Black House (2001)

This being my 54th book by SK, makes me one of em long time readers that SK talks about in his other books. So not one of his best works but not entirely a bad one either. So I had to concentrate reel hard to keep up with what was happening with the story, many re-reads were required as I lost track from time to time, this is not typical of SK books where once you start it is tunnel vision and you are immersed in the world that is created for you and you have to pull yourself out to come up for air so to speak. The start was pretty slow as well, and I wondered whether this was going to be the first SK book that I did not complete/like, reading some of the reviews here I would have not been the first to give up. So I dropped a star as a result of these criticisms. Having said that I pressed on and boy was I glad, as the story opens up and reveals itself, the twists and turns, and the plot draws you in. The character's are well developed and I really enjoyed the relationship between Jack and Henry especially the music references which is always like a hidden mickey and I stop pause lookup the song using my trusty music app which for me further enhances the enjoyment of the book and the telling of the story and I have learned a number of new songs that I enjoyed and will continue to enjoy in future. As a result every time I hear a song from the books it all comes come back like watching a movie in super fast speed, isn't it amazing how the mind and memory works! So should you read this book, well for me due to the investment that I have made in SK books so far its a no brainer but for the casual reader I not sure that the investment in time (+/-26hurs listening) is really worthwhile. Not sure if the story has been made into a series or movie yet but if I was you I would rather watch that. ( )

So glad that's over - real struggle.

Jack sawyer saves Tyler Marshall from Black house, gets shot in the end but survives in the territories. Major hints that he will come back later in the DT series ( )

3.75*
Note: I probably should have read The Talisman first, but didn't realize it was a second in a series until I was at least an hour into listening to the book.

While I enjoyed the combination of the real world and the fantastical elements of Black House, there were still some of those strong Stephen King elements of rambling on about things that aren't moving the plot forward and also end up feeling slightly like an info dump of observations. These are usually things that are observed by a main character, sometimes elements outside of them like nature and sometimes an internal thought process - all of which do nothing to move the plot forward and do little to reveal to us further character development. It's at these times that I wish I were actually reading the physical book versus listening because it's a little difficult easier to skim and skip forward in a book versus skipping forward and trying not to miss the plot when listening. I'm also not sure what I thought about the narration. At first it felt like I was being read a script in a play or movie (almost like listed stage directions), so that took some getting used to. The part of the narration which literally talked to the reader also didn't quite do it for me. There would be times when the books would say things like, "Let's leave these characters here for a while to continue on their journey, while we ride the breeze over to the house at the end of the road." I just couldn't get into that. The flip between third and almost second person doesn't float my boat.

I plan to go back and listen to the The Talisman to find out about some of things I missed which I'm sure others who read the first one would have picked up on. Overall, a solid book, I liked the plot and characters (thankfully there weren't too many to follow like in some King books) but the writing style didn't sit entirely well with me. ( )

I had to stop this one about eighty pages in. I just couldn't get into it. Straub and King seem to have totally forgotten what made The Talisman so magical. There's no magic in Black House, at least not the small portion that I read. ( )

I made it almost 600 pages in. I enjoyed the book up to the point where the authors work very hard to combine the mythology of the Talisman with the mythology of The Dark Tower. Suddenly, we're being handed a lot of very forced gobbledygook and I just got completely completely turned off and realized the book was ruined for me. I couldn't find it in me to go another 200 pages as the spell was broken. Ah well. ( )