The Shining is one of those novels that is world-renowned for being at the top of their genre. I enjoyed it, but I did find it a little slow in parts. It's very much an object of its time. There's a scene towards the end of the book when Halloran is racing towards the hotel to try and save Danny. The Overlook's "soul" for want of a better description screams out a warning that made me freeze in my tracks. There is absolutely no way any author would get away using racial slurs like that in a modern story.
However, I did enjoy it, and I'm intrigued as to what Stephen King did in the follow-up Doctor Sleep that I'm tempted to buy it.
I didn't find it particularly scary (I can see where others might though), but it's extremely well written, and Stephen King has an awesome ability to turn a phrase on its head and make it glow that I wish I possessed.
The Shining
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Jane
Yes its creepy. Yes it scared me. Yes I loved it.
Reviewed in India on 12 November 2017Verified Purchase
Jane
Reviewed in India on 12 November 2017
There have been so many books that left me disappointed despite being hyped and loved. And only very few that did live upto my expectations. Clearly, THE SHINING falls in the latter category. I had never read a horror-thriller book. I was always curious about how a book had the capability of evoking creepy disturbing thoughts in your head and leave you scared. THE SHINING made me experience all that. And that's why I loved it so much.
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G. Robinson
Almost perfect.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 29 September 2018Verified Purchase
Michael P Crouch.
Read War and Peace instead.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 30 September 2019Verified Purchase
Richa Mehndiratta
#ReadavorousReview
Reviewed in India on 3 October 2019Verified Purchase
Adnan Soysal
Genealogy of Psychology
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 13 September 2020Verified Purchase
Adnan Soysal
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 13 September 2020
I am bit tired of reading endless side stories and characters with empty dialogues with the same Middle Class American English.
They are absolute disengager. (examples: IT, THE STAND (uncut version) )
However, this novel is sort of free of them because it is taking place in a closed environment among a few people.
There is not much space to introduce unrelated characters with loads of side dialogues, descriptions.
SK's narrative is good when he sticks to a one line of story flow, which is usually in a suspense sphere, and a few characters.
When I watched The Shining (an adaptation movie), my initial view was that it was horror / thriller movie that makes your hair stand on.
But when I read the book, I felt that movie was missing very important moral story; Genealogy of psychology.
Moral story of the book is what parents are doing to their kids is what their own parents did to them.
This is wonderfully put by Wendy's (Danny's mother) thought
In fact, weird suspense coming from of Jack's (Danny's father) abusive character starts from the right beginning before they move to the hotel.
Same goes for his mother's troubles coming from her own mother.
In fact, Jack's abuse reaches its climax at the hotel.
His is possessed by the "evil" spirit of the hotel.
But maybe, Jack was long ago possessed as a result of his trauma by his father.
Maybe he was going to the same thing on another place.
I think SK's success in horror come from the his narration of his dream/nightmares instead he is writing a horror fiction out of blue air. (That would feel always artificial)
Horror dreams are always weird, awkward, unclear, aren't they?
And that's is also what you feel in SK's novels. I think The Shining could be best example of it.
And I think what makes SK's books selling millions is that his weird, awkward dreams coupled with his ferocious story telling.
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