After finishing “The Shining” I was obviously desperate to find out what happens next so went straight into “Doctor Sleep”.
So, let me say straight away, I loved this! Absolutely loved it. I’m so glad that Stephen King decided to re-visit Danny and let us know how he’s getting on. The book was extremely well written, as you would expect from Stephen King, the plot was extremely gripping and at times I found it hard to stop reading as I was desperate to see what would happen next.
The main plot is set quite some years after “The Shining” with Daniel Torrance now a grown man living in New Hampshire, attending AA meetings and working at a hospice where he uses his shining to help people as they pass on. Before getting to this point King shows us flashes of where Dan has been in the years between the events at the Overlook Hotel and where we now find him in New Hampshire.
One of the questions I had after “The Shining” was whether or not Dan would also turn to alcohol, King gives us the answer to this and we see Dan’s behaviour spiralling out of control with him finally hitting rock bottom. When he arrives in Frazier, New Hampshire something changes and with the help of his new employer, Casey Kingsley, who also becomes his AA sponsor, he gets sober and makes a decent life for himself. This life he has worked hard to get is threatened when he meets Abra Stone, a girl with the strongest shine he has ever seen, and learns of the True Knot, a group of creatures who feed on the life force of kids who shine.
King did a good job of making sure readers were aware of the events of “The Shining” without making it unnecessarily repetitive for people who have already read it. I also like the little nods he puts in for other books that regular readers will spot, this time even including a mention of Charlie Manx, who was the villain in his son, Joe Hill’s, book “NOS4R2”.
I did have one issue with the book and that was the slightly convoluted way that it was decided Dan and Abra needed to be related. I don’t really think this was necessary, he was already happy to help her and it felt a little forced to me. I would also have liked to have seen a little more about how Wendy Torrance coped after the events of “The Shining”. She’s limited to very few mentions.
All in all, another excellent book by King and it was great to see how things turned out for Dan Torrance.
thebookwormery 