Got a brew ready? Today I've got Cell, the 2006 novel by Stephen King for you. My copy is 657 pages, and large print. I read it in two days. Let's get right into it.
Cell opens with a bang. We are given a couple pages with our protagonist Clay, a suddenly successful artist with an estranged wife, just back from selling his first graphic novel. Not owning a cell phone and unable to call his wife until later, he stops at an ice cream truck to for a distraction, when the worst happens. Anyone using a cell phone seems to go insane. There were three women before him in line, and they all sort of… zombify. One of them was just listening to the phone from a step away, and her behavior degenerated the least, to panicked amnesia. The other two began to attack those around them. The older one attacks the ice cream truck driver, while the third young lady rips out the throat of the one that attacked the driver with her teeth. Not being an isolated incident, a normal day on the streets of Boston suddenly turns into a bloodbath as Clay tries to figure out what to do next and how to get back to his son.
Cell is a wild book. The characters are well fleshed out, in that Stephen King style that lets you see the thoughts in flowing slang, fitting age and culture. The protagonists, two middle aged men led by a teenage girl, make their way North through an apocalyptic October New England, discovering the worst about the new occupants of America: psychic, hive-minded zombies with a penchant for soft music and easy consumer goods like Twinkies and potato chips. There's plenty of shocking gore and depravity, drawing from the depths of the human condition.
An interesting thing that I'd like to note is the time period: 2006. The book focuses on cell phones and their hypothetical danger. How much more frightening would this story be, revamped for the modern era, merely 16 years later? Cell phones blew up in availability and functionality. Remember last year when Facebook went down for a day or so, and people were admitted to the hospital for panic attacks? Or perhaps that was the whole point all along, a caution to the masses as the world simultaneously grows and shrinks within our palms?
This was a good book. Not Mr. King's best, but not at all his worst. I would say that I liked it better than Dr. Sleep, despite loving the continuation of the story of the Torrances. It was just more engaging for me.
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