The Shining

Written by the master of horror novels, Stephen King, The Shining is a phenomenally sophisticated and terrifyingly thrilling book that has been adapted for the screen more than once, the most revered adaption being Kubrick’s starring Jack Nicholson, but none have managed to capture the raw terror and intricate complexities that King successfully writes about. By extension along the lines of that thinking, The Shining can be seen as an “unfilmable” book, although Kubrick came rather close. Eloquently written, but at the same time, imprinting horrific and gory images on the brain, The Shining is a FANTASTIC book and your life will not be completely lived should you choose to go through it without reading it! 

When Jack Torrance takes the job as the winter caretaker of the infamous Overlook hotel, he believes that it will serve as the perfect chance to strengthen his damaged ties with his wife, Wendy, and his son, Danny, as well as overcome the writer’s block that renders him unable to complete his doomed play. But nothing could be father from the truth. For the Torrances, life at the Overlook begins fine and even promising, but then as winter comes closer with the threat of isolating them from the outside world, things in the hotel begin to happen. There’s a mysterious woman in room 217, the hedge animals appear to move, and around every corner, voices can be heard, as though the hotel is developing a life of its own. 

Admittedly, The Shining is a hard book to get into, as the first half sees the improvement of Jack and then the slow decline into insanity as the Hotel gains a grip on him, and it’s all very slow and seemingly unimportant. What keeps the reader rabidly engrossed and turning pages faster than lightning, is the strength of the characters of Danny and Jack and the way that King blends the two worlds of thought and reality. 

The book has many voices, not all of which are spoken aloud or in the mind of the central characters, and although it brings a challenge to the grasping of the telepathic concept of the story, it’s so intricately and cleverly constructed that you cannot help but marvel and continue to wade through it. He’s a very clever writer, Stephen King. 

The violence and horror aspect of the book is also cleverly depicted as it’s blunt and brutal, thereby really thumping the images onto you brain, a little like the roque mallet that plays a significant role, but it does not go into all that much detail which I think is good because there is horrific and then there is horrific and the subtle difference between the two is that one is terrifying but compels you to keep reading whilst the other just turns you off completely. King’s depiction of violence and horror is repelling but also compelling, making the book one that you simply do not want to put down. 

Filled with horror, evil forces, telepathy, insanity, violence, hope, and a lot of clout, both figurative and sometimes literal, The Shining is an absolutely BRILLIANT book! It did its job by me definitely: I got quite frightened and had one or two little nightmares. It’s absolutely BRILLIANT!