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If it Bleeds (2020)


Before reading: We are officially in a new (and the most recent) decade of King. I feel as though the 2010's were fairly strong so I'm excited to see what these newer ones bring. If it Bleeds is a collection of four novellas which I am excited about because I thought it was a short story collection. It consists of two stories that have already been made into movies that I have seen: Mr. Harrigan's Phone and Life of Chuck. I don't know what If it Bleeds is actually about plot-wise but I do know it is the next installment in Holly Gibney's story. The fourth story in this collection, Rat, I know nothing about but we do know that SK loves writing about rats. As is typical, I will give each story their own review as well as the collection as a whole. 

After reading: I think this format is my favorite of King's. This thought kept popping up as I reading, but I was ignoring it because obviously King's novels are his best work. However, when I realized that my favorite King story of all time, The Long Walk, also came from a four-story novella collection, I changed my mind. This was so very good, much like the rest of King's novella collections. If you were to separate out the stories included in all of his collections, I believe a good bit of them would be his best. Additionally, they have made some of his best films. If anyone is sleeping on this format, you are truly missing out on some good stuff. 

Mr. Harrigan's Phone: As I mentioned, I had already seen the movie adaptation of this one. It was very well done and close to the book. I find it interesting that someone decide to make a movie out of it, while reading I never would have thought that it could be made into one. It's a very well-written and engaging story. It reminded me a lot of reading Shawshank, it had similar tone and pacing. Not my favorite, but still a good read.

The Life of Chuck: This story means so much to me. I have watched the movie so many times and absolutely love it. I was so pleasantly surprised at how similar the movie and book were. This is just such a beautiful and unique read. Were it on its own, I think this would be probably one of my favorite King books of all time. It's so good. 

If it Bleeds: This was our first Holly-centric story and I enjoyed it. I was a little surprised that it was basically a sequel to The Outsider. I kind of wish I had re-read that one before this one because some of the details were lost on me. I'm not sure how easy of a read this one would be if you hadn't read any of Holly's previous stories. I think this one could have been released on its own, it was long enough and had all the pieces. I'm excited to see where Holly goes next. 

Rat: This was a shorter one and definitely my least favorite of the four. However, I thought it was a good little story and enjoyed reading it. I also love when King writes characters who are falling into madness, I got excited when the writing started getting wonky. 

We are moving right along and in the final stretch. Up next is the third Hard Case Crime book: Later. 

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