Order from a Major Online Bookstore
Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine
Save Your Time And Money
| AnyBook4Less.com | Order from a Major Online Bookstore |
|
| Home | Store List | FAQ | Contact Us | | ||
| Ultimate Book Price Comparison Engine Save Your Time And Money |
||
 |
Title: The Stand: Complete and Uncut by Stephen King ISBN: 0-451-16953-0 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: May, 1991 Format: Mass Market Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $8.50 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.6 (754 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: Apocalypse now... or whenever
Comment: Stephen King is a guilty pleasure; he writes for "the masses", which some snooty readers look down their literary noses at. But he is one helluva storyteller, as well as a more than passably good writer. "The Stand" is not his best book, but in a way it's more chilling than some of his better works like "Salem's Lot" or "Pet Sematary"; whereas nobody really believes in vampires or Wendigos, "The Stand" gives us a scenario that is all too believable. In a hidden laboratory in the Mojave Desert, the military is busy creating all kinds of nasty bugs to be used in bio-chemical warfare, in direct violation of the Geneva convention; and one of them is a spectacularly lethal, shifting-antigen virus called Superflu which has 99.4% communicability, which means 99.4% mortality. Simply put, almost everybody in the world will catch it, and everyone who catches it will die. When the virus breaks out of the lab,a technician bolts off the base with his family, carrying the Superflu virus with them, and a chain reaction is set in motion that will culminate in the deaths of billions of people. In a world gone insane with death, social breakdown and anarchy, an Antichrist figure appears named Randall Flagg, and the survivors of the Superflu epidemic will have to take sides in an apocalyptic confrontation between Good and Evil.
The first 250 or so pages of "The Stand" are by far the best, as King spins the compelling story of how the Superflu escaped from the laboratory, its rocketing spread across the United States, and from there to the rest of the world, and the spiraling descent into anarchy as people drop dead like flies. Most of the survivors, including a lanky Texan, a young pregnant girl, a deaf-mute and his mentally retarded friend, a self-centered rock singer and others, gravitate towards their guardian angel, a 108-year-old black woman named Mother Abagail, just as others are drawn, in spite of themselves, to the Dark Man, some loyal to him for what he stands for, others out of fear (this dude has a habit of nailing people to crosses when he gets annoyed at them); everyone has to choose a side, no fence-straddling allowed. Sooner or later, a clash is inevitable, and when it comes, only one side will be left standing.
King sometimes overwrites, and "The Stand" could have used some judicious pruning; but he knows how to keep the tension high and one has to give King his due, the tension never lets up in this book. One reads this book and wonders, even without the mythical figure of Randall Flagg, could it actually happen? In smaller ways, it already has: the plague epidemic in the 14th century killed a third of the populations of Europe and Asia, and less than 90 years ago, the "Spanish flu" epidemic of 1918 left 30 million people dead -- and this was before the age of jet travel. King's genius lies in producing spine-tingling shivers, but this time around he outdid himself; what he produced in "The Stand" is the stuff of nightmares.
Rating: 5
Summary: My favorite King novel of all time, next being IT!
Comment: The Stand by Stephen King was ORGINALLY released by Doubleday in 1978 and it was 816 pages long, The Stand was rereleased in 1991 complete and uncut, but the orginial manuscipt was 1200 pages long, now The Stand is not 1200 pages long, but just 1,153 pages long. The Stand takes place in Nevada after a deadly virus is released, one of the watchguards then grabs his wife and two kids, and get out of dodge. But they are too late. In Texas, we run into Stu Redman and the local crew hanging out at the local gas station, and they see the soldier driving, and he crashes into the pumps, the soldier is sick, and his wife and kids are dead. He is then taken to the hospital where he dies before he reaches there. In Maine, we run into Fran Goldsmith who is pregnant with her boyfriends child, and she does not want his kid, so they break up. Now we meet Nick Andros, a deft-mute, but he can read lips, he gets attacked by the local bad boys and is rescused by the local sheriff. In New York, we meet Larry Underwood, a up and coming singer who has a hit single called 'Baby Can You Dig Your Man?' to escape the horrors back in California; drugs, parties, and drinking where he can clean himself up. Soon, the virus spreads thanks to travlers crossing the country when they stop to get gas at the station where the dead soldier crashed into the pumps. Soon the country goes into chaos, and two sides eventually come together in this chaos. The highways are crowded with dead drivers trying to escape the death of the big cities, and soon the world is wiped out, but the suriviors who survive face a new terror: the devil's imp who goes by the name of Randal Flagg, he gets his followers together in Las Vegas, and while Mother Abagaible who the other side of the survivors see in their dreams. So they meet up with Mother Abagaible and they head to Boulder Colorado.
Now, while they know the two exists, one of the followers goes bad and plants a bomb into a apartment trying to kill everyone where they are heading a meeting to restablish the Bill Of Rights and the Constitution, so one of the followers head to Vegas to take Flagg down.
The Stand is by far THE BEST STEPHEN KING novel he has written in his 30 year career, the only best novel that can reach The Stand is IT. So dont be intimidated by the length of this novel, this novel would read through a breeze, and it very good. Defintely one of my favorite novels of all time, one of the being American Psycho, The Rules Of Attraction, The Rainmaker, The Firm, IT, The Cardinal Of The Kremlin, Patriot Games, and the list goes on. Read it, and you wont regret it.
Rating: 5
Summary: Feb 7, 2004 spoiles the ending!!!!
Comment: Firstly, ignore this review if you've finished the book. I've already finished the book, so it didn't effect me, but if I read Feb 7's review before I finished the Stand, I would have been pretty mad at having the ending mostly spoiled. This book has an awesome ending if you don't know what to expect. The Feb 7 reviewer just spoiled the biggest surprise that this book has. Thanks, buddy.
 |
Title: It by Stephen King ISBN: 0451169514 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: June, 1997 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
 |
Title: Salem's Lot by Stephen King ISBN: 0671039741 Publisher: Pocket Books Pub. Date: 01 November, 1999 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
 |
Title: The Shining by Stephen King ISBN: 0743424425 Publisher: Pocket Books Pub. Date: 28 August, 2001 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
 |
Title: The Talisman by Peter Straub, Stephen King ISBN: 0345444884 Publisher: Ballantine Books Pub. Date: 31 July, 2001 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
 |
Title: The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King, David Palladini ISBN: 0451166582 Publisher: Signet Pub. Date: 10 April, 2001 List Price(USD): $7.99 |
Thank you for visiting www.AnyBook4Less.com and enjoy your savings!
Copyright� 2001-2021 Send your comments
