No book is off-limits since horror is subjective. In this novel, he explained everything and I never worked up a good scare.Here is your place to share your love or loathing for horror lit, but remember to be respectful.Ībusive comments and posts will get you banned but having a dissenting opinion is acceptable. My imagination takes hold and I scare myself. Stephen King’s short stories scare me half to death, I think because he doesn’t allow himself the luxury of explaining things. I spooked myself pretty good a few times, but that was more because I stopped reading at a bad place than because it was truly scary. I do wish it would stop showing up in his books.Īs for the scare factor–eh. That’s a life-changing, maybe even a life-shattering, event and I’m pretty much wishing that the guy would just “Get over it, already!” I feel heartless. I know, I know! That’s easy for me to say. I really hate to write this, but I’ll be glad when Stephen King gets his accident written out of his system. The plot wasn’t the same, but the same sorts of ideas show up in Charles de Lint’s Memory and Dream (which I prefer to this one, by the way). Also, I sort of felt like this had been done before. I’m no expert, but it seems like–if they’re set in this world at all–his novels are always in Maine, or at least New England. I liked the characters, especially Wireman, but it felt weird to read a Stephen King novel set in Florida. I tore through it, just like I tear through every Stephen King book I read. Do Edgar’s paintings hold a clue to Duma Key’s past and present? The therapy is good for him, but strange things are happening on Duma Key. Edgar takes up sketching and with amazing rapidity becomes a painter. His only neighbors are an old lady and an eccentric ex-lawyer. He tells Edgar to do something that makes him happy because he “ hedges against the night.” Edgar moves to Duma Key on the Gulf coast of Florida and takes up sketching. His therapist suggests that Edgar should get away from everything and get a fresh start. Then he is involved in a terrible workplace accident that leaves him with a brain injury and an amputated right arm. Edgar Freemantle is a building contractor in the Twin Cities in Minnesota.

Duma key