Firestarter

Firestarter (1980) is a fairly early King novel -- the eighth counting ones he wrote under the Bachman pseudonym. I'm not a fanatical Stephen King fan, but after finishing Firestarter I wondered just how many of his books I've read. I found an online checklist, and it turns out I've now read 29 of them, which probably more books than I've read by any other single author. Still, he's written 80 and is at work on more, so I've got a long way to go if I want to catch up.

I've never seen either of the two movie adaptations of this novel, so I went into it not knowing anything other than the fact that it's about a little girl who can start fires with her mind. In the book, this power is call "pyrokinesis." The critic S.T. Joshi claims the correct coinage should be "telepyrosis," but I believe that Joshi's version would mean heartburn from a distance. Pyrokinesis sounds just fine to me anyway since it sounds like you're throwing fire.

Stephen King starts this one with the tried-and-true technique of dropping the reader into the middle of the action. Seven-year-old Charlene (better known as Charlie) McGee and her father, Andy, are on the run from government agents who have killed her mother, Vicky. A pair of agents had already taken Charlie captive by the time the narrative starts, but Andy managed to catch up with them and use his own mental powers to neutralize them. The secretive agency known only as "The Shop" has plenty more agents, though, and they will keep coming until they have Charlie in their clutches.

In flashbacks we learn that Andy and Vicky met in college. The psychology department was running an experiment where a dozen student volunteers would be paid $200 each to take a mild hallucinogenic drug called Lot Six while being monitored. They both could use the money and ended up doing it together to provide each other a little moral support. As it turned out, the experiment was a sketchy operation being run by The Shop, and some of the students who took part died or were mentally impaired afterward. Vicky and Andy experienced what seemed to be telepathy with each other. As a result of the experience, they grew closer, eventually marrying and having a child. Vicky and Andy also each retained weak psychic abilities. Vicky could use telekinesis to move objects, while Andy's ability allowed him to "push" other people into doing what he asked them to do, like a very strong case of post-hypnotic suggestion.

This is where I have to say that I had expected that this would be a story about an adolescent girl slowly discovering her awakening psychic powers and having to learn to control them. While the latter does come into play, the surprise for me was that Charlie had her pyrokinetic ability from infancy. This brought to mind the Superman comics of the 1960s that I read when I was growing up, where Ma and Pa Kent were always amusingly having to deal with and/or hide the fact that their baby could lift the farmhouse off its foundation if he was looking for a lost toy. Raising a baby who could cause random spontaneous combustion events didn't come across nearly as funny as Superbaby's antics, though.

To sum it up, without going into much more detail, I will note that Firestarter falls into three well-defined acts. In the first, Andy and Charlie are desperate and on the run until they are finally captured by The Shop's implacable Native American superagent, Rainbird. In the second act, the two are prisoners of The Shop, where they are drugged into submission. Psychological techniques are used to gain their trust. The Shop wants to understand the extent of Charlie's powers (which she refuses to show them at first) with the idea of perhaps developing a eugenics program using parents who have been doped with Lot Six to produce superpowered mutants. All of this is being done in name of national security, of course. In the third act, Charlie and Andy finally gain some agency of their own and manage turn the tables on their captors. The climax is unputdownably exciting and cathartic. The denouement that follows provides a satisfying sense of closure.

I never read at the beach. I don't even understand why anyone would. But this is a great book to read on an airplane or anywhere else that you want the hours to fly by unnoticed.

As cash-poor grad students, Andy McGee and his future wife Vicky meet while signing up to be participants in a drug experiment for the Psych Department. They think the worst that can happen will be a bad trip. The experiment is more scary and intense than anticipated, and it changes them in subtle ways, giving them subtle, limited telekinetic abilities. The Psych Department was doing the experiments on behalf of a secret branch of U.S. Intelligence knowns as The Shop. Years later, their young daughter Charlie begins to exhibit the ability to set fires with only her mind. This makes her very appealing to The Shop, who has been keeping tabs on the family all along. They intend to capture the Charlie and exploit her powers by whatever means necessary.

I was excited to revisit this book after reading it many years ago - it's a sentimental favorite for me. I saw this movie at a very young age - probably too young but it was the 80's and parents weren't really thinking about what their kids were watching at the time. I remember being fascinated by Charlie McGee. First because Drew Barrymore was already cool as hell, but also because Charlie was a kid who could make things happen, who could do things for herself. And the people who did her wrong, hurt her and her family, she could make them pay. It made a big impression on me. The first time I read the book I was focused on her autonomy and I read the story seeing myself in her shoes. Reading it again, many years later and now a parent, I was much more focused on father Andy McGee. What he went through to protect her, and what he went through when he couldn't protect her, and what it would be like to be in his shoes. I felt so much more tension reading this again as a parent - it's almost unbearable. Andy and Charlie had a really sweet and lovely father-daughter relationship and it broke my heart. I felt his fear as my fear, and I felt his failure as my failure. Isn't that what parenting is all about? Trying your best, failing, and getting back up and trying again?

