If It Bleeds
by Stephen King, copyright 2020
Scribner, An Imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Every decade or so, Stephen King likes to put out a collection, usually novellas, sometimes short stories, or a mix of both. So to cap the second decade of the third millennium (Also known as “Mankind’s next-to-last decade”), he has presented us with If It Bleeds, which consists of two novellas, a short novel, and three intertwined short stories.
Mr. Harrigan’s Phone is what, in the hands of a normal writer, be a fairly mundane “voices from beyond the grave” story. The adolescent-going-on-teen protagonist gets a summer job and eventually befriends an old guy up on the hill who, as it turns out, is a happily retired titan of tech industry and a billionaire. He’s also, despite his mode of making money, wary of new fangled devices like cell phones, tablets, and in all likelihood, microwave ovens and color TVs. The kid gives the old boy an Iphone to play with, and lets him discover the world wide web.
Then the old boy kicks the bucket. Nothing unusual about it, but at the open-casket funeral, the kid takes the old guy’s Iphone and chucks it in the casket with him. After all, the old boy wound up loving that phone.
The fun begins when the kid tries calling the phone, just to hear the old boy’s voice one last time on voice mail.
King, in relatively few words, gives both characters full bodied personas, and backs them with an array of memorable side characters. It’s what King does, better than anyone.
The Life of Chuck is three intertwined stories revolving around the life of Charles Krantz, who plays a central role in all three tales, even though in most of the tales, nobody, including the reader, knows who he is or why anyone would care about him. Nonetheless, in a world rapidly falling apart, there are billboards and ads all over the place lauding Chuck and thanking him for 39 great years. Despite the clearly experimental nature of the work, it’s easily approachable and a lot of fun for the reader to unravel.
The final novella, Rat, incorporates three of King’s favorite themes: the tormented writer, bad weather, and contagion. The protagonist is a writer who has had several promising novels flame out on him about sixty thousand words in (in the most recent case, literally. Frustrated, he burned his manuscript—and nearly burned down his house with it). He gets hit by inspiration, a novel, a western so trite Sam Peckinpah couldn’t save it. He decides to write the novel in seclusion, in a Maine cabin out at the end of Shithouse Road. He leaves over the objections of his wife, who figures he’s going to flame out again and do something stupid. He stocks up on gas and goods at “The Big 90”, a clapboard general store at the end of the paved road, stopping to shake hands with the phlegmy old proprietor.
He gets to the cabin, and, in short order, comes down with the flu, gets hit by a massive Nor’easter, and flames out on the book. He’s deep in delirium (even Dr. King’s Cold Remedy can’t help), watching the walls shake from the fury of the storm outside, his fire down to embers along with his soul, when an injured rat comes into his life. The rat, it seems, can help him with his problem. For a price.
The story was written sometime before September 2019, long before the phrase Covid-19 came about, so to answer one obvious question, King wasn’t cashing in on the pandemic. If he wants to do that, he can just release an updated version of The Stand.
Rat makes for a lovely little bit of King tale-telling.
The third story is the novel, and it features one of the most interesting, and real characters King has ever devised—Holly Gibney. She first appeared as the dowdy and withdrawn kid sister of Detective Bill Hodge’s love interest in Mr. Mercedes and King, finding her a fascinating and challenging character, has had her blossom from recurring character to leading character to main protagonist. She got her own first novel in The Outsiders, where she defeated a psychic vampire.
It’s not unusual for sleuths, private or badged, to be neurotic and obsessive. It’s a tradition going back to Sherlock Holmes (in the Sherlock TV series a few years back, Holmes hears a policemen muttering about “letting that bloody psychopath into a crime scene.” He rears up and loftily informs the policeman, “I am not a psychopath. I am a high-functioning sociopath!”). The type of personality hit its peak in the TV series Monk. Holly is a much more nuanced and functional version than the Tony Shalhoub character. In a time when plucky female characters roar “Guurrrlll power!” she is gritty, determined, and very very human. She is, perhaps, King’s most admirable character.
If It Bleeds is a sequel of The Outsiders, and one gets the feeling that is it the doorway to a series of Holly Gibney novels, fighting various protonatural heavies. King makes it clear in the comments that he absolutely loves this particular character.
It’s a lovely little read for those gray pandemic afternoons when reality shows with bossy, bitchy judges have worn thin.