The story is littered with animal and human deaths, and does actually include some long-winded paragraphs detailing “the gushy bits” (King’s wording) of torture in WWII. The boy blackmails the man into narrating grizzly war crime details, which drives both of them into a murderous craze. First there’s the fact that the subject matter is intentionally unpleasant in itself- a teen boy obsessed with the gruesome details of Nazi Germany discovers an elderly Nazi officer hiding with a false identity in his neighborhood. The real rant for me comes with the second story, “Apt Pupil.” I loathed every moment of this, so prepare for some vitriol. “The oath of a convicted murderer may not be worth much, but believe this: I don’t lie.”

Unfortunately this is not particularly surprising to find in King’s older work, but I think it’s important to note whenever it comes up, even (especially) if the rest of the story seems worth reading. There are several racial slurs, some very irreverent (and probably inaccurate) discussions of prison rape and homosexuality, and an uncomfortable denial about racism in prison: one character argues that in prison, every man is a. However, as with quite a lot of King’s work, parts of the piece have aged poorly. The plot, which involves a wrongly convicted prisoner working steadily toward a surprising escape for over a decade, is also fun. I had the benefit of having watched the film adaptation previously, which portrays Morgan Freeman as the narrator I recognized while reading several direct quotes that made it into the film, which made it impossible for me to read this without Freeman’s voice in my mind (and, thanks to a one-time viewing of Evan Almighty many years ago, I now always hear Freeman as the voice of God, which adds a further layer of entertainment). King doesn’t often utilize the first-person point of view, but when he does it brings the story to unique life. First up is “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption,” a compelling first-person narrative of a lucky prison break.

Stephen king different seasons stories