I really enjoyed The Shining. I have never read any Stephens King or any horror novels, so this certainly expanded my interests which is good. However, I read it all in one day, which I do not recomend to anyone. I could not sleep because I just kept thinking about it. I think the power of Jack's relationship with his father is so interesting. I thought Wendy's character was a little undeveloped and I wonder if that is because she was written by a man. It made it a little interesting though to be able to be more free in my ideas of what she was like and her thoughts during the whole story. I think with all this talk about the movie I will have to go out and rent it.

Of the books read so far in class I found the Shining to be the most interesting. This was the first Steven King book I have read. I have seen many of the movies made from his books, but the shining is the only book I have read. I want to read more of his books, to see how they differ from the movies, considering the Shining book was different from the movie, but not in so much a bad way. What I liked about the shining was the supernateral part of it, with Danny seeing images. This supernateral was in Beloved,which is one of the reasons I liked it so much, but it was not as much as I would have like to have seen, the Shingin kept more of the supernateral throughout the whole book. The Shining I felt was a great book overall with the supernatural element that it had.

I really disliked The Shining. I think the characters were developed well and the book read quickly, but I really just don't enjoy the type of novels that Steven King writes. I didn't like Wendy's character because she was so weak, and all the sexual imagery and Freudian psych. stuff I didn't appreciate either. But I am really enjoying Bastard Out of Carolina. I hope the ending of this book is a bit happier than the others we've read.

well....i very much enjoyed "the shining". it's a well written novel for sure. i really liked danny's character development throughout the book. interesting to compare it to the movie.....as was said in class, the book was far better than the flick! all of the characters were much more alive--even the hotel was more "alive" in the novel. as it should be, no? i thought the psychological aspect of jack's "breakdown" and danny's "breakthrough" was brilliantly written by mr. king. of all of his novels, i'm starting to think that "the shining" could be my new favorite. :-)

with respect to the new novel we're reading, i'm already falling for it! i love southern based novels and am already enjoying the dialect, the scenes, the scents, and the memories this book is conjouring up for me. (i have a lot of family down south.) great characters so far--all of the extended family and accompanying drama/trauma has been great! mama's obsession with bone's "bastard" title--her love and loss of lyle--granny and aunt alma's stories about bone's daddy---excellent stuff. i truly didn't expect what happened to bone while her mama was in labor with glen's child. i was absolutely horrified!! i know it's just a book, but i was moved. and isn't that what it's all about? being touched/moved/shaken by a book? getting excited about reading a well-written work of fiction is so rare...i embrace it when it happens.

thankfully we've read a whole list of books that i like and love. it's been a challenge to reread these books (like my fave, "the bean trees") and assess/critique them. a whole new light really...being shed on them. i like it. it's difficult--sometimes i would like to just "enjoy" the book without having to analyze and digest it so thoroughly. but, again, isn't that what this is all about? to challenge and teach us how to better critically approach fiction??!?!?!? looking forward a nice warm weekend with my new novel and not much else on my plate. aaahhh....don't you just love spring?

I found The Shining to be dull. I also thought that even though it was to be a horror book full of suspense, I was not at all enertained by it until the end. The Shining was full of good potential. Had the book been more realistic, for example, Jack goes crazy in his mind from flashbacks that keep haunting him because he has nothing other to occupy himself with while at the Overlook. Jack then relates all of those hard memories to his wife Wendy and his son Danny and becomes enraged with anger. Jack then kills them both out of his own created insanity. I enjoy the more real point of view vs. "The underworld". Overall it was a good book, way better than Beloved. Bastard Out of Carolina is disturbing, but sends a real message about families. This book is the second best, next to The Bean Trees.

   The Shining was an awesome novel. I really enjoyed it. Of course being from the state in whihc it takes place certainly adds to the creepyness factor to say the least. I liked the writing style a lot actually, which is a surprising thing considering that overall I am not a big fan of King's writings in general. The concept of whether or not the book was more scary on a pyscological or basic greaky level was interesting to me. I can certainly see where some people might think that it is more psychological. I loved the way that they book was easy to get through and managed to keep my attention the entire way throughout, unlike all the books read prior to it. As for my thoughts on Bastatrd out of Carolina...ummmmm, well, it is very different. Basically I hate it. It is so boring and drab and everything that I hate in a novel. The sibject matter isn't interesting, nor anything that I can relate to. The part in the beginning where they are eating salteen crackers with Katchup on it...ugh, that me cringe. Hopefully once I reach the end the promise of it being a page turner will be revealed to me.

I just finished Bastard Out of Carolina, and although I was disturbed by it, I was also enthralled by the struggles of all the characters. I think out of all the books we have read, this one examines the family in the most deep, profound way. Although the abuse to Bone is horrifying and the plot kept the pages turning, I also feel like this topic has been done over and over. Maybe I'm just jaded because of all the Lifetime movies, but it didn't seem like an original concept. Nervertheless, I still really enjoyed this book, and I loved Bone. I think this was my favorie book out of all the ones that we have read.

I am reading Bastard out of Carolina right now and am very interested in what is happening. I have become more and more interested in studying families as this quarter has gone on and Bastard interests me because their are so many characters that all have their problems and different kinds of relationships with each other. I think the issue of alcoholism among working-class men is interesting, especially since I have a large working-class family with many uncles who like to drink beer, however I wouldn't say they have drinking problems. Of course, the most interesting character is Glen and why he is so screwed up. This book seems to raise the question of to what extent does a parent's treatment of a child affect them as they get older. Is Glen a child molester because his father doesn't live him like he should or just bc he is a pervert. I would go with the latter. Anyway, I think Bastard is a great book bc it seems to make the reader uneasy as they read on hoping that Glen doesn't strike again, or that Bone doesn't have to go back to living with him.

