Okay, so I love dark fiction, right? Of course I do! As I mentioned in my introductory blog post, that’s
the whole premise of this blog, and a large driver of my writing as an author.
So, you may find it jarring to learn that until now, I had never read a Stephen
King book.
I’ll pause for you to gasp…
Well, maybe what I said is not technically true. So, last
year, I did try to read my first Stephen King book, The Gunslinger. Now,
this may have been a bad idea to begin with. I had read recommendations from
countless Stephen King fans noting that The Gunslinger is a strange
book, and probably not the best representation of Stephen King’s overall body
of work. Still, I prefer to get my first taste of an author’s work with a
relatively short read, and The Gunslinger was just that, so I gave it a
try. This blog post isn’t about The Gunslinger, so I won’t delay you by
going in depth about that, but let’s just say I didn’t particularly enjoy the
book and ended up not finishing it.
But alas, I couldn’t give up on King so easily. So, here I
am, roughly a year later, jumping into Carrie, King’s debut horror
novel. Like many of King’s other works, it’s a classic. Stephen King’s Carrie
was first published in 1974, though it allegedly was a book that almost never
came to be. King attributes the book largely to his wife, Tabitha King. For,
when he first began drafting the novel, which he had in mind as a short story,
he grew frustrated with it and threw it into the trash. It was Tabitha who
fished it out and, seeing the promise in the story that King himself couldn’t
identify, she demanded that he finish it. And so, fifty-plus years later, we
have this classic on our hands. A classic that I’ve read through and am eager
to give my opinions on.
Before I dive in, I do have to mention that during my first
readthrough of Stephen King’s Carrie, I did put the book down for a bit.
There are a few things about it I found off-putting, and not in the engaging
dark-fiction sort of way—more about that later. But after taking a break to
read something else, I came back to give it another chance, and I’m glad I did.
Doing so allows me to appreciate this classic work for what it is, and now let
me tell you all about it.
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The Premise
Stephen King’s Carrie is the story of Carietta White,
a sixteen-year-old girl who is an outcast at her high school. Awkward, sheltered,
and subjugated to her mother’s extreme piousness, Carrie’s always been different
than her peers. But her differences don’t stop at her appearance and
personality. No, she has latent telekinetic abilities, which have lied mostly
dormant since her birth, except for during one or two stressful points in her
life.
When Carrie is shown kindness by a classmate, which allows
her to finally feel accepted by her peers, she prays that her days as an exile
may be coming to an end. But a cruel prank on her prom night turns her telekinesis
into a weapon of destruction—one so momentous that her small town may never
recover from it.
The Characters
This is a book where I found myself not caring much about
any of the characters, Carrie included. The book jumps around in point-of-view
from Carrier to her mother, her classmates, her teachers, etc. This POV hopping
in a relatively short book makes it difficult to fully connect with or
understand any of the characters. Naturally, we spend the most time with
Carrie, but I didn’t find her to be the most interesting character. In fact, I
found her vile mother to be much more intriguing, and I wouldn’t have minded
spending more time understanding her mother’s background story better.
If King ever releases a prequel on that very topic, please let
me know.
The Structure
As I alluded to above, the book does a great deal of POV
hopping, which is fine, but it feels a bit disjointed with how it’s done. On
one hand, I do like being told the story from different perspectives, kind of like
Zach Cregger’s Weapons movie from 2025, yet due to the books short
length it felt incomplete to me. I would’ve probably preferred a leaner take on
the POV side, and to get a bit more time with the characters that really
mattered to the story.
That being said, the pace of the book is a notable pro.
Within an hour of reading, you’re well off to the races in figuring out where
the story is going. Also, King throws in various scenes told from books and
interviews that occur after the main events of the story, and serve as intense
foreshadowing. It’s powerfully done, and after a certain point, it makes the
book nearly unputdownable.
Nearly… More on that in the next section.
The Writing
Stephen King’s writing is extremely accessible in this book.
Very simple, to the point, no excessive descriptions or anything like that—the writing
is very straightforward and easy to follow.
Although, there is one particular thing about the writing I
disliked, and it’s what made me put this book down on my first attempt. To put
it bluntly, it’s King’s seemingly random focus on things I find odd and
irrelevant to the story itself.
Firstly, the story begins with a scene that has become
infamous in the horror world. I won’t spoil it completely here, but it has to
do with a certain person’s… ah… time of the month, let’s call it. That scene is
bizarre, and quite unsettling, but it certainly has relevance to the rest of
the story. So, I don’t hold the awkwardness of reading that scene against King;
it was arguably necessary to be there, and it definitely left a lasting
impression.
However, throughout the novel there is a reoccurring emphasis
on physical appearance and sex that I found completely unnecessary and slightly
disturbing. I mean, there is literally a scene where Carrie is standing nude in
front of a mirror, and King decides to describe what her body looks like in
minute detail. Let me remind you that Carrie is a teenage girl. So, it just
leaves me with why—why bother describing such a thing? It was off-putting, added
nothing of substance to the story, and just made me feel like putting the book
down. But I didn’t put the book down until a follow-up scene in which one of
Carrie’s classmates (yes, another teenage girl) has a sex scene with her
boyfriend. Again, just… why? Why am I reading this? Trust me, it had absolutely
nothing to do with the progression of the story. So, when I reached that scene,
I put the book down, and went to Goodreads to scour reviews and determine if
the rest of the book had more of the same. Apparently, it kind of did, so I
went on to read something else before deciding to give it one more try.
And I will say, I’m very glad I gave it another go. Yes,
there were two or three more head-scratching scenes, some sexual and some
low-key racist, but I somehow found them slightly less egregious than the
earlier ones, so I was able to continue and to focus on the story itself.
All that to say that if you read this, you may become
uncomfortable and put this book down, or you may love every discomforting
moment; either reaction is to be expected.
The Verdict
Stephen King’s Carrie is not only King’s debut novel,
but a classic of the horror genre. The premise alone is punchy and gripping,
and when placed in a pacey book like this, it makes it hard to stop reading. However,
notable habits of King’s writing are not for me—in particular his weird emphasis
on certain aspects that don’t improve the story and rather distract from it.
The novel has stood the test of time and is clearly a work of art in its own
right. And overall, I did enjoy reading it. If you’re a lover of horror, or
just a fan of the legend Stephen King himself, then I’d highly recommend you
read Carrie. If not for the odd scene here or there, I would probably
give the book five stars. But, to be fair, I’ll have to knock it down a peg.
My Rating: 4/5 Stars
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