Cell by Stephen King

Stephen King is one of my favorite writers, even though most people I know think he’s not worth reading. I like his characters, and I like how he writes the normal everyday things into scariness. When I heard he had written another end of the world type book, like one of my top 10 favorite books of all time, The Stand, I had to get it and read it as quickly as possible. I couldn’t even wait for paperback. I liked this book so much that I read it in a few hours over a couple of days.

Clayton Riddell is in Boston where he has just finished selling his comic book idea. He is happy and looking forward to getting home to tell his wife and son. While he is in line to buy an ice cream cone, the woman in front of him answers her cell phone, and then, the whole world around him breaks into hell. Everyone who had a cell phone and used it was hit, and turned into their basic forms of self. They attack at will, without weapons or with. Riddell seeks shelter and groups up with two others, Alice, a teenage girl, and Tom, a middle aged man who was with Riddell at the first attacks. They decide to head to Maine to find out the fate of Riddell’s son and wife. Along the way, they discover more and more about the people affected by the “pulse” and find many “normies” along the way. Problem is, people have reacted to the event in many ways, and some don’t like them much. Everyone is heading north, and for some reason, the crazies want Riddell and his group safely transported into the middle of enemy territory. What will happen to our group of travelers, and will Riddell find his son in one piece? Will he be able to save him?

The only real issue I had with the book is that it, at times, seems to be a retread of The Stand, mostly the passages about survival, walking instead of driving, and some of the secondary “bad people” characters. Two of the guys in particular reminded me of The Kid that Trashcan Man meets up with on the way to Vegas. It was a bit disappointing, but it did make me want to read The Stand again. I still enjoyed the book immensely, anyway.

Cell is more than just a cool zombie, end of the world book. It is the journey of a man to find his salvation and to make amends with the son he left behind. It’s a peek into what we as a people are like after 9/11. What if there was another attack? How would we react? Stephen King just adds an element of the unnatural to bring the idea into the forefront. It’s a good read, albeit a scary one. It made me think twice about answering my cell phone after I read it.

Rating: 4 ½ Purrs