I am part of the way through Bastard out of Carolina and already I love it. I like the writing style of the author and I keep wanting to knwo what happens next. I only read a little bitof The Shining, but for some reason I do not like how King writes. Although it was difficult, I like the challenge of the style of writing in Beloved. It isinteresting to compare the works of different authors on style.

THE SHINING was the first book that i had actually been looking forward to reading, its also one of the only books that i actually enjoyed reading for this class... unfortunately i didn't have the time to finish it, what with my brother coming down the weekend before, and all other things like that... i never got around to finishing it, but as soon as i finish BASTARD OUT OF CAROLINA i plan on going back to THE SHINING.

I think that my favorite part of the book (from what i've read of it so far, that is) is the part where Danny and Dick are sitting in Dick's car talking about 'the shining.' it made me feel good about the story, even though i knew what was going to happen. I thought that the relationship, even if it wasn't really developed too fully, was the best one in the novel.

Right now i'm about half way through BASTARD OUT OF CAROLINA, and while its quite the change in pace, i'm enjoing it much more than i thought i would.

Overall I enjoyed The Shining, but I found myself having a very difficult time getting into it in the beginning. In comparison to We Were the Mulvaneys, I think the description actually helped this book along. I have never seen the movie, but after the discussion in class about how different but yet good the movie was from the book I think I might give it a try. I have just begun reading Bastard Out of Carolina, and so far I am enjoying the change of pace. I am not much of a horror fan, and despite the "family" aspects of The Shining it hasnt turned me on to the horror genre.

I am glad we read the shining in this class and got to discuss it. Normally when people think of the shining they tend to think Stephen King horror novel, or the famous line from the movie 'Here's Johnny!!!'. Most people don't think of the family aspect of the book, and personally i will never read the book or watch the movie quite the same ever again.

Personally I think The Shining was by far the best book selected for this class. The intensity is what kept me reading. What bothered me is the question on whether or not Jack would have gone crazy if he wasn't at Overlook. I think not, because there has to be a certain level of situations that is needed to drive a person crazy. A lot can be tolerated, but the events of Overlook, I think, is enough to make anyone nuts. I think Jack took the job as an escape, time to be with his family, but in the end he ended up alone and crazy. I loved how the hotel came to life, because, in a way I think that the hotel was the biggest character of the novel. This book was the only book so far that kept me wanting to flip the page, which made it a faster read.

In class, the "what-if" discussion concerning Jack Torrance really got me thinking. If they had never gone to the Overlook hotel, would Jack have eventually ended becoming abusive? Now its obvious he wouldn't have ended as badly as he did at the Overlook, but would he eventually have turned his inner troubles and angers on Wendy and Danny regardless of the Overlook? In class I argued that he wouldn't, and I think it's because King was so good at getting me to sympathize with Jack. In the book, I saw him as a man who had indeed made a number of horrible mistakes, the worst of which breaking his son's arm, but throughout the novel he seemed to be regretting that, trying to attone for it. The fact is that King made me want to believe Jack was on the road to improvement, when the big bad Overlook went and screwed things up. Looking more objectively at his character though, I find myself reluctantly agreeing that Jack probably would have lost his temper again somewhere down the road. Regardless of what it would be, something would set him off. I would like to point out, however, that in the TV special of "The Shining," King had a direct influence on the screenplay, and was involved in the making of that movie to be certain it was a more accurate portrayal of his book. In the ending of that movie, Danny is grown up, at his graduation, and fully capapble of handling his shine now. In the back of the audience, as he is taking his diploma, he sees his father, smiling at him, proud of his son, and Danny, not surprised in the least, smiles back. This ending is a bit more final than the ending of the book, and I can't help but think that maybe King had something to do with that ending, giving us his idea of what happens after his book ends.

Ok well in response to why the male characters with the alcohol problem didn't move on to harder drugs seems foolish to me. Yeah drugs are another major issue in American society, but look at the facts.. this is a ballpark figure but I'd say 1 in every 4 or 5 households has an alcoholic in the family. And I can speak from experience that alcohol has a very serious impact on a family. I think what made the shining believable was simply the fact of how disfunctional the Torrance family was, because of Jack's drinking problems and his poor anger management. Now Jack's character made me furious at several points in the book, just do to his reluctance to change. Then above all he regressed all the way back into what he hated the most, which was the portrayal of his own father. As well as it fit into the story, it truly had me worked up.

The Shining was a very complex book with many details like We Were The Mulvaneys but this time the details were great. It took me forever to finish The Shining due to all of the details but it was a page turner. I found myself re-reading certain parts just incase I missed something vital to the end. I have read several of King's books but this one takes the cake.
   I wanted to also comment on something that we discussed in class. Someone had mentioned that this was the first and only male author we are reading this quarter and I thought that was pretty weird. Women and men writers do have a lot of differences and I wondered if anyone thought the same as I do. I think that women definately read more novels by other women rather than men. When I compare the novels I've read from the two sexes, it is hard to find something to connect with in a novel by a male. There are always exceptions but I can understand why the male student in class didn't enjoy the other novels we have read in class.