Bag of Bones by Stephen King

I got a yellow highlighter to mark my favourite quotes, and at some point, I felt that the entire book would be soaking with the yellow ink.

I was being paid to do what I loved, and there’s no gig on earth better than that; it’s like a licence to steal.

One of the admirable aspects of having a physical book is that the ‘doodle’ side of your creative brain gets activated, at least for a while. Making shapes at the corners of a boring page, annotating with expensive sticky notes, and drawing those flowers whose species is not yet comprehended by botanists. But I am limited. Not that it’s my creativity is limited, but I’m just lazy.

I got a yellow highlighter to mark my favourite quotes, and at some point, I felt that the entire book would be soaking with the yellow ink.

Reading Kindle throughout the past two years had left me bereaved with a couple of lessons to know before I got that doodle brain out while reading physical books. Moreover, when reading Stephen King, you must remember to highlight only the most ‘important’ and ‘necessary’ lines and not everything that feels good to you because you’ll feel better with every line.

The book Bag of Bones is one from the foursome bundle I bought in February 2023 but hadn’t yet read. I still have some books I purchased way past 2 years that I haven’t read. My romantic relationship with Kindle temporarily halted (until I went broke) with finishing The Malazan Book of the Fallen.

You’d already know, by now, that I love Stephen King. The last three books that I read blew my mind. I still haven’t read The Stand or It. But, the moment I was gliding through the first few pages of the Pet Sematary, I knew he would be my favourite storyteller.

Bag of Bones keeps the story simple. That is the biggest pro of the story. A successful writer, who lost his wife due to a brain aneurysm, goes into writer’s block. The stories he wrote earlier to his wife’s death save his ass for the next four years until he runs out of stories to sell and none in his head.

He loses interest in writing and pursuing his career further as a writer, as he already has had his fair share of success with the art. But, a writer, however successful he is, feels an enormous void inside his soul when he realises he cannot write any more. It’s like a big part of his existence getting drained with a small flood that couldn’t even sweep the dry branches of a tree away.

In the pursuit of his desire to lose the block and with the reasons that you’ll find out in the book, he returns to his second house in a different town which was empty for the last four years. Now you’d start getting all the spooks already. However, Stephen King has kept most of these parts simple.

King’s expertise lies majorly in the way he tells a story. He keeps you on the track, allowing you to guess at some parts, but doesn’t give away so much that you start demanding a portion of his brain stay. He pushes you away where you think you got everything clearly, and pulls you back without letting you wear a mask that says, ‘I’m lost, and this writer ditched me’.

In the story, our writer goes to his home ‘Sara Laughs’ where he hears her laugh. And someone else is crying. One would get themselves away from such creepy houses, but our generous protagonist got a girl and her ‘beautiful’ mother to save.

His long-gone wife starts coming into the picture, and the story unfolds itself into the town’s history, darker and more profound, with villains lurking across different timelines.

Now, it’s our protagonist, Mr Noonan’s duty to right all those wrongs and save the town and its kids. Let me limit my spoiling capabilities to this, or Max Devoré will drown me inside the creepy dark lake !!!

Bag of Bones carries a similar vibe to the previous King novel I read, Needful Things, and almost all of his stories seem to be happening simultaneously across neighbouring towns. I nearly jumped out of my revolving chair when I read the name Alan Pangborn at the very end of the epilogue. The multiverse connects, and ‘Derry’ seems to be the epicentre.

Although not so popularly admired by his fans, this book succeeded in giving me chills at some parts, and 730 pages felt like just a hundred. They could as well have felt like fifty pages if not for some parts in the middle.

King uses simple language to immerse us into his American culture, whatever timeline he wants us to get immersed into. Even though one has never visited the country, one feels like an American just by reading these books. That’s a hell lot of talent mastered by few people on this planet. Taking simple storylines and making spine-chilling stories is his unique expertise. Keep it simple- keep it scary as hell !!

Although the instances of grief of the loss of loved ones and the passage of a person through grief are not heart-wrenching as Pet Sematary, the horror side of Bag of Bones wouldn’t fall short in competing with the latter. You would expect that some aspects could be dwelled a little deeper, but you’d not want so many door stoppers on your bookshelf.

I felt Stephen King perfectly finished the book in 730 pages, neither short nor so long.

Guys, I recommend Stephen King on any given day at any time. He is my favourite. But I rate Bag of Bones one star short of five because that is what my brain tells me.

Sometime, heart is not the only thing that speaks and laughs, Sara does too !!