"The Shop" - the secret government organization behind the experiments that created Charlie- is very effectively scary - omniscient, omnipresent and impossible to evade. Is Andy being paranoid, or is he not paranoid enough? Also, I want to note how scary John Rainbird was on multiple different levels. First he hunts Charlie and Andy with creepy accuracy. He's a psychopathic assassin and being inside his head is terrifying. Then he plays the role of an orderly to gain Charlie's trust and manipulate her, to try to convince her to submit to the tests The Shop wants to conduct. What kind of person would do that to a child? That's lower than low, really. The plot is a long, slow burn, with King turning up the temperature one degree at a time over the course of its chapters. Good, solid, classic King and a great big explosion at the end.

A. Great. Book. To. Read

For a major brain aneurysm survivor I had to work on pretty much everything again. When I saw this Stephen King’s book (plus this year is about “Firestarter” film) I didn’t know if I could read again but I bought one anyway. Surprisingly I could understand what some of the words meant. Sure I understood about 70% of this book, but truthfully I was really happy that just understanding part of the book I could read again :)

Love this book

When you love reading books (at least good ones), you can be pleasantly surprised when one goes beyond your expectations. Many years ago, I saw the 1984 film version of “Firestarter”, and though I do not remember much about it, I was not overenthusiastically looking forward to the novel it was based on. Boy, was I wrong in my expectations as this novel is one I absolutely loved.

Andy McGee and his young daughter Charlie are on the run from a government agency known as the Shop. They want to take Charlie and use her as a weapon due to her pyrokinesis ability that she would rather not use (she refers to it as “the Bad Thing"). To get her to do what they want, manipulative tactics are employed while trying to prevent her from using her ability against them.

Unsure as to how a girl who can mentally produce fire could last the length of a novel without using her weapon against the Shop and ending the story early, Stephen King once again proved his mettle as an incredible writer by reminding us that she was human even though she had an extraordinary power. Essentially the product of a medical experiment gone wrong, Charlie’s ability to create fire is her loss of innocence. She wants to go to school, to stop running, and not to kill. Normal wants, but she is not able to because people in power think they should be able to control her. In that regard, the book makes more than a subtle reference to our human desire to be free, a desire that no government should ever be allowed to quash.

Another great King novel is “Carrie”, and there are noticeable similarities: A child who is not at fault for her abilities (plural as Charlie can do more than start fires), a strangely odd eagerness by the reader for revenge (they are made-up people so I can wish for vengeance on them, right?), and a single parent that drives most of the world view of the child (fortunately, Andy is much more likeable and sane than Margaret White). Even the names Carrie and Charlie are similar.

What is not similar, though, is the climax which is more satisfying than “Carrie”, the villains are stronger and easier to dislike, and it is overall a better read, which really says something about how great this book is. The way King builds the tension is exhilarating, and, as of now, this is his best novel in my opinion. This is a book I did not want to put down and even had to fight sleep once (sleep eventually won that time). Not sure why there was such an overly long conclusion after the climax when the tension was in a steep decline (much like the extended version of “The Stand” which went on too long after the main conflict ended). Brevity is welcome at that point, but the experience before it packed a wallop. A terrific read.

4.5 stars out of 5

Not for me

Pushes and Shoves can be a dangerous thing....as can Fear, Pain and Fire!

FIRESTARTER had me at the get-go with a super intense spring-into-action run as 34 year old Andy McGee and daughter Charlie, 7 flee for their lives with no money and only the clothes on their back.

The story alternates between Andy's past college days bringing to light how a need for an extra $200 bucks brought him to present day terror in search for a way out....a way to survive....a way to keep his daughter safe.

There is no scary or gory KING here, but there are monsters....monsters of the humanoid type who have evil intentions and mask their motives with 'for the good of the many'.

So....don't go into Room 70, stay away from mad Doctors, be wary of crazy Indians....and do not trust THE SHOP.

Another Stephen King winner for me!

(As is the norm, KING added to my shelf with a horror short I can't wait to read entitled "It's a Good Life." by Jerome Bixby, mentions POE's William Wilson again, makes reference to his son Joe Hill's IN THE TALL GRASS (a few times)....and the shop from THE STAND plays a prevalent part here.)

I received the exact copy of the book that's advertised. Book arrived in new condition.

Good book