#CastleRock #Readathon ‘It Grows On You’ by Stephen King

The short story, ‘It Grows On You’, is featured in the 1993 collection, ‘Nightmares And Dreamscapes’, stories which, as King says in his introduction, represent re-prints, revisions and updates to stories which have been published elsewhere.

Comprising non-fiction, poetry, a novella (‘Dolan’s Cadillac‘) as well as crossing all sorts of genres, this book is ostensibly King drawing a line under anything worth publishing, and stating that going forward, any collections will be made of new fiction .

‘It Grows On You’ is set in Castle Rock, although an argument can be made for including the tale ‘The Night Flier’ (and even by extension, ‘Popsy’ if you believe that the same creature inhabits both tales) as Richard Dees, the Kolchak-esque reporter who is the central character tracking a supernatural murderer, appears in ‘The Dead Zone’.

Apart from being set in the town, there are lots of outside links to other King fiction which add to the depth of the story-the central motif is one familiar to what King refers to as ‘The Constant Reader’. Old men chewing the cud at a community vantage point-chairs on stoop overlooking a town square, huddled around a stove in the back of a shop- these often pop up serving the purpose of bringing the reader into the narrative, making them a part of the tale and also reflecting on the oral storytelling tradition. As the title of the story states, it grows on you with the telling.

This is the tale of the Newall house, an edifice constructed by an out of towner who remaind a resolute out of towner.

And therein lays his crime which follow him through his lifetime -and beyond.

Joe Newall , factory and land owner, begins to build his family home in 1915,and what is recounted by the various men who chip in during the telling of the house’s history, is a tale of righteous tragedy which blighted his life.

Whether the death of his only child, the death of his proposed dairy herd, then his wife and finally himself was due to bringing his own malign influences into the town, or, his intrinsic darkeness was attracted to the town itself, is left to the reader to decide.

What is clear is that in this 29 page story is that it is a microcosm of what Stephen King does best. And why he sets so much of his work in Castle Rock. His vision of small town life is so well documented, so well realised that I bet, as you were reading it, you could think of a similar house and family in your home town or where you grew up.

I definitely could. Small town born and bred, I could see the transferability of the tale which contains so little truths to it, yet also is a truth of sorts, to pretty much anywhere around the world. People forget, as small town stories expand, that the facts pretty much get lost in the mists of time. The central motif stands-outsider gets his just desserts and with no happy ending. The house Joe starts building grows with each tragedy….and continues to grow with new additions after his death.

Is this supernatural? Is this the plan of a man who wants to overlook a town which was cruel and harsh towards someone who wanted to keep to himself? Is the Newall house expanding every time someone tells the tale of Cora’s mishapen baby,or the deaths that occurred there? No one knows for sure.

”He feels he would like to sermonize on the evil of time and perhaps the evil of certain places,and explain why Castle Rock is now like a dark tooth which is finally ready to fall out.”

The links to other King works are in the names of some of the characters-the Clutterbucks, specifically Andy, appears in several other novels(‘Needful Things’, ‘Lisey’s Story’ and I want to say, ‘The Dark Half’)

Gates Falls Mill appears in a story from ‘Night Shift’, where a college kid trying to earn extra money working in one of Joe’s factories regrets taking on a basement clearing overtime assignment.

And it’s a stretch, but the name ‘Paulson’ appears again in the short story,’The Revelations Of Becka Paulson’, a longer version of which appears in the novel ‘The Tommyknockers’. It may just be conincidence, and I am sure these stories are meant to be read as simply that, short stories, they pass the time and take you away from your current situation, wherever that may be. And Lord knows we need this now more than ever.

It’s been so long since I have read ‘Nightmares and Dreamscapes’,and I am absolutely planning on reading more than a handful of stories from there. The power of a well written short story, in a market place which has blockbusters galore, can never be underestimated.

Especially if you are struggling to read. It seems odd to write about the comfort brought about from reading horror stories , but they really have done the trick today, in keeping real life demons at bay whilst getting me thinking about the small town I live in…

As King himself says, fiction is the truth inside the lie, and ‘It Grows On You’  exemplies it so well.

Links-http://michaelrcollings.blogspot.com/2017/07/stephen-king-nightmares-dreamscapes.html

https://www.tor.com/2013/11/20/the-great-stephen-king-reread-nightmares-a-dreamscapes/

I found this podcast whilst looking for links on the internet and haven’t listened to it yet. Looking forward to though as this is epsisode 95, so there must be a lot to catch up on!

All of what comes before are my own takes immediately after reading the story, so it will be interesting to see how this podcast interescts-or doesn’t!