Fairy Tale

I am not usually drawn to books written by Stephen King but there was something that was very intriguing for me about Fairy Tale that made me want to read it. After I started to notice that so many of the people I am friends with on goodreads had given Fairy Tale such high praise, I decided to give it a try. I decided that if I determined that it was not for me I had at least given it a try. Within just a few minutes I was completely immersed into the plot of Fairy Tale. Stephen King created engaging and likable characters for the most part. I listened to the audiobook that was brilliantly narrated by Seth Numrich and Stephen King, himself. Since I had Fairy Tale downloaded on my kindle, I also read certain parts as well. It was fast paced, so creative and well plotted. I was glad that I decided to read/listen to this book since in my opinion it was a creative gem. Fairy Tale was told in the first person by twenty-four year old Charlie Reade as he looked back on his life the year he had turned seventeen. Charlie had been an only child. He lived in Sentry, Illinois with his mother and father. One afternoon when Charlie had been seven years old, his mother had decided to walk to town to buy a bucket of chicken for dinner. His mother left Charlie and his father watching a baseball game on the television. After buying the bucket of chicken, Charlie’s mother started to walk home. She was eating an extra piece of the chicken while she walked. As she started to cross “that G D bridge” on her way home, a truck came out of nowhere, hit her and she died instantly. Charlie and his father were devastated as they learned about her death. The only way that Charlie’s father was able to cope with his wife’s death was by drowning his sorrows with alcohol. Before too long, Charlie’s father was a certifiable alcoholic. Charlie was forced to grow up very fast. He became the caregiver for his father. When Charlie’s father’s drinking problems became so severe, he was fired from his job. Charlie envisioned that he and his father could potentially become homeless or worse. It was then that Charlie started to pray that his father would stop drinking. Charlie made a promise to G-d that day. If G-d would make his father stop drinking, Charlie would pay it forward and help someone else in need. Just in the nick of time, Charlie’s father’s friend stepped in. His father’s friend became his sponsor in Alcoholic’s Anonymous. Taking one baby step at a time, Charlie’s father found his way to sobriety. There was a house at the top of the hill on the street that Charlie lived that was known by the neighborhood children as the “psycho house “. One day, Charlie was walking home and as he was passing that house he heard a dog barking frantically. The man who lived there was quite reclusive. No one knew a lot about him and he seldom left his home. One of Charlie’s friends had warned him that he had seen the dog that lived there several years ago and that it was quite vicious. Charlie pondered about what to do. He thought that something was wrong. Charlie decided to climb over the fence to see. When Charlie got to the backyard, he saw that the old man that lived there had fallen off a ladder and was hurt very badly. Charlie called 911 and got an ambulance to come and help the man. The man’s name was Mr. Bowditch. It was just Mr. Bowditch and his dog, Radar that lived in the house. Mr Bowditch did not have a wife, children or any living relatives. Before the ambulance took Mr. Bowditch to the hospital, Charlie offered to take care of Radar and feed him for Mr. Bowditch. That was the beginning of Charlie making good on the promise he made with G-d. Over the course of Mr. Bowditch’s recovery, Charlie became his caregiver and the two formed the most unlikely but beautiful friendship that anyone could have imagined. Mr. Bowditch was not your typical neighbor as you might have already surmised. He hoarded lots of things in his house and he was opposed to modern day conveniences and technology. His t.v. was probably as old as he was. It had rabbit ears and an antenna on the roof. He was not in the possession of a cell phone or a computer and he had no desire to own one either. One thing was apparent, though. Mr. Bowditch loved Radar with all his heart and the same could be said for Radar’s feelings towards Mr. Bowditch. When Mr. Bowditch came home from the hospital, he began to confide in Charlie about some things. Mr. Bowditch had to pay the hospital for his stay and the surgeries he had. Charlie learned about the gold that Mr. Bowditch was in possession of and that strange noises that could be heard coming from the padlocked shed on Mr. Bowditch’s property. Mr. Bowditch revealed information to Charlie on a need to know basis. One day, while Charlie was at school, he got a call from Mr. Bowditch. Charlie could tell that something was wrong. Mr. Bowditch was having a heart attack. He needed Charlie to know some very important things. Probably the most important thing Mr. Bowditch revealed to Charlie had to do with the shed on his property. Mr. Bowditch told Charlie that within the shed was a well that led to the “other world” where the sundial existed. Years ago, Mr. Bowditch had gone on the sundial to make himself younger. Mr. Bowditch had shared this information with Charlie already. As Charlie continued listening to the all that Mr. Bowditch had to tell him, tears welled up in his eyes. Charlie knew that Mr. Bowditch was dying. By the time that the ambulance got to Mr. Bowditch’s house, he was already dead. Charlie took Radar to his own house. Radar became his dog on that day. Unfortunately, Radar was also quite old and didn’t have long to live. That was when a plan started to formulate in Charlie’s mind. He could not loose Radar too. Charlie would do whatever he had to do to find the sundial and make Radar young again. The next part of Fairy Tale took place in the “other world” known as Empis. The fairy tale characters were very creative yet believable. Charlie’s adventurous journey was full of discovery, magic, dangers, good, evil and monsters. Some of the scenes were gruesome and unpleasant but for the most part they were well plotted and even uplifting. The ending was quite satisfying and it tied everything up quite nicely. I found myself thinking about the characters long after the book ended. Charlie was my favorite character by far. I am so glad that I took a chance and read Fairy Tale by Stephen King. I highly recommend it.

