Stephen King’s “Full Dark, No Stars”

“Full Dark, No Stars” is a good, solid collection of horror tales — four strong novellas by Stephen King that had me engrossed. Interestingly, three of the four tales — “1922,” “Big Driver,” and “A Good Marriage” — contain no supernatural elements whatsoever, and deal only with murders.  The one tale of the supernatural — “Fair Extension” — is a shorter, faster, superior take on the basic plot device examined by the less-than-stellar “Needful Things.” It was typical King; parts were slow, but the pace didn’t change the fact that this was a great page-turner that was hard to put down.  There were a few references to other King novels to please long-term fans, including a reference to “The Dark Tower” series.  Even the Afterword was entertaining, as King delivered his down-to-earth recounting of how he got the ideas for each story.  There’s some great trivia there, too — King says “The Long Walk” was the first novel he wrote, at the tender age of 18. My copy of “Full Dark, No Stars” had a bonus feature — a damn fantastic short story called “Under the Weather.”  Don’t miss it.

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