'Salem’s Lot
Author Ben Mears returns to ‘Salem's Lot to write a book about a house that has haunted him since childhood only to find his isolated hometown infested with vampires. While the vampires claim more victims, Mears convinces a small group of believers to combat the undead. )
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6recommend
10mentions
9people
2007–2026years
70% recommend30% neutral
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What Hacker News says
- Which books did you read at least twice? Please give author, title, and how often you have read it.
For me the (probably incomplete list) is:
Connie Willis: Doomsday Book (three times)
Neal Stephenson: Cryptonomicon, Anathem, Quicksilver, The Confusion, The System of the World (twice or three times)
Frank Herbert: Dune (three times)
Tolkien: Lord of the Rings (three times)
Stephen King: Salem's Lot, The Shining, It (three times each)
Stephen King & Peter Straub: The Talisman (twice)
Vernor Vinge: A Deepness in the Sky, A Fire Upon The Deep, Rainbow's End (each twice)
Tracy Kidder: The Soul of a New Machine (twice)
Larry McMurtry: Lonesome Dove (twice)
Ross Thomas: Chinaman's Chance (twice)
William Gibson: Neuromancer, The Peripheral, Agency (each twice)
- The exact same thing happened to me. I re-read The Gunslinger a decade after my first read, and somehow found it even worse.
For a long time I refused to read King, but I've since read Salem's Lot, Pet Sematary and The Shining and all were great.
- I suggest Stephen King as a reintroduction for general audiences (since a lot of people have a hard time vibing with high fantasy, I know I do).
He's not the greatest writer of all time, but he's enjoyable while not feeling like you're reading YA or something age inappropriate. And his classics are classics for a reason.
Can't go wrong with Carrie, The Stand, Misery, The Shining or Salem's Lot.
- > Oh, and use an editor (the human kind, not the digital kind.)
This is so important (IMNSHO). It's fairly obvious, that editors are becoming a "lost art."
My mother was a scientific editor, and she was brutal (she edited some of my work).
It's really hard to find fiction books, that are less than 500 pages.
I read a story about Stephen King. Apparently, he hates being edited (most writers don't like it).
When he was just starting out, he was forced into being edited. I remember reading 'Salem's Lot, back in the 1970s. It was an awesome book (Relatively short, succinct, scary as hell), and made me suddenly become a Stephen King fan.
As he got more and more famous, he started being able to bully his editors, to the point where his work is barely edited at all.
And it shows.
I really can't read him, anymore.
- The example that I use for the importance of an editor, is Stephen King. He is well-known for disliking editors, and, as his fame grew, he didn't need to use them.
Back in the 1970s ('75 or '76, I believe), a friend told me about this awesome book, called 'Salem's Lot. I got it, and read it. It wasn't too long, and was fine for an addlebrained teenager.
It was the first book that I ever read, that made me look under the bed before I went to sleep. After that, I couldn't get enough of Stephen King.
Nowadays, his books are these monster tomes that make excellent doorstops, but I can't bear to read them, anymore. I think the last book that I read, cover-to-cover, of his, was It. While reading that book, I accidentally put my bookmark in the wrong place, and skipped over 100 pages.
I didn't realize that I had done that, until, near the end, something was referenced from those pages.
It was then, that I decided that maybe I finally had had enough of Stephen King.
- The Dark Tower is one of my favorites, probably because King doesn't feel constrained by convention or genre. And if you have read King's other works you will appreciate the connections to his universe throughout, particularly The Stand and Salem's Lot.
Like others have said, the first 2 books are particularly good. But, be warned that the second book deals with a lot of racial and sexual issues, and King does not have a filter. The fourth book is a prequel, and really stands on its own as a novel, but really threw off the rhythm of the series for me. I had a hard time getting into it because I wanted to resume the primary storyline. The ending does come with a warning, but I think it was perfect.
