#Spooktober ‘Revival’ by Stephen King

About the book…

A spectacularly dark and electrifying novel about addiction, religion, music and what might exist on the other side of life.

In a small New England town, in the early 60s, a shadow falls over a small boy playing with his toy soldiers. Jamie Morton looks up to see a striking man, the new minister, Charles Jacobs. Soon they forge a deep bond, based on their fascination with simple experiments in electricity.

Decades later, Jamie is living a nomadic lifestyle of bar-band rock and roll. Now an addict, he sees Jacobs again – a showman on stage, creating dazzling ‘portraits in lightning’ – and their meeting has profound consequences for both men. Their bond becomes a pact beyond even the Devil’s devising, and Jamie discovers that revival has many meanings.

This rich and disturbing novel spans five decades on its way to the most terrifying conclusion Stephen King has ever written. It’s a masterpiece from King, in the great American tradition of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe.

I was planning to keep ‘Revival’ as a ‘wine cellar King’, for those days when there will be no more novels by the master, however, the constant mentioning of Revival by the boys over at The Kingcast has made it a must read this year before it gets completely ruined !

Added to that,I can absolutely recommend the Losers Club podcast, and the Constant Reader podcast who both also add a weight and depth to reading King novels, this one in particular.

It feels like a companion novel, of sorts,to Pet Sematary where the notion of death not being a final end to the journey of a life is also explores.

Jamie’s life over 50 odd years, from the 1950’s to the 1990’s give it a vintage feel to a new King novel,leave it sitting in an uneasy middle ground that can make it difficult on occasion to relate to

The past is important because we readers need to go back to a time when the use of electric powered everything was still relatively new.

This is seen in contrast to Jamie’s father’s business of selling oil to households , a career which is increasingly precarious and very much so at the book’s opening,where an almanac predicted warm winter is forecast.

And when you read it in the context, especially as a Welsh reader whose entire life in the 80’s was dominated by the use of, and closure of the mines, fossil fuels and electricity are being regarded as something we can replace without damaging the planet.

However,in order to exist in the space that we take up om earth,we need to live in symbiosis with nature yet we are constantly taking way more than we need.

So when Reverend Jacobs comes into Jamie’s life at a point where he is looking at his relationship with a larger world,beyond the confines of his family dynamic,we get to read the material that King is so very good at. He excels at looking into the way we adapt as teens to the world around us and the importance of vital relationships within or community.

Into this space steps a young and hip Reverend whose very introduction shows a melding of science and faith with his Electric Jesus diorama, and Jamie is hooked.

Until an unforgivable and unforgettable tragedy permanently separates Jacobs from his family, and, from some extent his faith.

As Jamie witnesses Jacobs falling down moment,and the repercussions of it, he is thrown into doubt about what faith means.

Jacobs, meanwhile,is cast out of the community and sent away, and he spends the majority of the book not only using his scientific methods to try and ‘revive’ his faith, he sets up a travelling sideshow type affair where he holds ‘revival’ sermons that create miracles of healing.

It is this that Jamie remembers when his grown up addictions replace his childhood ones and he becomes again entangled with Jacobs with horrifying consequences.

Revival is described as a book of two halves and I completely agree-you have this beautiful description of a small town boyhood and growth that echoes The Body, and then the experiments to see what can never be unseen in the other half, this otherworldly, Lovecraftian horror that leaves you on the bleakest ending since Pet Semtary.

For what Jacobs is searching for is using electricity in a way that will allow him to answer the unanswered questions which has plagued mankind-is there life after death and is it what we hoped?

But just because you can,doesn’t mean you should and the way he uses one if his followers, the aptly named Mary, to act as a conduit is heartbreakingly unforgettable.

In much the same way as Jamie thought a session with Jacobs could cure his addiction,Jacobs is seeking a short answer to an ancient question. And what he finds is beyond anything his training or his research could ever prepare him for.

Horrifying, grimly satisfying and with a cataclysmic conclusion that left this reader numb for days, the way that loss and grief can push people to do the most insane things is at the heart of Revival.

You can listen to one of my favourite podcasters, Richard Shepherd, discuss it with his guest on the Constant Reader podcast, here.

About the author…

Stephen King is the author of more than fifty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His first crime thriller featuring Bill Hodges, ‘Mr Mercedes’, won the Edgar Award for best novel and was shortlisted for the CWA Gold Dagger Award. Both ‘Mr Mercedes’ and ‘End Of Watch’ received the Goodreads Choice Award for the Best Mystery and Thriller of 2014 and 2016 respectively.

King co-wrote the bestselling novel ‘Sleeping Beauties‘ with his son Owen King, and many of King’s books have been turned into celebrated films and television series including ‘The Shawshank Redemption‘, ‘Gerald’s Game’ and ‘It‘.

King was the recipient of America’s prestigious 2014 National Medal of Arts and the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for distinguished contribution to American Letters. In 2007 he also won the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America. He lives with his wife Tabitha King in Maine

Links-https://www.stephenking.com/

Twitter @StephenKing

@HodderBooks