Review: Needful Things by Stephen King
Small town, greed, and nasty grudges - the perfect market for a new kind of store, where there's something for everyone, but is the price fair?
Before the release of Stephen King's Fairy Tale last fall, I had never read one of his books. I didn't initially have his new book on my radar until some friends mentioned wanting to read it. I was desperate to start a new audiobook, ended up downloading Fairy Tale, and never looked back.
Needful Things will be my third Stephen King book and what a ride - I laughed, I cried, I tried to anticipate every move, and was continuously surprised. Having now completed one of his newest pieces of work and an older one, I am a fan.
The book takes place in Castle Rock, Maine, a continuous setting throughout King's books, in October 1991, which also represents the original publication date.
Right now it’s October, and in The Rock we let October stay just as long as she wants to. As far as I’m concerned, it’s the best time of year. Spring’s nice here, but I’ll take October over May every time.
A new shop announces its opening in the local paper and the town believes they've seen it all, expecting little from the curious shop calling itself Needful Things. The shop owner, Leland Gaunt, wins over the residents of Castle Rock with each sale - something for everyone, for a little bit of cash and a deed, a bargain everyone is willing to make.
King's ability to create and maintain soo many storylines in one setting is wild to me! With such a large page count, there was definitely the space to do it. I found myself invested in each one, except The Rock's religious members, the Catholics and Baptists. While I found these portions of the story less thrilling, they were still crucial to the overall message. Greed and Hypocrisy know no bounds.
What fascinated me was the simplicity of the items bargained for .. a rare baseball card, a picture of Elvis Presley, and even a lampshade. The slogan "Something for everyone" held true, and you begin to wonder, how does Gaunt do it? Each sale, soliciting a new deed, on its own felt harmless and petty, the residents could have never anticipated the chaos ahead, and neither could I!
Everyone loves something for nothing...even if it costs everything.
A unique quality of this book is, while the humor is dark, I didn't expect to find soo much of it and more importantly laugh as much as I did. I always had this looming idea that King's books were rather heavy and gruesome. A lot of the writing is raunchy and unrestrained. I loved it. Do I actively seek to read about middle age women masturbating to a picture of Elvis, no, but I can't imagine this story without the boldness of these characters.
As more residents convert to Gaunt's customers - the plot thickens and things get rather gruesome. Gaunt plays his cards well, slowly revealing his true nature and what he was after from day one. The reveal is well-placed and executed strategically. Broken up into 3 parts, for a book this size, it hardly slows or lulls, and I couldn't put it down in the last 200 pages.
I rated this a 4.5 stars based on the mastery of story weaving, the wild-as-hell characters, the level of comedic horror and gore, and my overall enjoyment of this behemoth of a book. If you've contemplated reading any of King's books, I think Needful Things is a fine place to start or jump back in.