"The Oracle"?
Never heard of it.
"A real limited edition, far from being an expensive autograph stapled to a novel, is a treasure. And like all treasures do, it transforms the responsible owner into a caretaker, and being a caretaker of something as fragile and easily destroyed as ideas and images is not a bad thing but a good one...and so is the re-evaluation of what books are and what they do that necessarily follows." - Stephen King
I was teasing.
Only 45 here. Got some gems still to read. Always nice to have things to look forward to.
I scored 7.
There are a dozen others that I started to read, and lost interest. This is intended as no indictment of King. Look at just about any author, and they have an outstanding work, maybe two, and it drops of pretty precipitously from there.
{Discursiveness warning, at least somewhat off-topic}
Read Hemingway. After The Sun also Rises and a few short stories like The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber, I'm done. Fitzgerald? Sorry, Gatsby is it for me. Joyce is known for Ulysses and Finnegan's Wake, which I find respectively unreadable and incomprehensible. But Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man are masterpieces. I could go on...
The idea that a great author is just going to write book after book that is of the same quality, and somehow should be of interest to everyone, is just nonsense. It somehow ties in with the notion that celebrities always have words of great wisdom to say on any subject, and we should listen to their opinions with hushed awe and make them our own. No, all they have is what is usually termed a "bully pulpit." What comes out of the mouths of celebrities is, by and large, of no more merit or note than that bandied about in truck stop restrooms or the checkout at the local Wal-Mart.
I will grant another category where one might claim books they really like. If someone is, let's say, a science fiction buff (which I am, sorta), then I might give someone like Larry Niven a half-dozen great books, while another part of me realizes it's probably no more than two or three. Even giants I grew up on and never out of, like Robert A. Heinlein don't stand up to close scrutiny. Stranger in a Strange Land, Starship Troopers, and Moon is a Harsh Mistress...that's about it. I've never thought his future history writing was all that great.
In the category of post-apocalyptic fiction, my favorite is Walter M. Miller, Jr.'s A Canticle for Liebowitz. Hands down. Better than King, Hoban, anybody. But as far as I know, everything else Miller ever wrote was pretty much embarrassing.
Talent is what it is, but it isn't necessarily consistent.
55
"Bow down to the ultimate Stephen King addict. You’ve read almost everything that he’s written, and that’s no easy feat. Over the years, Stephen King has delighted you, made you laugh, and kept you up at night. There are very few other authors for which you could say the same."
You're either a "critic" or an "Academia" enthusiast. In either case, who really cares what you think? People read what they like and they like, Stephen King very much. He may not now, be considered on a par with, Edgar Allen Poe or H.P. Lovecraft, but only academians will make that call at some time in the distant future. With no real, tangible reason, to boot. Shakespeare, was a schmuck in his day and wrote in order to eat. Who are you to pass judgement? Popularity is the only ruler you honestly have to measure their respective works and you sort of folks routinely ignore that fact.
Thanks for playing!!!
28 in 23 (?)!!!!
63 in '23!!!!!!!!!!
My Collection: https://www.thedarktower.org/palaver...ion-Merlin1958
The Houston Astros cheated Major League Baseball from 2017-18!!!! Is that how we teach our kids to play the game now?????
48... and I probably will never read Faithful.
31 for me and just started the Talisman
Not even joking around here.....I got 19
I guess it depends on how you interpret the list. Its either 59 or 65 for me.
I have read "Riding the Bullet" as part of Everything is Eventual, but not the stand alone book, which has a lot of content not in the collection.
I have also listened to audio versions of UR, Throttle, Mile 81, A face in the Crowd, In the Tall Grass, but have never read them.
I'm reading them (generally) in order. I am up to 11/22/63, and have read everything prior to this except The Plant, Faithful and On Writing. I also skipped ahead and have already read Joyland.
Mike
Wanted:
'Salem's Lot Portfolio #606
Fairy Tale UK S/L
I got 43! I read about 25 of them in one year in 2012, but I've slowed down since then because I don't want to have read everything just yet, I like knowing I've got a handful waiting for me.
Only 50 - but many of those more than once.
Dark Tower series 5 times.
Is there any in print versions of In the Tall Grass and Throttle (not eBook or audio)?
Throttle was printed in the He Is Legend anthology. As far as I know, In the Tall Grass was never printed on paper.
John
"In The Tall Grass" was a two part story in the June/July and August/September 2012 issues of Esquire.
63.
Haven't read ALL of Night Shift which is my glaring omission.
Then:
In the Tall Grass.
Throttle
Faithful
The Plant (Isn't this incomplete?)
Colorado Kid (My only S/L which is why I haven't read it)
UR
Mile 81
King A Face in the Crowd (Never heard of this)
I guess my score will improve after I read Bazaar of Bad Dreams.
Sloth Love Chunk