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In London she modelled, read for Twentieth Century-Fox and Victor Gollancz who had published her father , and then, as a stringer for a small British news service, reported on the reconstruction of Warsaw. A year later she was back in New York. She had a second, "serious marriage", to Richard Sigerson, a PR agent, which produced two sons, Adam, now an environmental consultant with two children, and Gabriel, who has worked in zoos from Philadelphia to Madagascar.
When that marriage in turn ended, about eight years later, she supported herself as a teacher at private schools and at a centre for delinquents; an autodidact, she also applied to Columbia University, passing an entrance exam despite her near-total lack of formal qualifications.
I went to high school for about three months. She married Martin Greenberg, sometime editor of Commentary, a respected translator of Faust and Heinrich von Kleist and brother of the art critic Clement Greenberg, in In he won a Guggenheim fellowship, which gave Fox the support and time to write. She embarked on two novels: Maurice's Room , for children, and Poor George, for adults. Between and , she published 15 books. When he apprehends a young delinquent in his home in the country, he decides to help the boy.
His wife strongly disapproves. But George, caught in blind philanthropic fervour, ignores her. The first line of the novel - "Who listens? It's just some slight sense of there being a watershed moment in the war against conformity - and of course in retrospect the 60s look a little less revolutionary now. In her children's books, Fox does not shy away from difficult subjects: I think I write mostly about children who, like me, are out of the bowl.
I had the experience on the streets that I wrote about in Monkey Island [about an year-old homeless boy in Manhattan], for example, and I have been in a storm at sea [ The Slave Dancer ]. Middle-class children don't get a certain kind of spiritual life with their parents. And it's a real deprivation.
Oh my, although we did read the whole book, it was outrageous. It was too horrifying and it made my kids feel sick. I tried to explain that by being aware of the atrocities in life we can change the world and do things better.
That still didn't help. So Fox was not groundbreaking, but she always had her own voice and her own vision. And she's definitely among a handful of the finest writers of contemporary and historical fiction for children. Fox has loved writing for young people, finding it no less of a challenge than writing for adults. And nobody ever said in a review of my children's books that I write down - I write straight across to them. I don't try to teach. Studies in Modern Children's Fiction , "is to write with magnificent restraint and precision about the interplay of personal and historical, inner growth and outer framework, the process of learning to think about oneself and the world.
Fox remembers a passage from Coleridge's Notebooks her husband once read to her. And she says oh, that was so good of you, and so wonderful. And Coleridge says that's the worst thing you could do to a child. You shouldn't be praised for doing what's right.
You should just do it. Sophie Bentwood, a middle-aged Brooklynite, puts down milk for a stray cat at the beginning of Desperate Characters In his introduction to the reprint, Franzen went further: It seemed unarguably great. And many have come to share Franzen's view. Instead, she distributes her formidable acumen unselfishly, so that even the most minor characters can suddenly offer crucial insight, and unsympathetic characters are often the most fascinating: Unlike many other houses in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, it is not a brownstone, but a beautiful, spa cious English-style terrace house.
She works at the top, in a room full of light lined with shelves of her own work in many foreign languages. When Fox's grandmother died, Elsie decided she shouldn't be told, as "she wouldn't be interested", and this throw-away cruelty was the seed for The Widow's Children , which eschews the baggier picaresque of The Western Coast, returning to the tight, controlled claustrophobia of her first two novels.
Laura, an ageing Spanish beauty, chooses not to tell a family gathering of her mother's death; instead she charges her editor friend Peter with the job. She's not to know! He knew he had to get Clara to the funeral.
My mother set that off by saying I wouldn't be interested [in my grandmother's death]. But I sharpened a moral knife on that phrase and made it come out different. I think what she failed in was to be good in the way Peter was. To make me come to the funeral. This is Fox's favourite among her novels, and her publisher told her at the time it was her best - but declined to publish it. He felt it wouldn't sell. It was turned down by another A Servant's Tale, which followed in , was turned down by 17 before appearing.
