So I finished The Stand, finally. All 52 hours of it. Luckily you can cut that in half with the double-speed feature on the iPhone. Very convenient feature.
It becomes apparent very early on in The Stand that King is a fan of The Lord of the Rings, and that obviously he is going for something similar here. But I can’t say that it measures up. Not at all really. King’s strength is that he is so good at telling a page turning story. He would have to be to get someone through a 52 hour audiobook, wouldn’t he. But at the end of this well told story, I still felt a little let down. Thematically it doesn’t have the depth that you get in a story like LOTR. There were many times when I King raises an issue that is really relevant and important, but then not really take it anywhere. Just kind of identify it. LOTR, on the other hand, should be added to the New Testament. Frodo’s story so often connects directly with my life. Of course I used to say that about the Simpsons as well…. Meh, maybe we should add The Simpsons to the NT too.
After The Stand, I started on Lord of the Rings as a refresher. But I find I can’t take too much of it at a time so I added to that Frank McCourt’s account of his poverty-stricken childhood in Ireland, Angela’s Ashes. This one is quickly turning out to be my book of the year. Just fantastic writing, simple story-telling, and in the author’s native accent. It seems like the Irish have the unique ability to make awful situations funny (come to think of it, I’ve heard some Jews who are pretty skilled at that as well), but McCourt accomplishes this without mocking or treating the situation lightly. A number of times with just a simple scene described in no more than a paragraph, he has got me tears. And then a paragraph later, tears of laughter. It’s the kind of book that I rush to read more of.
