Stephen King continues to write the kind of stories which leave the fingers lingering on the pages just as much as the plots are left to fester in the mind. 'Sometimes they see too much.' In fact, all four stories in Full Dark, No Stars are fabulous tales of betrayal and revenge, of complicity and the price that has to be paid. 'They say that loving eyes can never see, but that's a fool's axiom,' writes King. Unfortunately, the meander into supernatural horror - rats are depressingly predictable - only diverts attention from the superb moral quandaries the characters have to cope with. The tale of the murder itself is both gruesome yet gripping, the consequences of such an evil act sickening yet inevitable. Written as first-person narrative, it's the story of Wilfred James, how he murders his wife and how he persuades his teenage son to help him do it.

The first, and longest, story in the book - 1922 - is perhaps the most unsatisfying. What will Darcy do? Compelling and convincing, this is Stephen King at his terrifying best. The murders are horrific, the evidence is overwhelming. Until that night in the garage.' Bob is away on a business trip and in the garage Darcy finds a secret to suggest that her husband is a serial killer. she believed that in the same unquestioning way that she believed that gravity would hold her to the earth when she walked down the sidewalk. Entitled A Good Marriage, it's the story of Darcellen, Darcy, Anderson, her accountant husband, Bob, and how their safe, secure middle-class relationship comes crashing down. Probably the final novella is the best example and also the most satisfying of the four. However, what Stephen King also does with his novellas is to steer away from the supernatural the brilliant The Shawshank Redemption is a superb example and the technique is employed again to great effect in the stories in this latest collection. Novellas, however, are a very different kind of read to the novel itself: to engage - and maintain - your attention, the novella has to be short and sharp, but with enough substance to establish the characters and sufficient depth to sustain the plot. The snobs say his books carry no great literary significance, but for a man billed as the Number One Bestselling Author in the world, Stephen King must know a thing or two about writing good stories!įull Dark, No Stars is a collection of four stories coming hot on the heels of what was, arguably, one of King's greatest novels, Under the Dome. A university friend once said that with so many books to read, and life being so short, why waste it on Stephen King.

Stephen king full dark no stars review