Her last adult novel, The God of Nightmares , had a slightly easier time but didn't survive. By they were all out of print although, Fox is keen to point out, "There were very few of them, but I never ran out of readers". The same has not applied to her children's books. Since she has published 12 more; they have stayed in print, their ex-cellence duly recognised, winning her the Hans Christian Andersen Medal , a National Book Award , Newbery Honors , the Empire State Medal A new book has just been sent to the publisher. In , Franzen, fighting to finish his second novel, was at Yaddo, the writer's colony in upstate New York.
Franzen read and re-read it, taught it, pressed it on everyone he met, and then, in , placed it at the centre of an essay for Harper's Magazine about the American novel. He argued that Fox's absolute insistence on seeing things straight amounted to a tragic, as opposed to a depressive realism, and that "tragic realism has the perverse effect of making its adherents into qualified optimists". Bissell suggested it as a paperback reprint with an introduction by Franzen, but the editors hadn't heard of Fox and, pre- The Corrections , thought Franzen not starry enough, so had to be persuaded.
Fox got no advertising and no publicity - until a glowing profile appeared in the New York Times Magazine in Suddenly she was a phenomenon. Reading Fox can be gruelling. And it is with her. Much of the bleakness arises from Fox's utter rejection of illusion. It was like an order to fool yourself. But it's only bleak relative to the expectations that people have. I think we're all cursed with expectations - about other people, about marriage, about ourselves - almost everything that's bad comes out of disappointed expectations. Ask Fox who is reading her now, and her answer is immediate: Thanks for telling us about the problem.
Return to Book Page. Preview — Desperation by Stephen King. Desperation by Stephen King Goodreads Author. It's known as Desperation, Nevada. It's not a very nice place to live. It's an even worse place to die.
Let the battle against evil begin. Published August 1st by Signet Book first published September 24th Collie Entragian , David Carver.
To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. To ask other readers questions about Desperation , please sign up. I'm sorry if this is a stupid question. Is this novel a ghost or crime story or is knowing which a spoiler? Anyone else read this?
William King I read it. See all 7 questions about Desperation…. Lists with This Book. View all 18 comments. Feb 02, Dirk Grobbelaar rated it really liked it Shelves: Why, what a splendid book. King manages, for the most part, to keep the tension up throughout the novel, which makes it one hell of an uneasy read. Something about this bothered [him], but for n Why, what a splendid book. Something about this bothered [him], but for now he paid no attention. The nature of the supernatural antagonist is somewhat vague, but purposely so. It has some novelty value, having been released alongside The Regulators.
It also has an epic and mythical sweep that can at least partly be attributed to the setting. Have I mentioned just how scary it gets? Just how much of this will appeal to the reader would probably depend. View all 10 comments. Aug 04, Nicholas Armstrong rated it it was amazing. I'm an indecisive rater and my rating on this will probably fluctuate with mood and memory but regardless of that this is a great read.
What I always found insulting was how easily critics, snobs, and pretentious twits write-off Stephen King because he writes stories about realistic people in fantastic situations. Seriously, he writes amazingly so why give a damn what he writes about? Desperation is a perfect example of horror and fantastic writing and anyone who doesn't think so can go I'm an indecisive rater and my rating on this will probably fluctuate with mood and memory but regardless of that this is a great read.
Desperation is a perfect example of horror and fantastic writing and anyone who doesn't think so can go stick their nose in some classics of literature and sip wine and think about how superior they are.
This part is where Barnes lost me. Those are big words, but In the first chapter of the book we have a young Ambrose Graye just beginning his life as an architect when he meets Cytherea Bradleigh, the daughter of a retired Navy officer. Mary is thrust into the company of a possible embezzler, Jacobite spies, a Highland woman serving as a kind traveling companion, and a fierce Highland protector. You get a sense of order from arranging things. Responding to his first crisis, the young Richard turns aside the mob of the Wat Tyler Rebellion with his soft words, but that rebellion does end in bloodshed. I could not wait to see what happened with Mary and Hugh, and I honestly wasn't sure how it all would end.
