Book Review: Dr Sleep by Stephen King
Fans of horror delight The Shining will devour this sequel from Stephen King.
Following the now grown up Dan Torrance the reader learns Torrance’s ‘shining’ is still well and truly present, although he’s become a drunk to try and dull it. Hopping from place to place, a particularly horrifying incident leaves Torrance feeling guilty as hell and he finds a small town to try and become sober. All the while there are snippets of communication with an unknown child Abra who also possesses ‘shining’. When this culminates Torrance helps this Abra from things that want to devour her.
Characters
It’s hard to fault King’s writing and his character development as the reader is found to sympathise with Torrance and his ‘shining’ curse, while feeling resentful of his powers and agitated at his attempt to thwart them with alcohol. Of course, we’re not in Torrance’s shoes so cannot understand what it might have been like to constantly see people that aren’t there.
Still, the ‘shining’ was much better explained in this book than the original novel. While The Shining was utterly terrifying, it projected ‘shining’ as understood by Torrance as a child, so the reader also only understood a limited amount. Within Dr Sleep however Torrance is grown up and has been dealing with the ‘shining’ for a number of years — the reader is now given an adult perspective of this gift, power, curse (whatever you want to call it) and the perils and benefits of it.
It makes understanding the new character Abra much easier. We follow Abra from her birth to mid-teens, and what she does unwittingly and purposefully along the way with her ‘shining’. It is much stronger than Torrance’s which aids in the reader’s comprehension of what it actually is and how it performs.
Another group we’re introduced to within the book are the True Knot — a bunch of vampire-like creatures in human form that want to suck ‘steam’ out of people with ‘shining’. Because Abra’s ‘shining’ is so strong, this group want to get her steam. King’s portrayal of the leader of the group — a woman called Rose who wears a top-hat — is one of utter arrogance, cockiness and a lack of patience, and instantly we don’t like her. There’s not much to like in the group through, and we’re not given a huge amount of background on anyone, including Rose, which makes it easier to dismiss them when they die. However, it does mean that for the less substantial ones the reader doesn’t give them much time of day and they don’t add a huge amount to the novel bar numbers.
Still, the characters that are fully developed — which Rose is to an extent when it comes to her powers and feelings — make the reader care a great deal about them. Guess it’s lucky only one of the main characters gets the chop halfway through.
Plot
The plot itself is simple in Dr Sleep but there are so many intricacies and branches leading away that there is a lot for the reader to remember. However, this is what makes King’s writing brilliant as it means the reader is never bored following one character and knows there will always be something on the next page to keep them hooked. Too, King is apt at giving the reader just enough to understand while leaving enough mystery to entice us to carry on.
If readers haven’t read The Shining or know the plotline of the original story, it probably would become a little confusing. There are snippets of explanations of what happened in The Shining but not enough it the reader was going in blind.
Still, it’s a book that will keep King fans engaged and make you want to read The Shining all over again.
