misery's Child" where Misery gets killed off at the end of the book. Once Annie finishes reading the book, and realizes that Misery gets killed off and that this is the last Misery Chastain romance novel and that there will be no more Misery Chastain, she goes absolutely gorilla sh*t. She savagely forces Paul to bring Misery back to life, buying him a typewriter, sheets of paper, and setting up his own 'writers' desk in his room, beside the window looking over the Colorado mountains.
Paul really doesn't have a choice at all but to follow Annie's orders...besides, who's the one with the shattered body rendering to be transported around in a wheelchair? And it's not only Pauls disablity that leaves him no choice but to follow Annie's orders...there is of course, the prospect of Annie being very dangerously psychotic. Very violently psychotic...and she's not going to let Paul go until he has finished the new Misery novel and it is to her complete satisfication. If not, she will make him write it over and over again until it is to perfection. But once Paul does actually finish the novel and it is to her liking, Annie will still not let him go, for she is his number one fan.....even if it means killing both Paul and herself...
Paul Sheldon is in one 'hell of a jam' and if he wants to make it out alive and in one piece, he's going to need to use his mind, need to use his cunningness, but most of all he will need to use all of his courage.
"Paul Sheldon used to write for a living. Now he's writing to stay alive."
This is one of King's shorter novels coming up a little over 300 pages. But in the end, those 300 pages will have seemed so short, and you will be begging for it to be longer. This was my third King novel that I have read and finished, and probably my very favorite of his(aside The Stand). I haven't read many King novels but I plan on reading his whole collection eventually...someday. I have only read of his: "The Tommyknockers", "The Stand", "Misery", "IT", and "On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft." The best of those are "The Stand", "Misery", and "On Writing" which I highly recommend not only if you want great novels of Stephen King's but just great novels in general. Though, I still recommend "The Tommyknockers" and "IT"; those are really good too, even if it's not as good as the latter three.
If I were to recommend you just one book of King's out of the whole 5 of his that I have read so far, I would definetly recommend, "Misery", the most. I'll tell you why. "IT", "The Stand", and "The Tommyknockers" are too long. The first 2 tip over 1000 pages. The third one is almost 1000 pages. But they are still amazing, even though they are long. Sometimes you want it to be even longer just because it's so good and gripping and you can't stop reading it. Those 3 are like that, especially "The Stand"(which would be my 2nd highest recommendation out of the whole 5.).
"On Writing" is a part autobiography, and a part writer's manual, and I only recommend it highly if you are an aspirating writer of fiction for that is the only type of writing this book scans upon...or if you want some good chuckles, for this book is full of those.
I recommend "Misery" the most for it's shorterness, therefore it's more quicker, thrilling, blood-gushing pace, for it's lively, real, memorable characters, for it's sense of humor(cockadoodie brat!), for it is very well-written, for it's realistic situation(meaning that it could happen), but most of all for the great, horrific, compassionate, and memorable story it tells of "the price of fame" of "obsessiveness and psychoticness and the dsyfunction of the human brain" of "twisted love and admiration" of "a writer's struggles and trials and attempts of escaping the harsh circumstances" of "helplessness and the long gone end of free-will and how one will cope with such formidable climates" and of "the dark, sarcastic rendevouz of one twisted, obsessed, lonely and insane mind and another 'supposed literary genius mind' as they tangle with each other to reveal the darker, more unpleasant sides of human nature."
If you don't know where to start with Stephen King books(for he has many-and at that, many great ones as well)than I highly recommend starting with "Misery." "It's classic, vintage King; one of his very best."
Summary of Misery
After an automobile accident, novelist Paul Sheldon meets his biggest fan. Annie Wilkes is his nurse-and captor. Now, she wants Paul to write his greatest work-just for her. She has a lot of ways to spur him on. One is a needle. Another is an ax. And if they don't work, she can get really nasty...
In Misery (1987), as in The Shining (1977), a writer is trapped in an evil house during a Colorado winter. Each novel bristles with claustrophobia, stinging insects, and the threat of a lethal explosion. Each is about a writer faced with the dominating monster of his unpredictable muse.
Paul Sheldon, the hero of Misery, sees himself as a caged parrot who must return to Africa in order to be free. Thus, in the novel within a novel, the romance novel that his mad captor-nurse, Annie Wilkes, forces him to write, he goes to Africa--a mysterious continent that evokes for him the frightening, implacable solidity of a woman's (Annie's) body. The manuscript fragments he produces tell of a great Bee Goddess, an African queen reminiscent of H. Rider Haggard's She.
He hates her, he fears her, he wants to kill her; but all the same he needs her power. Annie Wilkes literally breathes life into him.
Misery touches on several large themes: the state of possession by an evil being, the idea that art is an act in which the artist willingly becomes captive, the tortured condition of being a writer, and the fears attendant to becoming a "brand-name" bestselling author with legions of zealous fans. And yet it's a tight, highly resonant echo chamber of a book--one of King's shortest, and best novels ever. --Fiona Webster
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