The King Chronicles: The Bachman Novels

Richard Bachman was almost more than just a pseudonym for Stephen King. According to his foreword, The Importance of Being Bachman, "...the most important thing I can say about Richard Bachman is that he became real." King even concocted anecdotes about whereabouts Bachman lived and how he spent his evenings. Bachman was a headspace where King explored "darker" and grittier story premises outside his albeit already grim catalogue of "King" stories. There was also concern from Signet publishing that King would be accused of publishing ghost-written novels if he kept cranking them out at the rate he had set. Publishing under Bachman alleviated this concern. Ultimately, King was outed in 1985 as Richard Bachman and was quite pissed about it. ...But more on that in a future installment of "The King Chronicles."

Many of these early Bachman novels were actually written while King was quite young--as early as sixteen years-old. These would have been novels that did not make it through the vetting process with publishing houses until after King became a household name they knew would sell. There's an innate unrefined quality to them. Knowing now that these are books penned by King, it's very interesting to see how his writing style grew and developed into what would become his first published book: Carrie. King gets pretty cocky with his pseudonym by the end of Bachman's run. He actually references "Stephen King" on more than one occasion in Thinner! No wonder someone was sure enough in his identity to put in the detective work only a year after its publication.

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Rage - 1976 | (No Rating)

      Holden Caufield... ermm I mean Charlie Decker shoots his teacher and holds The Breakfast Club... I mean his algebra class hostage by gunpoint. The police surround the school and attempt to negotiate with the rogue teenager while Decker holds the most deranged group therapy session the world has ever seen. 

      King penned this story while he himself was a teenager, and the story reflects a lot of the pressure and awkwardness most teenagers experience. It’s clear that King’s ability to steadily ramp up tension throughout the entire story has been present since his early writing days. While I can appreciate how raw and honest the angst and emotions may be for someone in this age group, the book certainly lacks some of the depth of character and plot complexity I’ve come to expect from a King novel. The girls are reduced to virgins or sluts and rated by their desirability thus. Yuck. “Ugly Irma” may be saved from this categorization, but only because the prefix in her title makes her so wholly undesirable to be less than human. I can only be grateful that King does seem to grow in his ability to discuss women, although it takes a few decades to get there. 

     The book was eventually pulled from publication and bookstore shelves by author request following a string of gun violence in schools where the shooters were each found to own a copy of Rage. I absolutely respect this decision, and only read the book myself because I have an old bind up of the “Early Bachman Novels” in which this book is included. I was shocked to find there are hundreds of bootlegs on Etsy where people are selling scans of their copies of “Rage” for people purchase and download. King did not want this book sold in order to limit the odds that it’d end up in the hands of someone ill with violent intentions. I almost did not include Rage in my collection of reviews. Instead I decided to keep it short and sweet and say this: Book banning is evil, but if an author wishes to keep children safe at the sacrifice of royalty checks, maybe you should respect those wishes. 

The Long Walk -1979 | 4 stars

     100 teenage contestants compete in the annual Long Walk for the chance to win the ultimate boon. The grueling trudge lasts until the final boy standing. Those who fall behind or collapse are given three warnings before they meet their demise. Ray Garraty is one of 100 boys competing in this year’s Long Walk in hopes of winning the coveted prize. Can he stay the distance and be the last on his feet, or will he succumb to muscle cramps, sleep, or madness? 

     The best literary decision I’ve ever made was to listen to this audiobook while walking my dog. The relentless fatigue felt by the walkers was palpable in my immersive listening experience. The story begins with such a boyishly hopeful and competitive tone. It’s astounding that though these boys would have witnessed 99 deaths each year, they were each confident that this year’s winner would be himself. There is no pause for meals, injury, or sleep. As the hours and days wear on, the jovial tone takes on a darker twist. The competitive air shifts to frightened camaraderie. The hope turns to “let’s just make it to one more crack in the road… then another”. I don’t know that I’d trust any other author to write a 370 page book chronicling a competitive walk. King nails the atmosphere, the walkers’ emotions, and the readers’ empathy. The Long Walk is a solid volume in King’s backlist, and arguably the best of the Bachman Novels.

