Ah, good ole Stephen King. He is by far my favorite author
of all time. I love his sinister way of writing and how descriptive he is in
his stories. Stephen King’s style of writing is often descriptive detail and
varies between short and long sentences. He does this so that we can visualize
exactly what King is saying without being overwhelmed by long, dragging
sentences. The book I’m reading right now, which is also my favorite Stephen
King book, is Salem’s Lot. Most people are familiar with the story of how
vampires appeared in Salem, Massachusetts and began changing all the residents
of the small town into blood thirsty creatures. Very exciting!
Right now in the story one of the main characters, Mark, is
in his room and his best friend, Danny, whose been turned into a vampire, appears
at Mark’s window and has just entered the room. In this except from the book, I like how much
detail and strong adjectives Stephen King uses to describe the scene:
"The face became suffused with
expression of vulpine triumph. The window slid up and Danny stepped in and took
two paces forward. The exhalation from that opening mouth was fetid, beyond description:
a smell of charnel pits. Cold, fish-white hands descended on Mark’s shoulders.
The head cocked, doglike, the upper lip curled away from those shining canines."
A
lot of King’s writing is incomplete and thought-based which makes his stories
more interesting and easier to read. For example, the last sentence in the
above paragraph is an incomplete sentence. Because of King’s style of writing,
there is no need to add additional information to drag out the sentence.
An editing mistake that I found this week was actually in
our homework (sorry Dr. J) for Taking Out Clutter.
The highlighted word in sentence 20 should be "nor" instead of "not." Just a tiny little typo that I thought I would be picky about and point out!
Although i've seen many Steven King movies, I don't think I've ever read his books. Based on that excerpt, I like that he writes in a way which puts you in the moment without overbearing details. Although it seems to be a basic part in editing to simplify sentences, i've seen many popular books with wordy descriptions. I am glad to know of another author I can look to when reading that won't let me down.
ReplyDeleteStephen King is hands down my favorite author as well. He is so descriptive in his writing that it becomes creepy to keep reading it. The Shining is a good example of this. The book I am reading for this class is one of his own called "On Writing". It is a very good look through his eyes at how to write and a look back into his life. I highly recommend it if you have not read it yet!
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