The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon
Author: Stephen King
Published: November 1, 2005
264 Pages
Reviewed By: Kim
Kim’s Rating: 4 stars
Book Description:
Nine-year-old Trisha McFarland strays from the path while she and her recently divorced mother and brother take a hike along a branch of the Appalachian Trail. Lost for days, wandering farther and farther astray, Trisha has only her portable radio for comfort. A huge fan of Tom Gordon, a Boston Red Sox relief pitcher, she listens to baseball games and fantasizes that her hero will save her. Nature isn’t her only adversary, though – something dangerous may be tracking Trisha through the dark woods.
Kim’s Review:
I won this book in an Instagram giveaway and I’ve been trying to read more Stephen King so it all worked out perfectly! I was a little worried about the fact that the entire book was a little girl walking through the woods; I don’t do well with monotony. But I was pleasantly surprised! I read the entire book in one day and really enjoyed it!
I liked Trisha’s perspective on her parents’ divorce and her brother’s response to it. Then when she got lost, seeing her reasoning and thinking through each problem that comes up was really interesting! All the advice that my mom always gave me about being lost in the woods came rushing back: hug a tree so it’ll be easier to find you. I loved the movie Far from Home: Adventures of Yellow Dog and while that kid had been trained by his dad in the practice of survival, it always annoyed me that he didn’t hug a tree! Trisha didn’t either and King made sure to show the possible consequences of any other choice she didn’t make! Not gonna lie, I’m sure there was some kind of metaphor with the monster in the woods … but y’all know I’m not deep enough for that. But the monster was creepy and added a scary edge to the story. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and would recommend it to just about everyone.
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
The Institute by Stephen King
Today Kim brings you a video review of The Institute by Stephen King. This was her first ever King book she read and she has so much to catch up on! She does go on a little bit of a rant about how King must think about people from South Carolina and how he must not know anyone from that state.
The Institute
Author: Stephen King
Published: September 10, 2019
561 Pages
Reviewed By: Kim
Kim’s Rating: 4 stars
Book Description:
In the middle of the night, in a house on a quiet street in suburban Minneapolis, intruders silently murder Luke Ellis’s parents and load him into a black SUV. The operation takes less than two minutes. Luke will wake up at The Institute, in a room that looks just like his own, except there’s no window. And outside his door are other doors, behind which are other kids with special talents—telekinesis and telepathy—who got to this place the same way Luke did: Kalisha, Nick, George, Iris, and ten-year-old Avery Dixon. They are all in Front Half. Others, Luke learns, graduated to Back Half, “like the roach motel,” Kalisha says. “You check in, but you don’t check out.”
In this most sinister of institutions, the director, Mrs. Sigsby, and her staff are ruthlessly dedicated to extracting from these children the force of their extranormal gifts. There are no scruples here. If you go along, you get tokens for the vending machines. If you don’t, punishment is brutal. As each new victim disappears to Back Half, Luke becomes more and more desperate to get out and get help. But no one has ever escaped from the Institute.
Kim’s Video Review:
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK
**Goodreads is currently running a giveaway where 25 copies are being given away. This giveaway runs through November 14th. Check out Goodreads if you are interested!
First Line Friday #129
Halloween is almost here and today we have our last First Line Friday with Stephen King. I have seen the movie, and while it had promise that did not deliver for me, maybe the novel is better:
The event that came to be known as The Pulse began at 3:03 p.m., Eastern Standard Time, on the afternoon of October 1.
There’s a reason cell rhymes with hell.
On October 1, God is in His heaven, the stock market stands at 10,140, most of the planes are on time, and Clayton Riddell, an artist from Maine, is almost bouncing up Boylston Street in Boston. He’s just landed a comic book deal that might finally enable him to support his family by making art instead of teaching it. He’s already picked up a small (but expensive!) gift for his long-suffering wife, and he knows just what he’ll get for his boy Johnny. Why not a little treat for himself? Clay’s feeling good about the future.
That changes in a hurry. The cause of the devastation is a phenomenon that will come to be known as The Pulse, and the delivery method is a cell phone. Everyone’s cell phone. Clay and the few desperate survivors who join him suddenly find themselves in the pitch-black night of civilization’s darkest age, surrounded by chaos, carnage, and a human horde that has been reduced to its basest nature…and then begins to evolve.
There’s really no escaping this nightmare. But for Clay, an arrow points home to Maine, and as he and his fellow refugees make their harrowing journey north they begin to see crude signs confirming their direction. A promise, perhaps. Or a threat…
There are 193 million cell phones in the United States alone. Who doesn’t have one? Stephen King’s utterly gripping, gory, and fascinating novel doesn’t just ask the question “Can you hear me now?” It answers it with a vengeance.
Purchase Links:
Amazon US
Amazon UK