#583 Dolan’s Cadillac- Stephen King
When I began this project the idea was to try read short stories by authors I hadn’t read before, or at least hadn’t read their short fictions before. Up till now, that’s been the case. I’ve read dozens of new authors like Rebecca Makkai or Luis Alberto Urrea, or I’ve finally read short works by authors I admire like Chuck Palahniuk or Haruki Murakami.
Now that I’m well past the one-year I panned on doing this, I wanted to add an old friend. I am an avid reader of Stephen King, and I’ve especially liked his short stories. Night Shift and Skeleton Crew are two phenomenal collections. King’s novels are great and while read by millions somehow under-appreciated by the tweed-shitting literary snobs that devalue his work. However, I think it’s the short story genre that King’s talents are best showcased. His creativity and ability to conjure situations that are immediately gripping, is only surpassed by his story telling chops.
So, here is the first story from Nightmares and Dreamscapes. It’s a bit on the novella side of things, but it reads fast and should be engulfed in one sitting. Robinson is a grieving widower. Seven years ago his wife was killed by Dolan, a rich gangster she was about to testify against. Now he is hell-bent on revenge. Although he is very much out of his depth in such matters.
“More and more I felt like a man who has jumped out of the bay of a B-52 with a parasol in his hand instead of a parachute on his back.”
The plan for revenge is pretty convoluted and over-the-top insane, but in the heat of the action, that is forgotten. King is wonderful at creating tension and motion in his storytelling. You feel the pace pick up as the plan is carried out. Often you see quotes from favorable critics on dust jackets of mystery novels that say things like “makes your heart race”—well this one actually did that for me.
Notable Passage: “Schoolteachers and high-priced hoodlums do not have the same freedom of movement; it’s just an economic fact of life.”
