Misery (original 1987; edition 1988)

Another book I read years ago . It took me a bit to get into it, but once you are, it is so scary. You can't stop reading. It made me nervous just reading about this crazy woman and her capture. ( )

Bestselling author Paul Sheldon wakes up one day to find that he's been in a car crash, his legs are shattered and he's the prisoner of Annie Wilkes, his not-quite-stable "Number 1 Fan." And it only gets worse. Much worse.

I'm probably the only person in the world who hasn't seen this movie, so I didn't have much of an idea what to expect. I'm glad I was able to approach it that way. I think it made it so much worse. I mean that in a good way. Because I wasn't waiting to see when this part happened or if that part was actually in the book, I got to just take it as it came. And King kept it coming. I think I was sweating in pain with Paul and tightening up with terror, thinking, "Hurry, Paul! She's coming! SHE'S COMING!" I'm not really exaggerating. I was awfully invested in this.

And that brings us to Annie Wilkes. So, like I said, I haven't seen the movie, but she was Kathy Bates. Or Kathy was Annie. Whichever way. I can only imagine how scary and perfect Bates was in this role. But aside from that, Annie was terrifying. She had such eerily cute little sayings that she would utter as she was doing some unspeakable thing. "Cockadoodie" and "dirty birdie" immediately come to mind. So silly, but so chilling when you've read the book. She has some sort of psych problem that I'm not even going to attempt to diagnose. Whatever it was, as she started to cycle down, my muscles tightened and I started to brace myself for what was coming. It wasn't going to be pretty. And she was going to be frighteningly matter-of-fact about it. Without thinking about it too hard, she just might be one of King's scariest characters for me. That's probably because she's firmly of this world.

If you can handle the violence, I do recommend this. I was scared to death, but that's exactly what I was looking for. ( )

Scared me so much that I couldn't sleep for weeks. ( )

Wonderful and Scary. King works with menacing glee in claustrophobic situations and Annie Wilkes is unforgettable. How many "UMBER WHUNNNN FAYUNNNN"s does King have? ( )

Wonderful and Scary. King works with menacing glee in claustrophobic situations and Annie Wilkes is unforgettable. How many "UMBER WHUNNNN FAYUNNNN"s does King have? ( )