The first thing that gripped me in this book was how goddamn creepy it really was. There are few things that scare me, really, but cops are one of them. Cops scare me because I'm terrified of prison. I have no reason to go but dammit if I haven't read and seen things that have convinced me that sometimes innocent people get put away and horrible, horrible things happen to them.
So the opening scenes of Desperation which show a sheriff who is seemingly innocent had me gripped and on the edge of my seat already. The characters were tense because of the bizarre way the cop pulls them over and the fact that they do have pot on them. This is probably my favorite part of the book but that does not mean it is the only good part.
King's use of repetition of the senses here really astounded me. I never knew how powerful repetition could be until I read this book and this scene and I begin to sweat as hard as I thought the characters were. As their paranoia grew I could feel my own paranoia growing until I wanted to shout at the book "Are you a good guy? Is this going to turn out as horrible as it feels? King's literary tools and knowledge of how to use them really awes me at times. From there the tension never slows and never stops. The characters are filled with real emotions, memories, and personalities.
The woman whose name I forget is badass. Seriously, her and the writer were my two favorite characters, flaws and all. Yes, this is a horror. Yes, it is not filled with symbolism or a greater cultural message which we all probably know. Despite all of this it is still remarkably well-written and any author that makes me feel what the characters are feeling and the absolute hopelessness of a situation gets a thumbs up. View all 5 comments. Apr 04, Mari Biella rated it it was amazing Shelves: Having read a number of his books, I've gradually come to think of him as being a bit like an old friend: On this level, Desperation does not disappoint; you're likely to be hooked from the very first page.
And, yes, it really is pretty nasty — but then I have got a slight phobia of creepy little towns, so I would say that. Highway 50 in Nevada is apparently being a Brit I'd hardly know "The Loneliest Highway in America" — not the kind of place where you'd want to run out of petrol, have an accident or, indeed, meet a seemingly psychopathic policeman, as a random group of travellers are about to find out to their cost. In fact, the policeman is just the tip of the iceberg, as the actual source of the horror is something bigger, older and considerably more deadly than one man.
The small mining town of Desperation, once a small but safe and friendly place, has been devastated by an ancient evil, and it falls to a ragged group of survivors to do battle with that evil. It's astounding how many of our primal fears King works on, and with what apparent ease: In many ways this is not for the easily-upset: King was never the man to spare us sickening physical details, and he's on form here, disgusting us with every dribble of blood, every rotten lump of flesh and every putrid corpse. The foulness can get a bit much on occasion, and yes, it does begin to feel a bit gratuitous, but it's a compelling story, so you can overlook that.
There are one or two gripes: And of course there are the recycled characters, the characters who have made numerous appearances in other King novels — the young boy with strange powers, the weary, cynical writer, the slightly downtrodden woman who has to struggle against the odds — but then again the fact that they keep coming back only really testifies to how successful they were to begin with. If ever a writer was a victim of his own success, it's SK; but then, in accordance with one of the major themes of the novel, God is cruel.
Recommended, if not for the faint of heart. View all 15 comments. I closed the book with a wicked smile across my face. First, the boy character made this book. Second, the way this story makes you feel like you're right there. The bigger the better in my opinion. One of his best for sure. View all 7 comments. Somehow, they get pulled over for some sort of technicality with the law and are brought to Desperation and all hell breaks loose.
The plot was steady and the suspense was incredible as one would expect with a King but the second half the religious ideologies overtook the storyline. Apart from all that the book is really fast paced, devouring the pages in a weeks time and the gore factor was top notch. Exploring addiction and alcoholism was well done as the subject hits close to home for Stephen King. Still, you sound check it out if the premise sounds interesting or if you are King addict.
I would definitely check out The Regulators to see how the narratives pair together. Have you read it what are your thoughts on it? View all 6 comments. This is a story about the little mining town of Desperation. Regulating the traffic on the nearby Route 50 is Collie Entragian, who is an absolutely giant madman. If you're caught with a license plate number missing or you've got a flat tire Collie brings passers-by into Desperation where the real nightmare begins.
