Summary
Stephen King’s second novel of 2018 is a treat that delivers some old-fashioned tricks. Just not the ones you might have been expecting.
If there’s one thing that Stephen King has perfected in his prolific career, it’s the art of defying expectations. In his latest novella ELEVATION, he turns Constant Readers around by delivering a Halloween release that speaks to the essential goodness inside of us all. It’s like a very special Christmas and Thanksgiving episode all rolled into the joy of some Amazing Stories.
Set in Castle Rock, and probably timed to coincide with the recent release of the King-related TV series of the same name, the basic premise may seem familiar at first. Scott Carey is an ostensibly overweight man who finds himself drastically losing weight at a rapid rate. However, unlike his counterpart in Thinner – the “Richard Bachmann” title this new release necessarily recalls – he never changes size. Scott is just getting lighter, and wonders what will happen when he runs out of weight entirely.
It’s possible to read ELEVATION in a single sitting. Indeed, for an author notorious for his weighty tomes (including last year’s overlong Sleeping Beauties), King delivers what is more akin to a glorified short story. In this sense, it’s just like Gwendy’s Button Box, the other King release from 2017, which is probably why King makes an aside commenting on the events of that book at one point.
Yet while most Constant Readers will rush through this in about an hour or so, grabbing in-universe references and some cheeky allusions to his meta-arcs, there’s far more to be had here than a simple journey into the Twilight Zone. The other half of the plot involves Scott’s new neighbours, Deidre and her wife Missy. They have opened a ‘fine dining experience’ called Holy Frijole in town that the locals aren’t swarming to, but it may have something to do with the conservative attitudes towards same-sex marriages.
It’s all seemingly building to something more sinister, especially given the historically spooky Castle Rock setting, but King continues to subvert our assumptions. Scott barely has a toe in society, with the retired Doctor Bob the only person he can truly call a friend. Scott’s attempts to befriend Deidre and Missy are frequently rebuffed. Yet Scott also acknowledges his only contact with the couple has been to complain about their dogs soiling his lawn.
Which might be one of King’s sharpest pieces of social commentary outside his social media accounts. Rather than simply being a hotbed of rabid dogs, parasitic twins, and mysterious shopkeepers, Castle Rock becomes a microcosm of modern America. Relationships are initially formed around differences, and King could have easily slid into a cynical observation on conservatism. Instead, Scott’s presence literally lightens the objects and people around him. King has reached deep into his Halloween bowl of candy and discovered that it is full of soft-centred confectionaries.
Highlighted by the tiny images at the start of every chapter – from dogs to sketches of a Christmas tree in front of a snowcapped town – this is the closest thing King has done to a storybook fable since Charlie the Choo-Choo. Except without the creepy fear for our lives. In fact, if you were inclined towards punning, you might even say that ELEVATION is…uplifting.
