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Hearts In Atlantis (平装)
by Stephen King
| Category:
Horror fiction, Bestsellers, Original books |
| Market price: ¥ 108.00
MSL price:
¥ 98.00
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| Stock:
Pre-order item, lead time 3-7 weeks upon payment [ COD term does not apply to pre-order items ] |
MSL rating:
 Good for Gifts |
| MSL Pointer Review:
King's another effort writing about loss of innocence, struggles of conscience, and the Vietnam War. |
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AllReviews |
1 2   | Total 2 pages 15 items |
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Maritza Volmar (MSL quote), Distrito Nacional Dominican Republic
<2007-02-02 00:00>
With a novel as rich, delightful, and fascinating-in one word unputdownable-as this, no matter how hard you try to write a thorough review about it, it's very likely that you will leave something out.
The story begins while the main characters, Bobby Garfield, Carol Gerber and John Sullivan, childhood friends growing up together in a small American town, are eagerly expecting the coming summer vacations, unaware that before the summer is over their lives are going to be changed forever.
Spanning four decades, the novel shows us how, though the eyes of a wide group of characters, directly and indirectly related to Bobby, Carol and John (Sully) and through their own eyes, their lives unfold.
Stephen King's narrative all through the book is at his best. He incorporates supernatural elements using his mastery of the craft and creates characters so humanly natural that they feel to the reader like old college friends. The experiences of the main characers are so well balanced between the quotidian and the extraordiary, that I almost felt this was a true story about real people. The supporting characters are so interesting that one cannot help wanting to meet them face to face and know more about how their lives unfold. The places are so richly and vividly described, and the time periods so pictorially represented through fashions, ideologies, settings, and even music, that you actually feel the richness and evolution of American culture as you read, even if you didn't live through those times.
Of everything this novel has to offer, what I liked the most, without a doubt, is its spectacular, believable, satisfying and sweet ending.
This novel is charming, entertaining, surprising and fun, for both fans and non-fans of Stephen King, and for everyone who enjoys the twists and turns of life and the hidden connections between the lives of strangers. A must read.
--Reviewed by Maritza Volmar
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A reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-02-02 00:00>
I really enjoyed this book especially Low Men in Yellow Coats Which has something to do with the Dark Tower and Blind Willie a story of a Vietnam vet who walks around acting like he's blind to get money. The only story I wouldn't give 5 stars to is the title story Hearts in Atlantis which i thought was kind of boring. Why We're in Vietnam is a good story about Bobby's friend John who is haunted by a woman killed in Vietnam. The last story Heavenly Shades of Night Are Falling was a good story were we find out what happens to Bobby and Carol when they attend John's funeral. In this story King has put believable characters in an unbelievable situation. Great book.
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Eoghain O'Keeffe (MSL quote), Ireland
<2007-02-02 00:00>
Whenever I recommend this book to somebody and they ask me what it's like, I always reply, 'Remember how you felt when you read 'Catcher in the Rye'?' I have only encountered a few books in my life that filled me with so much intense emotion. (A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving is the only other example I can think of right now). King's evocation of childhood friendship and long-ago summers and innocence lost is so rich and deep and real that when I finished this book the only thing I wanted to do was go back to the start and read it all through again. I have read all of Kings books and I think he has succeeded on this level a number of other times... It, The Body, Apt Pupil, etc... but never to this extent. This book is epic in depth and scope and range of characters yet he never loses track of those bittersweet moments that make your spine tingle and push you to the brink of tears. While the first story is undoubtably the best, I don't agree with other reviewers who consider the rest of the book to be 'mediocre'. It's true that older characters can't bring about the same emotions as the eleven year old characters, but they are fascinating nonetheless. This is not only one of my favourite Stephen King books, it's one of my favourite books of all time.
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Richard Kessler (MSL quote), France
<2007-02-02 00:00>
Hearts in Atlantis epitomizes for me that comfortable King writing style that I have loved for years. For King fans like myself, Hearts shows the author's ability of tying together three new stories using reappearing characters and plot lines, and intertwining the story line of another King series - The Dark Tower. The creativity and language - as always - made me feel like I was with an old friend.
Once I started reading Hearts in Atlantis, my usual King problem began. That is, how can I stop everything else in my life so that I don't have to put down the book!
For those of you who love Stephen King, this book can only reinforce your hope that Mr. King's health (physical & mental) return to the before-car-accident state.
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K.Narayanan (MSL quote), India
<2007-02-02 00:00>
Its a personal book. Low men is probably the best story, but it was the title story that really hit me. I'm an Indian, born after the vietnam war and all the things that may make this book significant to US readers, but the title story struck so close to home, the obsession that sweeps through a dorm and leaves a trail of damage, the scholarships at stake, the game that was always going to be the last game, it really took me back, though its been nearly seven years since i left college- so much so that I kept thinking about my college days a week after I finished the book. Any book that can keep me thinking about it for a week afterward, I think, deserves 5 stars. The other stories are good, with probably the exception of "Heavenly Shades of Night are Falling", but thats probably because it was more of an epilogue than a story.
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Stephanie Morrison (MSL quote), USA
<2007-02-02 00:00>
Stephen King has an amazing way with imagery and getting readers hooked with a story. I would particularly recommmend this book to anyone who hasn't read any King in a while. This work represents somewhat of a departure from his past style of shocking gore, and might be a pleasant surprise to those who think they can't stomach Stephen King. This book, like Bag of Bones and The Green Mile, weaves an intricate and thoughtful plot with an undercurrent of the supernatural. Definitely recommended.
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M. Petit-Sumrall (MSL quote), USA
<2007-02-02 00:00>
Born in 1970, I grew up on Stephen King. From the time I was old enough for my own "orange library card" (see the book!) I have seized and gobbled up every King I could get my hands on. I stayed up all night and scared myself silly, reading about frightening other-worldly entities.
