Đang tải dữ liệu
Hearts in AtlantisIntroduction of the ebook: Hearts in Atlantis
Đánh giá : 3.84 /5 (sao)
Five interconnected, sequential narratives, set in the years from 1960 to 1999. Each story is deeply rooted in the sixties, and each is haunted by the Vietnam War.
Stephen King, whose first novel, Carrie, was published in 1974, the year before the last U.S. troops withdrew from Vietnam, is the first hugely popular writer of the TV generation. Images from that war — and the Five interconnected, sequential narratives, set in the years from 1960 to 1999. Each story is deeply rooted in the sixties, and each is haunted by the Vietnam War.
Stephen King, whose first novel, Carrie, was published in 1974, the year before the last U.S. troops withdrew from Vietnam, is the first hugely popular writer of the TV generation. Images from that war — and the protests against it — had flooded America’s living rooms for a decade. Hearts in Atlantis, King’s newest fiction, is composed of five interconnected, sequential narratives, set in the years from 1960 to 1999. Each story is deeply rooted in the sixties, and each is haunted by the Vietnam War.
In Part One, “Low Men in Yellow Coats,” eleven-year-old Bobby Garfield discovers a world of predatory malice in his own neighborhood. He also discovers that adults are sometimes not rescuers but at the heart of the terror.
In the title story, a bunch of college kids get hooked on a card game, discover the possibility of protest…and confront their own collective heart of darkness, where laughter may be no more than the thinly disguised cry of the beast.
In “Blind Willie” and “Why We’re in Vietnam,” two men who grew up with Bobby in suburban Connecticut try to fill the emptiness of the post-Vietnam era in an America which sometimes seems as hollow — and as haunted — as their own lives.
And in “Heavenly Shades of Night Are Falling,” this remarkable book’s denouement, Bobby returns to his hometown where one final secret, the hope of redemption, and his heart’s desire may await him.
Full of danger, full of suspense, most of all full of heart, Stephen King’s new book will take some readers to a place they have never been…and others to a place they have never been able to completely leave. …more
Review ebook Hearts in Atlantis
Still my fave Stephen King book. This is now the third time I’ve read this and I think I finally get why I love it so much. But first the book.
‘Atlantis’ the mythical continent that sunk, is in this book, standing for anything that is slowly ending or falling apart like childhood, university, memories, the Vietnam war and what America stands for, and our lives – these themes are explored in the two amazing novellas and three short stories within. ‘Hearts’? – this is a group of stories about the Still my fave Stephen King book. This is now the third time I’ve read this and I think I finally get why I love it so much. But first the book.
‘Atlantis’ the mythical continent that sunk, is in this book, standing for anything that is slowly ending or falling apart like childhood, university, memories, the Vietnam war and what America stands for, and our lives – these themes are explored in the two amazing novellas and three short stories within. ‘Hearts’? – this is a group of stories about the hearts and minds of people in times of change. On the face of it I always thought ‘Hearts’ referred to the card-game featured in one of the novellas, but I swear it means more. What do you think Constant Reader? Right get a cuppa… real review coming up..
The opening novella – Low Men In Yellow Coats, is simply an exquisite and remarkable coming of age story for young Bobby Garfield, which King manages to not only write formidably as a stand-alone, but also deep-tie it in with The Dark Tower, whilst tearing the skin off of what it was like to be single parent in 1950s America, and indeed to be a single unattached old man. A phenomenal piece of writing on par with King’s ‘The Body’.
Seriously! ….The second Novella – 1966, Man We Just Couldn’t Stop Laughing, sees more King genius, ten years on from the first story, we’re on a campus where an almost demonic obsession with playing the gambling card-game ‘Hearts’ is the elephant in the room, in a story of first (not in-love) love, as well as a campus view of the growing schism in America over Vietnam. Some great characters in this novella, including a wonderfully multifaceted and non cliched leading female character!
The final three short stories cover Vietnam and its legacy for our cast of characters (from the first two novellas), and some of their past and new acquaintances. A superb King read that has a message about an America that was at crucial turning points in the 1960s and 1970s; but did it take up the chance to truly change? One of the key The Dark Tower books, one of the key King 20th century historical fiction books and a masterclass into intertwining separate stories over decades and the bringing of them together as a cohesive whole. 10 out of 12. Still the only King read I’ve ever given 10 out of 12 for!
2019 read …more
Leave a Reply