Stephen King’s Joyland is a wonderful story. Just a wonderful story. That’s really all you need to know. It was a joy to read. So buy it and read it.
Beyond that, it is written in the “old style” manner that made people love Stephen King and his writing. Like The Dome was written in his old style. And that after a desert of too many years of writing that just wasn’t the Stephen King we all came to know and love. (which seriously sucked) So it’s really good to have King back. I missed him.
I don’t know what that was all about. He did have his near-fatal car accident, which I’m sure didn’t help. But I believe his writing was in decline before then. Maybe he was just tired of it all, and he wasn’t “hungry” anymore, and that sort of thing. I can imagine it happens. Something similar happened to Dean Koontz. (who is also coming out of his slump — which was exacerbated by the death of his beloved dog)
Although this story has a “light” paranormal aspect to it, it reminded me of a Robert McCammon story, like Boy’s Life, or Gone South. It’s part of a “Hard Case Crime” ‘series’ of books, so it is really just a crime novel, of sorts, with a little mystery thrown in, which I suppose all crime novels have. I don’t read that genre, so I’m not sure. But I’ve heard about it and can imagine a little.
The story basically takes place in a North Carolina seaside amusement park called Joyland. There are some unsolved murders, and some sleuthing, and some romance, including broken hearts, and youthful (college age) growing up, and life-based stuff, and other stuff like that, all told from an older man’s future looking back perspective. That’s probably more than you need to know.
At $7.00 for the e-book version, it was well-worth the price. There are only a handful of authors for which I will pay that much for an e-book, King being one of them.