Cell
Ratings227
Average rating3.4
Hello, guys, the plot of this book is The Stand. Just about exactly. This is why this book did not get five stars from me. It's another of Stephen King's “I've run out of new ideas so I will recycle old ones” books.
However, that aside? It's still a pretty damned good book. Again King's incredible skill for character-building shines brightly; the main character was definitely relatable and his driving need to find his son above all else was heartrending at times.
The idea behind the plot – that cellphones can be used to wipe out the “hard drives” of our brains – is definitely something to put you in a nervous mood around your own phone!
My one qualm with this is that it doesn't actually end – King leaves it up to the reader to decide if good things happen or if bad things happen. I'm such a pessimist that my own choice at the end makes it a depressing book! Haha. Kudos to King for another entertaining read.
I really enjoyed this one. Much more than the zombie story I assumed (which makes an ass out of you and me). The standout aspect was the relationships the main characters made in the nightmare they found themselves in. No deep character developments or story, but a very good and surprisingly touching/heartbreaking (at times) story.
Dragged in some spots, but overall it was very good.
4.5 stars
This is one of King's shorter books although it still comes in at over 500 pages. As I'm sure y'all know by now if you've been following my blog for a while I participate in the #KeeperofKing readalong on Instagram with several other people. We read at least 1 King book a month and I always go into his books blind. Also, his books tend to be hit or miss for me.
Luckily this was one of the ones I ended up really enjoying. You have to suspend disbelief (is that the correct saying) but I loved how it made you think about how much we depend on our cell phones. We are immediately thrown into the action from the get-go, and it never stops. There are twists thrown in I wasn't expecting as well.
I didn't like how it ended but not because it was a bad ending because it wasn't. I think it was a good ending, but I personally hate when we are left with open endings. I don't want to have to imagine all the different scenarios that could have been the outcome. I want to be told exactly what happens. I also feel like we need a sequel because things were exactly explained to my liking. I still didn't really understand what caused this to happen after it ended. If King wrote a follow up book for this one, I would totally read it.
This may be my least favorite SK book I've read. Where to start? OK, the premise is decent. Although the Japanese horror film Pulse had already been out for some time and the American adaptation came out the same year, this one expands on the idea of technology and humanity warring with one another but swaps computers for cell phones. The key difference in Cell is that King comes off as a bitter technophobe. The book begins with a guy who just absolutely hates cell phones. In proper King fashion, a bunch of horrible stuff happens to those connected to the cell grid. I won't spoil anything, but he does a great job of setting the scenery for the rest of the book. From there, the story becomes flimsy nonsense and we're treated to one of the most head-scratching endings in the King-verse.
Quick rundown of the plot:
- Everybody is on their cell phone all the time
- Are zombies still cool?
- Antagonist named The __ Man (quite the SK trope there)
- ?
- Botched ending
One final thought: As with most any book about technology, the reader is treated with an outside-looking-in view of obsolescence 2 years after publishing. It's funny looking back knowing that King was writing about brick phones and not the smart phones of today. It makes me wonder what would happen in the story if everyone was on iPhones and Galaxys. Does the cell network include the Internet, too, or has the signal in Cell become obsolete as well?
It time to look the truth in the eyes. I do enjoy Stephen King's books.
Cell was no exception to that.
I enjoyed this book about an unrelenting terror unleashed through cell phones and how it affects everyone. Clayton's journey to find his son was a riveting read, keeping my interest throughout.
Is it possible to enjoy the way a person writes but not the stories they write? This became interesting to me a little over half-way through with thr mutations, but didn't keep my interest. Well written, but not an interesting story to me. Perhaps I'm not a fan of zombie-type apocolypse stories though as I wasn't a fan of the last few I read either.
This book starts out with a bang and gets really interesting really quickly. Unfortunately, it gets pretty boring about halfway through.
Dirò un'eresia, ma io sono tra quelli che non hanno apprezzato così tanto “IT”, e dunque dico che la parte iniziale e di mezzo di “Cell” mi è piaciuta di più della parte di mezzo e finale di “It”.
Con buona pace di chi a questo punto probabilmente non starà più leggendo questa recensione perchè mi ha dichiarato eretico! A parte gli scherzi questo libro reputato tra i più una prova deludente del Re a me non è dispiaciuta affatto, sarà perchè amo i libri catastrofici e il film “Zombi” di Romero.
Siamo molto più vicini allo splatter che al'horror classico o al filone catastrofico in più punti ma in qualche modo, in certe descrizioni a me ha ricordato quel capolavoro de “L'Ombra dello Scorpione”.
Mi sono piaciuti i personaggi, mi è piaciuta la storia e mi è piaciuto il finale e l'ambientazione. Possiamo sorvolare su alcune misere riflessioni dell'uomo moderno a contatto con la tecnologia attuale che poco si addicono al libro e alla filosofia in se e che sembrano più discorsi del tipo “non ci sono più le stagioni”, da sconosciuti in un ascensore.
A parte questo il tutto scorre molto velocemente e l'idea di un impulso che faccia impazzire in un secondo l'intera umanità al cellulare in quel momento, regredendoli a semplici animali dall'istinto di sopravvivenza molto marcato, è bella anche se probabilmente non originalissima e viene sviluppata in maniera molto efficace all'interno della storia.
Consigliato per un po' di svago a tinte rosse.
I really liked this book, even though I wasn't crazy about how it ended. It's definitely one I could read, and enjoy, again.
This is the first Stephen King book I've managed to finish in a long time. Of course, my all time favorite is The Dark Tower series. Intrigued by the idea of cell phones turing people into zombies, I had to get this one. However, what I thought this was going to be about and what it ended up being are two different things. Yes, this book is about how a single call changed the way people look at communications over a cell phone. But in my head I wanted to see how the world coped in this new zombified world. And King didn't deliver that story. Instead, he turned it into one man's journey to find his son and understand what may or may not have taken hold of him. Even at the end, I found the book a bit open ended for my tastes and didn't leave me with answers to the questions I wanted. I even read this one in a few hours, so it's a quick read too. This book helps boost my goal of reading more fiction than non-fiction.