The Shining - Steven King

★★★★☆

The inner monologues and flashbacks are as incessant as ever with King but they are a price worth paying to get so far into these characters' heads. The more you learn about the Torrances, the less their plight at the Overlook feels like simple bad luck. It starts to feel as though they ended up at the hotel because they were so perfectly poised to be its playthings. This sense of inevitability cranks up the dread to the point where animal-shaped garden hedges became something so alien and terrible that I found myself only half-picturing their scenes, convinced that they would notice me if I got too clear a look. And the tunnel! Thinking of that tunnel makes me grateful for my mundane life like nothing else. King doesn't stop twisting the knife with this family that loves each other, even as they hate, and it pays off in a climax that hurts the heart as much as makes it pound.

On Storygraph