Book Review: Duma Key
Rene Rodriguez - The Record - Hackensack, NJ
Jan 28, 2008
"Duma Key" gratifies Stephen King's continuing desire to meld his monsters and boogeymen with more literate, sophisticated narratives.
The book is heavy on character and inner dialogue, and its central protagonist Edgar Freemantle, a wealthy land developer who loses his right arm in an accident and discovers a supernatural new talent for painting is a much more complex character than the heroes and villains who usually populate King's books.
After the accident, which also leaves him with flashes of uncontrollable anger that cost him his marriage, Edgar moves to an undeveloped stretch of beach on Florida's west coast to start his life over. It is there that his new ability begins to manifest itself, an ability that his aged landlady encourages and nurtures.
But as quickly as Edgar becomes a celebrity in the art world, so descend the dark consequences of his gift, with a gradually mounting sense of dread that implies there is a lot more going on in "Duma Key" than anyone suspects.
This immensely satisfying novel, easily King's best in years, succeeds on several layers at once: as an exploration of the nature of creativity, a meditation on loneliness and aging, the unreliable nature of memory and the way in which horror of the full-blown, nightmarish sort can lurk beneath the most placid, peaceful settings.
**
Click below to listen to a clip from the Duma Key audio book written by Stephen King, read by John Slattery, published by Simon & Schuster Audio.
Shop for the Duma Key audio book available from Amazon.
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Copyright 2008 by The Record - Hackensack, NJ
