#583 Dolan’s Cadillac- Stephen King

#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.”

Rating: 8-9-9-7 Total= 33

#3 The Statement of Randolph Carter (1919)- H.P Lovecraft

As onomatopoeia relates to the sounds of words, the picture of H.P. Lovecraft above relates to his writing.  Just look at that intense boring darkness.  Living contemporarily with Bela Lugosi, it’s a waste of a face that he did not become a star of black and white horror movies.  

I guess we’ll have to settle for his writing.  Of all the authors in my stack for this project, Lovecraft is the one I was most curious about.  Wow, what a style! Known as a master of horror, existing in the genre somewhere between Edgar Allen Poe and Stephen King (acknowledged as a huge influence on the latter), Lovecraft was virtually unknown during his time, being relegated to pulp printings and mostly forgotten but for the hundreds of authors who found inspiration in the world of his dark themes.

This short story is one a four using John Carter as the narrator.   Here his “Statement” is a monologue spoken to interrogators after the mysterious disappearance of his friend and partner. It’s essentially a statement to the Police.  Carter relates a harrowing account of a late-night grave digging session presumably to further the odd and ungodly studies of the deceased. 

What they uncover is a monster too hideous to describe.  Cater lures in the mind of the listener but leaves the monster’s details to your own imagination by relating that “…It’s too utterly beyond thought…no man could know it and live…” and so Carter’s companion dies, the monster is left trapped, alive, and lurking in the unholy sepulcher.  Carter is spared to answer the unanswerable.

The writing is so rich and satisfying.  I could read his writing style for hours with or without plot.  I mean, have you ever seen a paring of words such as “effluence of miasmal gases?” Don’t you think your life would be more exciting with more writing of this kind?

I Loved it, and cant wait to read more. Unfortunately most of Lovecraft’s works are longer novellas, or full works.  I’ll manage to get a few in this year I’m sure, but probably only a couple of the shorter stories for this blog.

Notable Passages: As I stated above, the story was packed with great passages. Here are two of my favorites:

 “Vision or nightmare it may have been – vision or nightmare I fervently hope it was – yet it is all that my mind retains of what took place in those shocking hours after we left the sight of men.”

“It was in a deep, damp hollow, overgrown with rank grass, moss, and curious creeping weeds, and filled with the vague stench with my idle fancy associated absurdly with rotting stone”

Rating: 8-9-8-7 Total= 32