Reviews tagging 'Kidnapping'

Fairy Tale by Stephen King

14 reviews

hannahakins's review

Go to review page

adventurous hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

rissaread's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous emotional hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

this was my first stephen king book and i think it was a nice introduction to his writing and his style.  i loved this book, i love the story and reading everything charlie was going through. i can of course see why people didn’t click with it, not everyone is into fantasy esque books and that’s fine. 

and yes, i can say at some points it felt as though there was unnecessary details or pieces in chapters that were definitely not needed ( like that part in a chapter about the jenny girl charlie knew, kind of unnecessary to me ) some parts did drag and i was like alright get to the point lol but i loved the story! 

i also saw some reviews here of people saying once charlie enters empis it got boring and they liked the beginning better but i completely disagree. the whole point of this story was about the other world, the world under the well and it was so fascinating to me. again, i get it not being everyone’s cup of tea but don’t pick up a book literally called fairy tale and expect a normal story about a teenager and a dog. 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

unicornofblue's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

depmythmoon's review

Go to review page

adventurous challenging emotional hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.75

 “[…] learn to listen so you can listen to learn,” (pg. 413)

“There’s a dark well in everyone, I think, and it never goes dry. But you drink from it at your peril. That water is poison.” (pg. 446)

This was my first Stephen King book (I know I’m behind, please ✋🏾😭), and I really enjoyed his writing style. If I had to relate it to anything I’ve read before, it would be “The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger. It’s that descriptive type of writing that tends to have longer sentences and delve into minor details of something a character mentions. He also uses parenthesis more liberally than any author I’ve read before, which I enjoyed seeing. I’m not exactly sure why some people suggest that this isn’t the Stephen King book to start with. It was a great read in my opinion (if the 5 ⭐️ rating was anything to go off of). If this isn’t considered to be one of his best, I’m just glad that I have many more great works to look forward to.

This story has an overall theme that focuses on morality and how nobody is only good or only evil. We follow the male MC, Charlie Reade, who has a less than squeaky clean past, yet he has such a noble role within the story that juxtaposes that past nicely. He can even recognize that he may not be the textbook definition of a protagonist in a story, but he steps up to the plate anyway. The whole reason he even got into this situation is some twisted sense of obligation that hurt my heart for him while also making me think further about the motives of the good deeds that people choose to do. Anything that makes me slightly question how I view the world and others is guaranteed to stick with me and get a good rating.

Radar, the dog that Charlie goes on this mission to save, was both so adorable and heartbreaking. Seeing how her condition deteriorated as the story continued pulled at the heartstrings. Had I been a pet owner, I know for a fact that this book would have made me shed more than a few tears. So, pet owners, please be careful when going into this story. She’s such a good girl 😭

I will say… the big bad if the story did feel slightly anticlimactic while also being fitting for this tale. It left me torn, but I did love how King was able to tie it all back to multiple points that go all the way back to the beginning of the story. It would have been nice to see a little bit more there, of all places, but we were already pushing like 500+ pages at this point, so I don’t exactly blame him for getting it out the way. 

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

mscalls's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark mysterious tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

ktdakotareads's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No

4.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

tfaison3's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

nyree42's review

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark hopeful mysterious sad tense medium-paced

4.0

My first ever Stephen King. Picked it up due to... you guessed it... the title, since I love fairy tales and fantasies and "other world" stories.
Well, it delivered exactly what I was looking for, and now that I know that a work of Mr. King was quite enjoyable, I will peruse his catalogue to find out if he has written anything else that might be to my taste.

As for my review... the plot of "Fairy Tale" was a bit slow at times; he is quite a verbose author who seems to like to thoroughly flesh out the character's life and the world around them, but that was fine. I still enjoyed all of it, even if sometimes I put the book down for awhile once I'd gotten to one of the more "drawn-out" parts.

It's not a "scary" tale; just creepy when talking about the villains, the evil, and the bad things that happened to people, but it remained "down to earth" and hopeful even in the face of darkness.

I will be hoping that it is adapted into a mini-series! That or two films (need at least two so that important things aren't rushed over). My preference would be a nice, "true-to-the-book" TV mini-series adaptation though. Amazon Prime or HBO, let's do this! (Sorry, can't bet on Netflix, they might ruin it.)

Reading age: would recommend for, at the youngest, age 16 and up. (Note that it contains violence, some gore/death/injury-depictions, frightening/tense situations, some sexual mentions and lewd jokes and swearing, so it's not child-friendly.) 

Since it's about a teenager, there is something that teens would get out of it; yet it's written for adults and with an adult perspective, so if you're in your 20s and up it will probably be more meaningful. I've passed my 20s and it still hit home for me, making me remember what it was like to be an adolescent - although Charlie Reade was a lot more cool than I was at that age.

Expand filter menu Content Warnings

karapillar's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings

topherisswell's review

Go to review page

adventurous dark sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0


Expand filter menu Content Warnings