     I have not yet watched the 2025 movie adaptation. I really need to get on that…

Roadwork - 1980 | 2 stars

     There’s going to be a new interstate extension in town, and its path runs directly through Bart Dawes’ home and workplace. He must uproot and relocate himself and his wife. The laundry business he manages looks to Dawes to locate a new address. Like any reasonable Midwestern, he will not be taking this blatant insult lying down. He turns his impending homeless and jobless prospects into fuel to single-handedly take down the bureaucracy. 

     Ah, yes the fear of Eminent Domain. That’s one hell of a topic for King to explore in a horror novel. Admittedly, this one had little to no staying power in my mind. It probably would have been punchier as a short story, and likely would have been more memorable as such. I can appreciate the frustration and devastation of being forced out of your home. I love my house, and being paid the “fair value” for it would not pay for all the memories and character in its bones. I wanted to commiserate with Dawes, but the build up to his "snap" was just too drawn out and unreasonable to keep my attention. 

     Dawes responds to his plight by simply... not doing anything. We spend almost 400 pages listening to Dawes narrate how he should house hunt, and how he should put in a bid for a new location for his laundry service. Instead of taking any of these actions, we follow Dawes around buying various tools of destruction, though he “isn’t sure why” he’s acquiring the accoutrement. By the 100th time Dawes complained about how he’d be out of a job, I just wanted to throttle him because he was the only person keeping himself away from a simple solution. It wasn’t just his own livelihood on the brink of collapse. Dawes’ had many people who worked for him to whom he blatantly lied to about their job security. 

     While I was seething with anger at Dawes, I simply felt as though I was trudging to the end like the boys from The Long Walk. When we finally made it to Dawes’ explosive final stand, I was more excited for the confrontation to end than I was for his possible victory. Dawes' narrative voice was frankly exhausting. I could see how King was trying to weave together his trademark web of tension here, but it fell flat for me. 

The Running Man - 1981 | 4 stars

     Set in the year 2025 (the humor of this futuristic setting is not lost on me), Ben Richards signs up to compete on the government-mandated “Free Vee” game shows. His baby is sick, his wife is earning a pittance on her back, Richards is out of a job, and they have no means for medicine or food. The excessively gruesome and dangerous game shows seem to be his last crack at a lucky break. Richards is drafted into the most dangerous game show of all: The Running Man. The goal is very simple. Richards must survive while being tracked down and killed by The Network’s Hunters. He will be awarded $100 dollars for every hour he survives, and a grand prize if he lasts five days–a feat no one has accomplished before. The starving public may be rewarded for reporting any sightings of Richards, leaving him no allies and few safe havens. 

     I couldn’t help but compare this Black Mirror-esque story to The Hunger Games in some ways. Is it the way the government televises cruelty in the name of entertainment, perhaps? Though contestants in The Hunger Games are not competing on a volunteer-basis, you get the same gritty, hungry reality between the Panem districts and the general population in The Running Man.

I really enjoyed this one. On several occasions, I caught myself wondering “How the hell is he going to get out of this?”. There was a piece of me that craved a more in depth explanation of how this dystopian world operates, but it's evident King’s goal was to solely illustrate the experience of the everyday man in this reality not that of the rich and glamorous. I can respect that. 

Thinner - 1984 | 1 star

     For fuck’s sake, I’m dreading talking about this one. I can’t think of any reading experience that has made me even remotely close to how uncomfortable Thinner has made me. I’m going to keep this brief. 

     Lawyer Billy Halleck strikes and kills an old woman with his car. Through disturbing “white boys’ club” connections, he is found not guilty on all counts and walks free. The deceased’s family meets him outside the courthouse and wallops Halleck with a g*psy curse (yes, this is the term used in the book) to be “thinner”. Oh, yeah, did I mention Halleck is grossly overweight (though by modern standards his weight would be only slightly above average.) So we watch Halleck lose weight at a concerning rate as he tries to undo his plight or wither to nothing. 

     I don’t really want to say much more here. What an unhealthy premise for a book. This did not age well. There are a lot of questionable aspects to King’s catalogue, but this entire book is one giant ick factory.