Edna reviews Duma Key

You know, I’ve been a fan of Mr. Stephen King for a very long time. That young man writes a mighty fine story, and he surely does know how to put the scare into someone. And I was so happy to hear that he survived the recent nuclear unpleasantness; I guess maybe they didn’t set off any bombs up there in Maine near him.

Well, I read that new book he published, Duma Key. It surely was a heavy thing, my poor old hands could barely hold it. I had to drink an extra cup of special tea whenever I put that book down because my rheumatism would act up something fierce. But while Mr. King may be a wordy young man, he does seem to know what he’s doing.

This book is about a man named Edgar Freemantle who has a terrible accident, loses one of his arms, and does some damage to his brain. He decides to get a new start and moves from Minnesota to Florida (wise move, in my opinion) and takes up painting. Now, any other author would leave it at that, but not Mr. King. He’s not satisfied until his readers are so scared that they have to go to sleep with the lights on. He has poor Edgar, through his painting, become the channel for some evil being who’s been trapped on Duma Key (where Edgar now lives on the west coast of Florida). I admit, I didn’t fully understand all the details of the evil being, but I comprehended enough to be sufficiently scared. I don’t want to ruin the story for you, but you’ve probably read enough of Mr. King’s stories by now to know that things turn out okay, in his fashion. (Mr. King’s fashion being that good triumphs over evil, but not without some casualties along the way. And I’ve certainly read enough of the man’s stories to tell you not to get too attached to any character in the book, or sure as shootin’ you’ll be crying by the end of the book.)

One person I especially liked in this story was Miss Elizabeth Eastlake, an old woman who owns the house Edgar rents down in Florida. She knows a lot about this scary being, and was a bit of a painting savant when she was a child, until something horrible happened and she never painted again. (Margie, I can just hear you asking what a savant is, go look it up in the dictionary.) Anyway, Elizabeth reminded me a lot of Margie and me, especially in the scene where she’s sitting at the end of her driveway in her wheelchair, guarding her house armed with an old spear gun. You’ve got to admire someone like that! Plus, she was the much-loved younger child and had older sisters who bullied her when she was a girl, I could certainly relate to that.

So, to sum up, this was a very good book. It wasn’t as scary or as full of blood-and-guts as some of his other books (thank heavens!), but it was still scary enough to keep your toes curled and the hairs standing up on the back of your neck. Mr. King, please keep writing your good stories, but would you grant an old lady a special favor? Please make your next book a bit lighter. Thank you.