Book Review: CARRIE by Stephen King

To start off, I want to point out that horror is not my genre of choice. My interest in Stephen King’s writing is as a writer, not because I’m particularly intrigued with the type of books he tends to write. King is very good at what he does, and his popular success over the past forty-plus years bears testimony to that. So please bear in mind that this is a review of a horror novel, by someone who is not a big horror reader. I actually read the book back in April of this year, but I’m posting this review now as part of the YA Buccaneers’ Creepy Reads from the Ghost Ship: October Reading Mutiny challenge. The review that follows is based on the Goodreads review I wrote soon after finishing the novel.

Carrie White is the school misfit. Between her overzealous religious mother, and the cruelty of her peers, she is beaten down, mocked, and much to be pitied. But when a senior prom prank turns deadly, the town of Chamberlain, Maine realizes Carrie, with her blossoming telekinetic powers, is the wrong person to mess with…

CARRIE was Stephen King’s first novel, and is now considered a horror classic. But this is not horror in the blood-and-guts sense, which I think tends to be how people think of “horror” today. CARRIE is more suspenseful and shocking: more horrific than horrible. The nature of what happens to the small town of Chamberlain as a result of Carrie’s revenge is extremely unpleasant, but while there are some moments of bloodshed, and a few nasty scenes, overall, the book is more of a frightening tragedy than a blood-fest.

Stephen King has a very down-to-earth and readable style. His novels are not hard to follow, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have literary merit. There’s metaphor, foreshadowing, and other literary devices, and King knows how to use them well. He just doesn’t overdress his prose; he prefers jeans-and-t-shirt to tuxes and cravats.

An interesting aspect of this particular novel is the fact that King includes excepts from books, newspaper stories, and magazine articles to flesh out back-story. This is a good technique for keeping the story going, and also giving the reader context. In doing this, he actually discloses early on much of what’s going to happen. You would think this would detract from the shock and surprise, but it really doesn’t mar the story. I still found myself wanting to know how the awful events we know are coming actually played out. I consider this a sign of good writing.

There are no layers upon layers of sub-plot in CARRIE. It’s a fairly straight-foward story, told from a third-person omniscient perspective (except with some of the excepts which are first-person accounts from survivors). But it’s well told, and, as I said, quite readable.

Where the book loses points for me is with profanity, and depictions of sexual acts and situations that are a little too “straight-forward” for my taste. If that’s something you don’t mind, then you might give the book a higher rating. Also, while the excerpts were a good way of introducing back story, they also kept me a little distant from the story, like a forensics report might distance the medical examiner from the human being on his table.

No surprise that I give CARRIE an R-rating, not so much for violence (though there’s understandably quite a bit of that, especially toward the end), but for profanity and sex. However, if you enjoy horror, this is a book you should probably read. Especially if you’re getting a little tired of modern movies’ obsession with blood-and-guts for the sake of it. Here’s how to be shocking without being overly graphic.