Review: 'Salem's Lot

'Salem's Lot by Stephen King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Ahh there's something cathartic about reading an old-school vamp novel.

Classic, day-hating, blood-sucking, savage vampires. Exactly how I like them.

King goes to great lengths to set the scene early so we learn all about the town and its inhabitants riiiight before evil runs rampant and everyone is picked off slowly. What's the point of offing people we don't care for?

I love reading these old classic King novels because they really do demonstrate why he's so successful. His stories suck you in and give real chills. They make you part of what's happening and this particular story will have you keeping away from windows at night and refusing to enter dark spaces.

There's not really too much I can say that hasn't already been said except that I'm preeeetty sure this story came into being before Star Wars so it was fun to read references to The Force. And I'm not even a Star Wars nerd (My poison is LOTR, just FYI).

I loved the way this terrified me, gave me shudders and shivers and made me think a lot about staying away from the windows. I enjoyed the speed at which everything happened (which seems weird for such a long book that spends so much time talking about the town) and I loved that it felt like a super classy B-Grade horror film only actually brilliantly done. So A-Grade, I guess?

The characters were a lot of fun (I'm not gonna get all feminist over it, it was written in the 70s, after all) and I loved that Mark played such a big part because kids are too often underestimated but I think it was quite honest the way Mark believed the easiest. Kids don't question. They just believe.

(view spoiler)[Also Callahan is the main reason I was driven to read this book because of his part in The Dark Tower series, beginning from Wolves of the Calla. So I loved reading his part but I'm also so grateful for having read that series first because Callahan's ending here is pretty abrupt so it's nice to kinda know what happened to him in the end! Although now it's chronologically messed up for me so I feel like I gotta read that series again. (hide spoiler)]

I feel like I'm rambling a bit here so let me just sum up by saying this is a classic. It's old school King, old school vampires, and it is one heck of a creepy story. Totally lived up to the hype.

Oh! I just wanna add ... (view spoiler)[Barlow's death scene was one of the most epic death scenes I've ever read. All that description ... Even if death the dude was creepy AF. This is why King is the KING, folks. *shudder* (hide spoiler)]

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Reviews of Bonus Content to come

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