2. The Regulators

By: "Richard Bachman" (read: Stephen King)

Ok, this is my last King book for a while.


The Regulators is the "companion novel" to Desperation, and as intriguing as that concept sounds (the original novels had covers that made a larger picture when you held them together, it really ends up being more of a gimmick than than anything else.

Its hard to discuss these books without giving away some minor spoilers, so *highlight* to read, or just skip to the next paragraph:

Both stories are about Tak - a kind of 'vampire of the soul', in Desperation, he invades the body of his victims and uses them to wreak havok on the small town which bares the same name as the book. However, he is unable to last long in any given body as they start to decompose. However, in The Regulators, Tak finds that he is able to survive in the body of an autistic boy who has his own supernatural powers.

The books can be read in either order as one is not a sequel to the other. Its more like one is an alternate reality to the other. This idea is *very slightly* touched upon in one of the books, and more dominant a theme in the Dark Tower series.

The problem though, is that there is not a great deal of innovative use of the "alternate reality" idea between these two books. Most of the similarities are superficial (some of the same characters appear, some characters re-appear with slightly different names).
Desperation was a fast paced engageing horror story right from the begining. The Regulators also starts off well, however it quickly becomes a gore-ified version of a twilight zone episode. And by "Twilight Zone", I'm not talking about the Rod Serling classics, I'm talking about the campy 80s remake.

The idea of alternate realities between 'companion novels' is intriguing to me, but not realized to any interesting conclusion in these books. They can easily be read alone and you wouldn't miss much.

I'd recommend Desperation, and if you're des.per.ate for more (hat tip to jarrett's sense of humor), then read on to The Regulators.

1. Desperation

By Stephen King

Like an abused spouse, I return to reading Stephen King as my first book in 2007, so quickly after being so let down by the conclusion of The Dark Tower series. However, Desperation has been on my list for a while. First of all, there are some interesting tie-ins to the DT series. Secondly, Desperation came out with a "companion novel", The Regulators by "Richard Bachman" (SK's alter ego). I'm not sure if that was just a little gimmick or something that will pan out as actually interesting when both are read together (stay tuned for a review of that book as well). Finally, I caught the first 20 minutes or so of the televisonification of the book, and it wasn't that bad at all. In fact, its a pretty good opening;

Soon after passing a road sign for the town of Desperation that has a dead cat hanging from it, Mary and Peter are pulled over by a local cop in the middle of nowhere. The cop finds some of Peter's sister's pot hidden in the trunk, and arrests the couple. Mary and Peter think they're in deep shit, but it turns out that this shit is much deeper and much shittier than it appears.

The begining is indeed, the best part of the book - which isn't to say that the rest of the book is bad. The problem I find with horror books and movies in general is that they're more enjoyable before you really know what is going on. The mystery is the page turner, but then if it drags on to long it becomes tedious. Once the initial mystery/horror is revealed, King builds the tension in the way he does best: blood and guts.

The world that King creates around his Dark Tower universe is indeed intriguing, and there is a certain satisfaction in picking up on the little tie-ins that connect that world to the worlds of his other novels. Even though these novels are enjoyable on their own, the connections give a sense that each book is a piece of a puzzle.