Play Book Tag discussion

Mr. Harrigan’s Phone: Craig works for the rich old man and gets him a cell phone. With reluctance Mr Harrigan starts using it. When Mr Harrigan dies, Craig slips it into the coffin to be buried with him. Craig liked Mr Harrigan and finds himself comforted when he can call and her Mr Harrigan’s voice and leave a message. Craig is bullied and calls Mr Harrigan to tell him. It’s not long before the bully is found dead.

The Life of Chuck: It seems the Earth is falling to pieces. But what is this giant ad that keeps popping up – on billboards, even when the tv starts disappearing, there is this ad about Chuck retiring after 39 great years. The story moves back in time to reveal to the reader Chuck’s life.

If It Bleeds: Holly Gibney, a detective character from the Mr. Mercedes books, is our main character. When a school is bombed, she sees it on the news. After dealing with a family issue, she thinks more and more about the bombing and the reporter who first came on tv with the story. Something is a bit off about him…

Rat: Drew is an author and has an idea for a novel. He insists on leaving his wife and kids to head out to his dad’s old cabin in a rural, isolated area, despite that the last time he tried to write a novel, something went very wrong with his mental health. He insists he’ll be ok. Unfortunately, while there, he not only gets sick, a huge storm comes up likely to strand him for at least a few days.

I often rate short stories (though one was closer to a short novel) no higher than 3.5 stars (good), but Stephen King is not only one of my favourite authors, all of his stories can grab me and keep me interested. And these did. I would have rated every one of these, separately, 4 stars… mmmm, maybe “Chuck’s Life” would be 3.5 – I didn’t like it as much as the others. I know many people love Holly Gibney, but when she was first introduced, she drove me nuts! I was ok with her in this story, though.