Last week I came across this book and saw something interesting. 'Stephen King writing as Richard Bachman'. I had seen the book before but had not paid much attention until recently. Did not know it was Stephen King back then. Now I had to read it. Plus the blurb of the story was interesting enough.
An old gypsy woman gets run over by a car driven by Billy. Lawyer Billy, with the right contacts, walks free from the case. The gypsy's father touches Bily and utters a word 'Thinner'. Billy who is an overweight person suddenly starts losing weight. Initially fearing a disease, he soon realises this is a curse. The rest of the book deals with this malady of Billy and his nightmarish journey to search for the gypsy and try to reverse the curse. Does he succeed?
A typical Stephen King outing. The first thing that stands out is the length of the book. Oddly around 300 - 320 pages, Stephen King writes this in his usual style not shying away from making the book lenghtier. Plus the crazy plot line. I love Stephen King's books for the plots like this. The story travels through Billy's perspective and I prefer that better than the multiple perspectives that we read nowadays. The single perspective along with the journey to find the gypsy and what followed was very riveting for me. Lengthy dialogues, a person's inner dialogues which are typical to King's books reflect here as well. The pacing of the book was good except during the middle where I did feel a slight drag for say 10 to 15 pages. Post that, it was an engaging read like before. There were a handful of well-written characters. I particularly liked Billy, "The Hammer" Ginelli and Gina Lemke, the gypsy's granddaughter. Once the character of Ginelli gets involved it is a rollercoaster read. The ending was a bit of a shocker for me. Knowing Stephen King, I expected the ending but I never did expect the characters that got involved to the end.
Initially written as Richard Bachman, the news got leaked that the writer was actually Stephen King and the sales skyrocketed back then. I heard there is a movie based on the same. I would like to check it out sometime even though I know for sure I will prefer the book anytime. King himself plays a role in the movie. To sum it up, this was an engaging read for me except for a hiccup in the middle. Stephen King fans will enjoy this. People who want to read a quirky story plot can go for this book.
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