Over the last few years, I've seen King move away from the "scary monster" genre into a style that is increasingly philosophical, almost metaphysical; increasingly these stories have a feeling of "This could happen".
"Hearts in Atlantis" is definitely one of these.
From the moment I recognized elements of the Dark Tower creeping in, to the finale that comes around full circle 40 years after the story starts, I was enthralled, lifted to new heights, and plunged back down into the underground tunnels of a runaway mine train. By the time I got to the end, I was breathless. Literally. As I closed the book and slowly put it down, exhaling, I could do nothing else but remain thoughtful. Wanting to pick it up again right away, read it again. That had never happened to me before, with anyone's work.
It took me a while to realize I'd been virtually holding my breath over the last few pages. Even when I scared myself as a child in the middle of the night, reading "Carrie" or "Salem's Lot", that had never happened to me before, either.
I think he must be very proud of this book, for in his own style he is emulating L. Ron Hubbard, a writer who influenced his career by virtue of the admiration King holds for his work. I think he is doing a wonderful job.
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Blake Kleiner (MSL quote), USA
<2007-02-02 00:00>
When I saw the movie adaptation of "Hearts in Atlantis," I knew I had to read the book. What I didn't expect when I picked up the book was to have the movie cover only the first 200 pages, and the differences to be so extensive. The movie is wonderful, the book is a masterpiece. Both exist in completely different worlds of storytelling, yet both bear the same name. Never before have a book and film existed so separately while complimenting each other so greatly. But they do, and while "Hearts in Atlantis" is arguably the best film of 2001, it is also arguably one of Stephen King's best books. From the very first page of every story told, I was sucked in and absorbed into this novel so completely that I would lose track of time and spend hours in a chair, practically immobile. Not many books have done that for me; this one did.
The first story, the one the film is about, discusses the short time period after Bobby Garfield's 11th birthday, and how his life was tossed upside down with the arrival of a friendly stranger named Ted, who we learn has a very special gift. A gift so special that it has him on the run from the "Low Men", and also very contagious through the simple act of touch. The story follows Bobby and his friends Carol Gerber and Sully-John through their youth, but the bulk of the story is about Ted and Bobby, who develop a sort of father-son-best friend repore even as Bobby doubts Ted's sanity. The story comes to a climax in a supernatural meeting that is very intense and scary, and then levels into an ending that sets the tone for the second story, which follows Carol Gerber to the University of Maine in 1966. With the main character in the story being Pete Riley, the story explains the novel's title with more clarity as the third floor lounge of Chamberlain Hall becomes a stomping ground for a bunch of automatons who are obsessed with the game of Hearts. It becomes such an obsession to the people in the dorm that scholarships are revoked, people drop out, and the Vietnam protest finds its way into the realm with a simple "sparrow track" on the jacket of a crutch-wielding activist. But what really drew me into this story (the best one in the book) was the interconnections made as the love story between Carol and Pete develops and climaxes (you'll get the irony in that choice of words when you read the book) with her first participation in a Vietnam protest. The second story is so wonderfully thought out and original that I was upset to see it end. It is brilliant, funny, delightful, lovingly written, and it gives even a youngun like myself a true understanding of the nature of the Vietnam struggle in the US. But it's really only the mid-point. The last three stories are shorter, but no less absorbing. There's Blind Willie, which follows the life of a very minor character in the first story through his routine during the Reagan era, and then Sully-John resurfaces right before one of the most original and unsuspected events I've ever been privy to as a reader. And then we are brought full circle with Bobby Garfield as a middle-aged man returning home.
I was left completely breathless when I turned the last page of this book. If you just looked back on the collection of films that have been based off his works (aside from "Shawshank" and "Green Mile"), you would never suspect such an accomplishment of literary genius from King. But even as an avid reader of King, I was surprised to feel the feelings that he evoked from my soul. "Hearts in Atlantis" is a true masterpiece of all the genres it encompasses in all the stories. This is King at his very best. Please read this soon.
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Sherrie Martin (MSL quote), USA
<2007-02-02 00:00>
It is said that you can't go home again, but reading this book takes you darn close. Though a thin supernatural thread runs through the stories comprising the book, the central theme is rites of passage and coming of age amid the social upheaval of the 60's in the shadow of the specter of the Viet Nam war. The characters are as flesh and bone as any ever created by King. Their stories cover nearly 700 pages and I still wasn't ready for it to end. This is a must-read for those of us who grew up in America in the 60's and have brought with us into the 21st century a social conscience and fond memories of great music, bell bottoms, and "sparrow tracks."
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A reader (MSL quote), USA
<2007-02-02 00:00>
Hearts in Atlantis takes a story that starts in the 1960s and strings it out into many stories that conclude in the present day. All of the characters in Hearts in Atlantis are described in great detail pertaining to the characters personality. Throughout the book the reader is able to logically follow why the character feels or acts the way they do. A good example of this would be in the first story. The reader can easily follow reasons of resentment that the main character harbors toward his mother.
Hearts in Atlantis also vividly depicts the decade. King uses his characters to paint the time. Characters go to peace rallies that turn violent; characters go to college to avoid being drafted and characters flunk out and go to Vietnam. King also uses music as a device to convey the times. Specifically, music was used to convey the 1960s. Most songs mentioned were songs of protest by folk singers but there were also oldies included.
I thought Hearts in Atlantis was a very good book and I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys reading historical fiction. The book is very accurate when it portrays the times from 1960s to the present. The stories, particularly the first and second ones, are enthralling. I could hardly put the book down.
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1 2 | Total 2 pages 15 items |
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