This book was no exception for my need to satisfy the feelings of guilt, fear, and sadness that I so desperately crave.  I haven’t always been a big reader, like my parents, I struggled to comprehend what was so great about a book. In addition to my parent’s aversion to books, I inherited my mother’s love of fear and my father’s love of adrenaline and action. As I grew older, I discovered that I really did love reading, and I couldn’t stop. Because I couldn’t stop devouring books, my mother suggested I look into one of the only authors she would read: Stephen King.

“Carrie” takes place in the town of Chamberlain, Maine and follows the story of a girl named Carrietta (Carrie). Carrie is a 17-year-old girl who is abused by her mother and her classmates. Carries classmates (unaware of the extent Carrie’s mother abuses her) torment Carrie for everything she does and even things she has no control over. After a locker room “prank” pulled on Carrie a group of girls are forced to face repercussions and have detention, one student (Chris) refuses to go claiming she shouldn’t have to go to detention because Carrie didn’t know about a period. Due to Chriss’ refusal of detention, she isn’t allowed to go to prom, outraged Chris and her boyfriend Billy begin to plot against Carrie. While Chris plots revenge, Sue Snell decides to try and to fix the damage she has done to Carrie by having her boyfriend Tommy take Carrie to prom.

 

Carrietta White has fallen victim to the dehumanization of those who have snapped under the extreme pressures of both physical and mental abuse by family and peers, in ”Carrie” one of the articles talks about how Carrie has become a symbol or “print on a page.” “They’ve forgotten her, you know. They’ve made her into some kind of symbol and forgotten that she was a human being, as real as you reading this, with hopes and dreams and blah, blah, blah.” (Stephen King’s Carrie pg. 165 paragraph 3).  I love that passage so much because it shows how easily people can become a cautionary tale or a character in a story. Another thing I loved about Carrie was all the perspectives you get to hear from. In this book, you hear from Carrie, (pre-prom and post-prom) Sue, Billy and Chris, and multiple different articles about Carrie and the incident that took place a prom. One of the reasons I really love the change in perspectives for this book is because you get to hear from Chris and Billy and how they plot their revenge on Carrie, you hear from pre-prom Sue and her regrets, post-prom Sue and how the event affected her. Carrie and how she was slowly pushed over the edge and how every action impacted the hate that burned inside her. Different experts from articles trying to rationalize the events that took place, biographies of the survivors, all these small stories put together to make one.

But, because of all the different articles and perspectives throughout the book, articles started to repeat what had been said earlier. At some points, it was ok because it elaborated one new information, but other times it felt like I was reading an essay that requires a certain amount of words, or a certain length so writer decided to repeat the content with somewhat different phrasing and hoping no one notices. Another issue I had was hard to follow transitions and as much as I loved the multiple perspectives, sometimes the transitions felt unclear. A lot of times I will read a book with switching perspectives and it will mark each chapter to tell you who’s speaking, “Carrie” didn’t have chapters, it had headings (occasionally) and parts.

To read more reviews or find out more information on this book look at Goodreads, or Barnes and Noble. In addition, you loved this book you should check out the soundtrack for Carrie The Musical.