What I'm Reading Now - Joyland by Stephen King

The sad truth is I sometimes pick out books to read by size. No, really.

It's like this. I don't read at home all that much. I read while I'm walking to the bus (yes, I read while I'm walking, it's not that hard), I read when I'm on the bus, I read when I'm on the stationary bike at Dixon, and that's about it really. I'm a pretty fast reader and that gives me about an hour or so per day - that's enough.

Now the issue. All of those places I read are not great places to read a 500 page hard cover book. They're just not. Plus, they're all either on the way to work, at work, or on the way home, which means at some point the book will end up in by backpack. I do not like 20 lb hard cover books in my backpack.

All of this blather leads me to Joyland by Stephen King. Yes, it's a paperback. I was actually pretty excited to read Doctor Sleep by Stephen King, but it is, in fact, a 20 lb hard cover book that I don't want to lug around daily.

As an aside, I checked Doctor Sleep out from the library a couple months ago, but couldn't finish it before it was seriously overdue (you know, the whole "can't lug it to work" thing), then I received a copy of it for Christmas, so I do have it and will read it soon. But probably at home.

So there you have it.

And I'm Done Update:

Classic Stephen King. Although much less horror and supernatural happenings than usual, which makes sense as its a Hard Case Crime novel. Some good carny atmosphere and an authentic small-time amusement park feeling here, which I know well from hitting a few low rent parks in my day. Nothing extremely memorable, but a fun, quick read.

Ranking All 62 Stephen King Books!

I know I can go for weeks without considering the second R here at The Two R's, but every once in a while I find something about the subject of writing that's just too good to pass up...like Vulture.com's ranking of every Stephen King book!

Now, even if you're not a Stephen King fan, it's impossible to be unaware of his work. I mean, even if you don't read his stuff, there isn't a single person on the planet that hasn't seen Shawshank Redemption by this point, right? They show it four times a week on TBS, for Gob's sake!

Personally, I had a point in my life, early to mid 20's maybe, where I had read every single thing King had ever written. I can't say that any longer - the past ten years have been very hit and miss - but I've still probably read about 80% of his novels. I still pull The Stand off the shelf every year or two and reread it. I even found a paperback copy of It at one of the rental houses we stayed in last year in Hawaii - read the whole thing in the week we were there (Payton tried to read it as well, but got a little freaked out during the first few chapters and decided to put it down - yeah, it's still a scary read).

In other words, I have my own opinion of King's novels, so when I saw this list (I love ranked lists!) of every King novel, I just had to share it with you.

Now, I'm not going to spoil the fun for you, as seeing how the list unfolds, and agreeing or disagreeing with it, is the whole point. But I do have to make just a few observations...I have to!

-I've got to disagree with throwing in the non-fiction books in with the fiction. How do you compare a book about the art of writing with the Shining? They're not even from the same universe! They really should have narrowed it down to the fiction books - you only would have had to toss the writing books and the baseball books...maybe four books total? You just can't compare the writing and tone of those with the fiction. Well, I can't.

-I have no problems with the very bottom of the list. Many of those books are so-so, and a few came out during the "drug years," where King himself has said he was always doped up out of his mind and wasn't writing worth a damn.

-Firestarter is too low...way too low. I also have a soft spot for The Long Walk, but I realize that one shows it's age - and King's age when he wrote it. Still love it.

-Why is Thinner way down there?!? That is just a great read, and Richie Ginelli is one of my all-time favorite King characters. This is a top-20 King book!

-From a Buick 8 is way too high! Maybe I'm missing something here, but I thought that was an uneven, uninspired effort. Am I missing something?

-Yes, there is a brand new Dark Tower novel just out. It's called Wind Through the Keyhole. And yes, it is included in the 62 ranked books - number 35 to be exact.

Ah, that was fun. Looking through that list, and thinking back on all those books, made me wonder about other authors have a huge list of books we could rank. Hmmmm...Elmore Leonard anyone?

King Novels image by Marc Burnell

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