Saturday, August 21, 2010

Graduation Afternoon (Review of Stephen King's short story)


Graduation Afternoon
(Short story by Stephen King) A Quickie Review



This is my fifth short story I’ve read out of Mr. King’s “Just After Sunset,” short story collection: from the dreary “Harvey’s Dream,” which really was King’s nightmare, to “The New York Times..” and “Ayana” which brings to mind, King’s inner philosophy, of life after death, I sense he believes in it, he just hopes he don’t have to deal with Jesus, I think he’s hoping he can live on in some mellow dream world—when that short day comes; anyhow let me add “Rest Stop,” to this package, which had the only realistic and interesting ending to all those five stories, although all badly written. Thus, “Graduation Afternoon,” another nightmare of King’s, didn’t have much teeth-clinching, to it. Let’s say it did have that “exquisite stillness,” to it though—so much so it was dry. His description and explaining of the story was okay, with a lack on intensity. Some nasty, dirty stuff (that will never open heaven’s door for him; he does change the four letter word now and then with an ed or ing at the end, after 40-years of writing you’d think he could come up with a few new words to personify his need to express) for those who like the four letter cuss words it helps the story become more formless. Anyhow, a bomb comes, not too original, and here I gave him credit in a previous review for a good imagination, not in this story. Not sure which one is worse, “Harvey’s Dream,” or “Graduation Afternoon,” and to be honest, I doubt Mr. King cares one iota, I think he just wanted to document his dream for posterity sake, and fiddlesticks with the readers.

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