Salem’s Lot

Within the last few months I have ventured into reading my first Stephen King novels. I began with The Stand which for the most part I found entertaining. It didn't wrap up in the most satisfactory way but whenever you tend to invest in a long form of fiction this can tend to be the case, just see the final season of Game of Thrones for example. 

It is never an easy thing to conclude a very long tale in a way which will leave most people satisfied. 

However I did find some comfort in King's writing style. I like books which don't mind taking their time, that meander and go off the beaten track to explore what some might consider the mundane parts of life. 

Haruki Murakami, who I would consider one of my favourite writers, is similar to King in this way, alas with better prose and far less brutality. His books tend to follow an ordinary young man and we see his usual everyday life which is in parts broken up by these slice of life moments like in his novel Norwegian Wood and also in books that are of the Magical Realism genre such as 1Q84 and The Wind Up Bird Chronicles.

Following on from The Stand I decided to read Salem's Lot. In Salem's Lot King throws you into a sleepy town and adds in the  supernatural in the shape of Vampires. As with the previous novel you have your usual day to day moments, Ben Mears the writer who has moved back to the Lot wanting to revisit his childhood trauma, his love interest Susan Norton who is already in a committed relationship. You have a local doctor, A priest, a Small town sheriff who is completely out of his depth with what is going to befall his town. 

I view these kinds of novels with a similar viewpoint to many of Agatha Christie's novels. You throw a group of people into a situation, in the case of Christie it's a murder or in Salem's Lot Vampires. Then we get to witness how they try to resolve or overcome the unexpected threat which they have had placed on them. It's a social experiment in a way, one which makes for solid entertainment.