Duma Key

Back to the world of Stephen King I go with "Duma Key" (611 pages). I love a bargain book from the store! From Goodreads:

"Six months after a crane crushes his pickup truck and his body self-made millionaire Edgar Freemantle launches into a new life. His wife asked for a divorce after he stabbed her with a plastic knife and tried to strangle her one-handed (he lost his arm and for a time his rational brain in the accident). He divides his wealth into four equal parts for his wife, his two daughters, himself and leaves Minnesota for Duma Key, a stunningly beautiful, eerily remote stretch of the Florida coast where he has rented a house. All of the land on Duma Key, and the few houses, are owned by Elizabeth Eastlake, an octogenarian whose tragic and mysterious past unfolds perilously. When Edgar begins to paint, his formidable talent seems to come from someplace outside him, and the paintings, many of them, have a power that cannot be controlled."

I really thought this book was fantastic, especially for something written fairly recently by King. Indeed I didn't want the story to end and I really savored the story, something that doesn't happen often when I read anything. I basically bought the book because it was extremely cheap for a hardcover at Barnes and Noble. Reading the dust cover didn't give me too much confident but a few pages into the read my perception changed. I was immediately lured into Edgar's story of woe and his recuperation living on Duma Key, a story that is winding and methodical with its large volume. As the mystery of Duma Key and its residents slowly unfolded I was drawn in even more. Toward the last one hundred pages or so the novel slipped into King's patented over-kill of goofiness but luckily he never went completely over the cliff (for me the difference between a four star review and a five star review). The conclusion left me satisfied in spite of some of the tragic events and unresolved relationships, but I guess such is life more times than not.

Recommended for fans of King, at some of his better writing lately, as well of fans of light horror and of the supernatural.