I loved this book from beginning to end, I was hooked from the very first page. It's an apocalyptic d "In these silences something may rise. It's an apocalyptic drama of God and evil, madness and revelation. There is a constant sense of tension that King holds over you relentlessly. It's true horror as the amount of gore and blood and guts is enough to last you for a lifetime. There's scary animals everywhere from coyotes to scorpions to buzzards to recluse spiders You could not wish for any more! People appear to have issues with the religious undertone of the book, but I personally enjoyed this aspect.
I felt like it was necessary in order for this story to progress and make sense. It allowed for the character David Carver to really shine. A young boy with the weight of everyone's survival on his shoulders. The other characters were equally awesome. King really developed each with their own unique characterisation and this is truly why he is the King. One of my top King books. An addictive read with a relentless pace.
So, I dropped the pretention and read a Stephen King novel. True, I read several of King's works After all, King's popularity is eclipsed only by, oh, I don't know I'll admit, the story was engaging. King has a way with propelling his story-lines over hundreds of pages without taking a breath. Or so it would seem.
Unfortunately, the mediocrity of his prose is, at best, d So, I dropped the pretention and read a Stephen King novel. Unfortunately, the mediocrity of his prose is, at best, distracting and at worst infuriating. How many internal monologues can one author insert haphazardly into a single paragraph? I don't know, but King sure does: Seriously though, King's writing suffers from a lack of ingenuity. Metaphors are ham-fisted and cliched, character development is superficial at best, and the dialogue is trite and unconvincing. The upshot to King's fast-paced, yet uninspired, novel?
It only took a few hours to finish. View all 38 comments. Sep 18, Jen from Quebec: It has ups and downs and definitely could have trimmed at least 75 pages or so with better editing, I think, but a good read. Heavy on the religious aspects, for a King novel. Aug 31, Doreen Petersen rated it really liked it Shelves: Although not one of my favorite Stephen King books I would still recommend it to all. Had I been reviewing in my teenage years, I probably would have given this two stars, and The Regulators four stars. The latter is a fun book from beginning to end, while Desperation takes off like a crackhead escaping police custody only to run out of steam about halfway to the sanctuary of his crack den.
This read was a little bit better than the first because I was expecting the slow-as- The first time I read Desperation , I read it back to back with The Regulators in the fall This read was a little bit better than the first because I was expecting the slow-as-mud, worship-ridden final pages, so I'm giving it another star. Most of my problems with this book is personal. The God angle leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I'm not a religious person, and for the most part, I don't get along with religious persons. I'm too fucking opinionated, and I'm notorious for flapping my jaws. Mostly because these are the people who laugh at me for believing in Santa Claus until I was 13 and don't see the irony in having a laugh at the hopeful child I once was.
You can have your Land of Make-Believe, I have my own. So yeah, the Come to Jesus Parade isn't to my liking. If you're rollin' holy, this is probably the King book for you. Stephen, if you thought you were being subtle with the subtext, you failed. Desperation is probably the closest thing to a horror novel King had written since Needful Things , which was Not one of those books are what horror fans would call scary. They scared me, but I'm fucking strange. Desperation was a return to such balls-out terrors. You have a psycho cop who's not everything he seems.
You have animals and the nastiest of insect life acting strangely. Statues that make you wanna fuck people to death. You know, Disney type of shit. My point is, this book is brutal, and I loved that aspect. Oddly enough, a miniscule - and I mean teensy-tiny - side character from Rose Madder has a pretty substantial role in this book. That one still shocks me. I know full and well some characters come into our lives and refuse to leave, but I remember thinking and still think Cynthia was the last person I expected to see within these pages.
My favorite character above any other is Johnny Marinville, though. One of King's best characters, that one. For tie-ins to the King-verse, click view spoiler, but please expect spoilers for ALL of King's work and not just this novel. The mine and quonset huts from Wolves of the Calla. Someone mentions Misery in Paradise , which is a romance novel written by Paul Sheldon. This also ties Misery deeper into the Dark Tower and King-verse.
I find it strange that King used the Mr. I've been trying to six-degrees Mr.
