The Dark Half

Stephen King enjoyed publishing under the pseudonym Richard Bachman, until someone figured it out and threatened to expose him. So, SK outed himself and wrote a book loosely based on his experiences.
Thad is a writer living in Maine, married with twins. For years he's written under a pseudonym, and he's about to be exposed, so his agent suggests they beat the guy to the punch and do a whole big media thing about it, which Thad does. He buries "George Stark" in a cemetery, takes pictures for the magazines, and washes his hands of the whole thing.
But then Stark comes to life and starts murdering people. Of course the police think Thad did it, since they have his fingerprints all over the scene of the crimes. I will never, ever forget the show more parasitic twin operation, when I first read that bit as a young teenager it scared the bejeezus out of me. show less

I'd read this as a teenager, then forgot everything. All I remembered was I enjoyed it. This was one of King's best. I can see the idea forming from him trying out his own penname on for size before it was revealed to the world. It's trippy and unusual, and Alan Pangborn has always been a favorite - he was here a lot. Very violent and brutal, but psychologically intriguing.

A late-80s Stephen King novel about an author whose pseudonymous alter-ego/absorbed-in-the-womb evil twin comes to life and goes on a brutal rampage right out of one of his own crime thrillers.

It's a really great premise for a horror novel, and one that hints at some intriguing themes of identity, creativity, and the dark side that may be hidden in good people. Mind you, King doesn't really go into any of those themes in any depth, but I think they're lurking in there, anyway, under all the supernatural weirdness and the gore. Mostly it doesn't tingle the spine the way the best of his stuff does, but the prologue does contain what may be one of the creepiest images he's even written, so I have to give it some points for that. And, as is show more usual for King, it's a very readable book.

On the other hand, while I was more than happy to accept its bizarre-but-fascinating premise, other aspects of it did stretch my suspension of disbelief, including a sheriff getting ridiculously chummy with a guy who's a suspect in his murder investigation, and a whole lot of thoroughly unconvincing dialog. And while, at about 430 pages, this is downright slim compared to some of King's later work, it does drag some in the middle in a way that makes me think it could have been cut down by 50 or even 100 pages and been the better for it. Plus, the resolution is... odd. It's well built-up-to throughout the novel, which is more than you can say for some of King's endings, but it's still odd.

Basically, this is middle-of-the-road King. Definitely not his best, definitely not his worst. show less

Stephen King's 1989 novel The Dark Half presents an intriguing premise wherein author Thad Beaumont, who achieved greater success writing under the name of George Stark, decides to figuratively kill off the pseudonym and write again under his own name, with the Stark's "burial" played out in a People magazine article that garners Thad some good publicity. But the dark and savage Stark, labeled "not a very nice guy" on his mock tombstone, resists, and sets of on a rampage of vicious murders in a quest to write just one more book with Thad under the name of George Stark. With King dedicating The Dark Half to his own pseudonym, Richard Bachman, you can clearly tell that King had a grand time writing this story, clearly drawing on his own show more alter ego for the story's inspiration. The sense of dread builds nicely during the first half of the novel as the mayhem ensues, but midway through, the story begins to bog down with the characters' long and repetitive internal musings, and conversations stretched much too far, needlessly slowing the pace and dampening the tension. Some judicious editing could have sliced sixty or more pages, leaving a much tighter story. show less

between 2.5 and 3. i like the idea of this and even the execution (of the story idea) but was a bit turned off by the quality of the violence. (also a few sexist/sexual comments that felt really out of place, but probably almost 30 years ago wouldn't have been. i just don't usually get that vibe from him.)

i think this is a really fun idea to explore, though, especially for someone who's own pseudonym had just been "killed" a couple of years before (so probably right before he started writing this one). the usual questions follow for this reader, of course; i wonder a little how much of richard bachman was in george stark. i guess very little, but whenever an author writes about writing i get curious.

this is a fun idea to play with, and show more a decent read. i feel like it's not one of his better ones but i also don't have any concrete reasons for saying that, except that it's a little too violent and far fetched for me, even as i enjoy the idea of it. (except i do have one complaint - the fact that thad didn't send liz and the twins away to stay with a friend or a relative, when he knew they would be under threat, it just made no sense. probably king could have come up with some reason to keep them in town with a sentence or two, but he didn't, and thad should have sent them away.) ok and for some reason i just wasn't as compelled to care, which is unusual because of how well he does characterization. he doesn't give us as much here (and it's unusual that we really don't know much about liz) and maybe that's all it is, but i don't think that's it. i think that there just wasn't quite as much tension in the overall story (in parts there were, sure, but i mean in general) as i'm used to. the pacing was still very good, so i was wanting to keep reading all the time, i just wasn't caring quite as much as i'm used to about how it would work out and what would happen. the tension wasn't quite right. otherwise, though, it's good. but that brings it down a bit for me. show less

I have to admit, King's style was a bit hard for me to get into, and he is a bit crude, for lack of a better description. I believe this is the 3rd book I have tried of his, and the first to complete - the other two being "The Stand" and "The Gunslinger". After about midway through this one, he really pulled me into the story, and it went really fast - quite enjoyable.

I think part of my problem is this genre is a bit new to me. I decided to treat it the same way as I do sci-fi or fantasy - just let myself go and treat the outlandish as entirely possible.

Little known literary author Thad Beaumont has a secret: he is also the author of four bestselling gut-bucket crime novels written under the pen-name George Stark. He’s recently gone public and George has symbolically been laid to rest. But George (described by Thad as not a very nice guy) isn’t so ready to lie down and die.

The Dark Half feels like Stephen King’s most personal novel. So many of the plot details follow events from King’s life. It is obviously based at least in part on King's forced outing as Richard Bachman. It was in part dedicated to Bachman, though the character of Thad Beaumont/George Stark seems to be modeled on Donald E. Westlake and his own famous pen name Richard Stark rather than King and his alter ego. show more Still, writing the novel must have been cathartic for him.

You'll notice that all my comments are about interesting connections to the book. What about the book itself? Well, I'm a little more ambivalent there. I loved reading the book for the quality of writing and characterization that King does so well. I remember one scene where George is laying in wait in a soon-to-be-victim's apartment. While waiting he observes that she has all of Beaumont and Stark's books, but is insulted that Thad's books are on a higher shelf than his. Nice little throwaway bits of characterization like this are why King is popular even outside the horror ghetto and the book is full of them.

The story itself is interesting, but something about it felt a little distant to me. Maybe it's because we have a strong hero and a strong villain, but for the most part our hero is not under direct threat from our villain. The first half or so of the novel details George's rampage in New York while Thad is safely tucked away in Maine. The book doesn't feel slow and is not boring by any means. But I do think that maybe there was a certain tension missing.

Things do pick up though and the final section of the novel is incredible. As a whole though, The Dark Half would rank somewhere in the high middle of king's work. Still better than most other horror novels for sure. Just not as good as his best. show less