Stephen King's Fairy Tale (2022) is part horror, part fantasy, and even part young adult if you don't mind the colorful language. The book begins with a sad, lonely boy, Charlie Reade, who gets a rough start at life when his mother dies in an accident. His father turns to the bottle and neglects Charlie as alcoholism and depression takeover. Charlie spends his middle school years getting in trouble with an evil friend. His bad decisions are ignored by his father. Charlie turns to God in despair and prays for his father's sobriety. His prayers become bargaining tools. If God could bring Charlie's dad back from his blurry haze, then Charlie could change as well by doing good deeds instead of cruel shenanigans. And God hears him. Charlie's dad comes back from his personal hell through AA. Now it's payback time. Charlie gets an opportunity to pay it forward. His neighbor, Harold Bowditch, a cantankerous elderly recluse, falls in his yard as Charlie is on his way home from school. Charlie helps the man by getting an ambulance and then promising to watch his dog as he recovers. Several months go by and they form a relationship. Mr. Bowditch is a mystery. He oddly doesn't have Medicare or insurance to pay his medical bills. In his desperation, he asks Charlie to go into his safe and take some of his gold to a place that will buy it without questions. Charlie learns that Mr. Bowditch is beyond wealthy. Once Mr. Bowditch is released from the hospital, Charlie continues to care for him and Radar, his German Shepherd that is also not doing well due to old age. He discovers more odd things about his neighbor and friend. When it becomes clear that Mr. Bowditch is going to die due to other complications, he tells Charlie about his shed, a winding staircase that leads down to another world, and a magical sundial that will restore Radar by making the dog young again. After Mr. Bowditch dies, Charlie and Radar descend into the unknown where the fairy tale begins. NO SPOILER! The title, Fairy Tale, is just that. There are lots of tie-ins with the great fairy tales of the centuries. For example, Mr. Bowditch has a fairy tale library in his house. As Charlie reads these classics, King deftly reminds the reader about famous characters and story lines. There are many comparisons with lots of fairy tales, especially Jack and the Beanstalk. Charlie meets several princes, princesses, ogres, monsters, talking animals, and more once he descends into an alternative world below the shed of Mr. Bowditch's house. He gets put into a position to play the hero. Fairy Tale is not Stephen King's best. My personal faves are The Stand and The Shining, but it's solid King that keeps you turning the pages, loving the characters, and connecting with the plot. One of the many interesting things that King does throughout the book, is illustrate the beginning of each chapter. The pictures resemble old wood-cuts from the Hans Christian Andersen tales. Besides the fairy tale tie-in, King brings up God a few times with universal themes of good vs. evil. Besides the AA program with God as a higher power and Charlie's deal with God, King uses the name Gogmagog as the name of the evil force/character that has taken over the fairy tale world. Gogmagog is technically a famous giant and also goes with King's mention of Jack and the Beanstalk. Furthermore, Gog and Magog as separate words are biblical references from Revelation that focuses on the End of Days. The characters in both Charlie's life and his alternative fairy tale life are some of the same, like a mirroring effect. We all have princes, villains, fairy godmothers, ogres, and other archetypes that show up throughout our lives. We have also played these archetypal roles for others. Joseph Campbell, author of Hero with a Thousand Faces, wrote about how mythological and fairy tale characters are ingrained within our psyche. Lastly, Stephen King is currently 75 years old. For decades, he has never failed to entertain us with his infinite imagination. I will always be a fan. Fairy Tale does not disappoint! 5 Stars.

J'ai vraiment apprécié ce "conte de fées" à la sauce King, qui évoque un peu par moment l'univers de The Dark Tower. N'hésitez pas à vous y plonger !

He leído la versión en inglés para Kindle, buen libro del maestro del terror. El principio algo lento, pero la historia recobra fuerza y vale la pena.

The master storyteller does it again! This book had me hooked from the word go. It's different, it's quirky, it's got those heartstopping moments when you know the good guys will somewhat win but you don't know how. For no one really wins, do they? And theres nothing called a "happily ever after"!

Um ótimo livro com uma história maravilhosa, como todas as que King nos conta. Sou fã, então não sou muito crítico.

"I'd like to tell you I came back to my better self at the very end. To say I felt regret. It wouldn't be true. There's a dark well in everyone, I think, and it never goes dry. But you drink from it at your peril. That water is poison." Charlie is a regular seventeen year old kid. Only Charlie has lived his life mostly looking after himself. After the tragic death of his mother, Charlie's father was driven to drink, barely able to look after himself, let alone a child. A chance meeting with Mr Bowditch, a recluse with a big dog in a big house at the top of a big hill, changes the course of Charlies life forever. After receiving a major inheritance, all of which included a creepy shed down in the back of the yard, Charlie sets out to save a life. In true King fashion, the story is a very slow build, crafting every single moment so you don't miss even the tiniest detail. The story is created based on the old Grimm's Fairy Tales, spun in a new light and modernized to fit with more recent times. The characters and their relationships are put together so beautifully, they draw you in and make you feel for every single one. Not one character feels insignificant. The stunning world building had me lost in a daydream, just imagining the spaces. The read will leave you happy and sad, nervous and excited, I wove through a multitude of emotions on each chapter. This is quite different from most of King's previous works, it is a work of fairy tale art as opposed to strictly horror style novels. There are some quite graphic scenes though, so younger readers may need to be aware of those.