Mercedes into the rest of the King-verse since I read the book almost a year ago and I've been coming up empty. There are mentions of the movie adaptation for Carrie and IT , but nothing stating that Mr. Mercedes is part of the same universe. Mercedes seems to be set in "the real world" apart from the King-verse, so I don't know if I'm grasping at straws or if he really did use Mr Smiley to tie Mr.
Mercedes into the Dark Tower. I know the bad guy's name in Revival comes up to 19 letters, so we have that Mercedes still elludes me. I guess we'll see if I can find anything in Finders Keepers this June. Also, dig on this, friends and neighbors What if the wendigo from Pet Sematary is the same kind of demon as Tak. And what if both of these bad boys are from the Prim, that chaotic void referenced in the Dark Tower books? Aw yeah, kids, I think they are. Desperation is a fun ride for about pages before taking a detour into Bible Country for the final pages. If you're cool with that, you'll probably dig this battle between good and evil accessed by way of the loneliest highway in America.
Is that a shotgun shell in your pocket or are you happy to have found Jesus? I won't be rereading The Regulators next. I know it sounds strange, but it's technically NOT a King novel. I have my reasons, and I will explain them eventually. View all 14 comments. Here we have it, folks: Before today, I considered Desperation bottom-of-the-barrel King.
I felt the religiosity was blatant, tasteless; the story derivative of things King had done better before. What can I say, I was able to apprec Here we have it, folks: King gleefully rips and mangles his characters in ways not seen since his early years. What this makes for is a novel that, while sometimes overly pretentious in its theological posturing, is packed to the brim with scene after scene of gleeful, demonic, sexual terror.
This is perhaps the one and only time a King novel reads like Clive Barker, albeit with more doses of Jesus and Americana than Barker has ever gone for. I have to say it, though. Kid suffers from Mother Abagail Syndrome: Like The Dark Half and Firestarter before it, rereading this novel made me appreciate the work and see what it is others see. If one is looking for scares, he or she could do much worse. A creepy rural Nevada cop starts kidnapping innocent travelers!? You know how King can't write an ending? And neither can his son for that matter, file that away for later Usually he can come up with a better name for his 'deus' than God.
The entire second half of Desperation is a pile of proselytizing garbage. Literally every single obstacle encountered in the latter pages is resolved by a character praying. I am so upset. This got two stars for each hundred pages I could stand. Mar 29, TS Chan rated it liked it. This book together with its companion novel, The Regulators penned by Stephen King under his pseudonym Richard Bachmann, are probably two of the scariest books I've ever read.
View all 9 comments. I read it months ago but only just finished its companion novel so I think I'm finally ready to organize my thoughts and write a review of this thing. I know I rated it three stars but that's really only in comparison to King's other work. Because compared with other writers, this book is far better, but compared to a lot of his other novels, it is just on the lower end of the Stephen King spectrum for me.
Which really is too bad because it contains one of the most brilliant evil entities about which I've read. TAK This book is about a group of strangers who find themselves stranded in the Nevada desert in a small town called Desperation. Not just stranded in the desert, but locked up a rinky-dink sheriff's office because the local sheriff, named Collie Entragian, has gone totally berserk. He pulled these strangers over, found some cause to haul them off to the police station, and some of them even had to watch loved ones die in the process.
Desperate to leave with their lives intact, these strangers have to work together to get away from this rogue man of the law who keeps interjecting phrases such as Tak a la, Tak a wan into every day speech and who also seems to be literally falling apart at the seams. Among these strangers are the Carver family: They are later joined by Marinville's road manager, Steve Ames and a hitchhiker he picked up named Cynthia Smith who is also a character in Rose Madder.
These strangers come together to try and figure out why they are the only survivors of whatever happened in Desperation, and why Entragian decided one day to kill everyone in the town. What they discover is a malevolent spirit who has hidden underneath the earth for centuries, waiting to get out and wreak havoc all over the place. Tak is a hard entity to figure out.
At first I kind of thought he was a demon, but that has too much of a mythological or religious aspect to it. Malevolent spirit also doesn't seem to work much. I think what I came to realize was that Tak is basically chaos. A non-corporeal entity whose sole purpose is to inhabit human hosts to create a world of chaos out of a world of order.