This tale of a young man and his dog entering another world is beautifully thought-provoking and fantastically spellbinding. Stephen King is one of my go-to authors, I can abandon myself to his creations and know that I will have the most fabulous reading experience. I lost my heart to Fairy Tale when reading the synopsis and Stephen King’s own thoughts. He explains that at the beginning of the pandemic he asked himself what could he write that would make him happy, and the result is Fairy Tale. This is a book that explores the reality of our world, and then disappears into another. I loved the ordinariness of the first chapters containing the barest hint and warning of what was to come. It reminded me of the feeling I had when I read The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis for the first time as a child. The enchantment that consumes with a goosebumpy shiver when normal transforms into something else entirely. Charlie is an absolute delight, true and honest, and as for Radar, well, everyone needs a Radar in their life! The concept of good and evil is explored with compassion and thoughtfulness. The fantasy element is as wonderful and dreadful as one would expect, and best left for the reader to discover for themselves. Fairy Tale is an absolute delight, yet another novel by Stephen King that I am more than happy to recommend far and wide, and proclaim as a Liz Pick of the Month and a LoveReading Star Book.
Legendary storyteller Stephen King goes into the deepest well of his imagination in this spellbinding novel about a seventeen-year-old boy who inherits the keys to a parallel world where good and evil are at war, and the stakes could not be higher - for their world or ours.
Charlie Reade looks like a regular high school kid, great at baseball and football, a decent student. But he carries a heavy load. His mom was killed in a hit-and-run accident when he was ten, and grief drove his dad to drink. Charlie learned how to take care of himself - and his dad. Then, when Charlie is seventeen, he meets a dog named Radar and her aging master, Howard Bowditch, a recluse in a big house at the top of a big hill, with a locked shed in the backyard. Sometimes strange sounds emerge from it.
Charlie starts doing jobs for Mr. Bowditch and loses his heart to Radar. Then, when Bowditch dies, he leaves Charlie a cassette tape telling a story no one would believe. What Bowditch knows, and has kept secret all his long life, is that inside the shed is a portal to another world.
King's storytelling in Fairy Tale soars. This is a magnificent and terrifying tale about another world than ours, in which good is pitted against overwhelming evil, and a heroic boy - and his dog - must lead the battle.