I first read this book when I was in high school just after I watched the Stanley Kubrick film. This was the first Stephen King book I ever read. I carried it to school for days, sneaking in reading time whenever I could. It started a life-long love of King's books. He's been scaring the crap out of me for several decades now. :)

The story starts out rather mild....a down and out man gets a second chance after losing his job as a teacher at a prep school. A friend helps him get a position as a winter season caretaker for a remote Colorado resort hotel. The road to the Overlook Hotel snows shut in winter....there is no getting in or out after the heavy snows hit. Jack just needs to keep an eye on the boiler that heats the huge hotel and maintain things. He brings his wife and young son with him....and they prepare to hunker down for the winter season. The only problem is that the Overlook has a mind of its own....an intrinsic evilness. Jack's son has The Shining...a strange, precognitive psychic power. He can see snippets of the evil that's coming. He knows his father is about to lose his mind.....

As is usually the case, the book is so much better than the movie. I loved the movie....it was creepy and strange. But, it also changed too much and left portions of the story out. The newer miniseries TV movie version from 1997 follows the book more closely, but I still prefer the story exactly the way King wrote it. I re-read this story so that I could read Doctor Sleep, King's follow up novel to The Shining, published in 2013. Supposedly there will be a movie version of Doctor Sleep coming out in 2020.

I listened to the audio book version of this story. The audio is almost 16 hours long and narrated by Campbell Scott. Scott reads at a nice even pace and is easily understandable. I have partial hearing loss but was easily able to hear and understand this entire book. Nice listening experience!

I enjoyed re-visiting this story. It was my first experience with King's books.....and one of the first adult horror novels I ever read. Loved it just as much this time as I did back then. Great story! ( )

Wasn’t scary like I was expecting.

I kept seeing reviews on how scary this book was and I kept waiting for it to get really scary and it never did for me. I felt like the first 80% of the book was very repetitive in theme and content. I never felt the escalation of tension for the characters. The book appeared to be several small events repeating themselves and then BAM – all hell breaks loose. It is understanding how the Torrance’s didn’t see the climax coming and that may be what the author intended.

The characters are very complex and well fleshed out during the book. Danny’s intelligence is that of someone much older and it doesn’t take the reader long to figure that out along with a good understanding of Wendy’s quiet strength. Jack’s character is probably the most fleshed out one in the book but what I really liked was how the author didn’t really give you any answers or motives to his actions.

I really enjoyed Campbell Scott’s narration. It was very smooth and his transitions between voices were really good. ( )