I've wanted to read S. King books for a while now and never knew where to start. So I stumbled on this one. I think I have a S. King over dose now

Carrie and The Shining are classics and are two of my favorite Stephan King books, I could not get into Salem`s lot unfortunately. I feel that Stephan King tried to hard to make it sound like Bram Stokers Dracula. There just wasn't enough to scare me in it besides an entire neighborhood being destroyed by vampires (spoilers). Still all 3 books are a great read and the shining is one of my all time favorites been needing to read it again!!

Carrie:
- I watched the movie back in high school so I was very much anticipating what would happen next in the book. The story was overall good, well written, and matched up with what I remember watching. The only thing I did not enjoy was the format. Some of the different sections were written as if pulled from a newspaper or a different book as there were page numbers with some. While different, this was very confusing to me. I wish there had been explanation around this.

Salem’s lot:
- Overall a very well written story. I didn’t know the book synopsis beforehand, so I was rather disappointed to find out it was about vampires. However, SK did a great job on the characters and reminding the reader who the non-main characters were without going overboard. For someone who has a hard time keeping characters straight, I greatly appreciated this!

The Shining:
- I was a bit unmotivated to finish this book. I think mostly because I was anticipating it to be scary, and also felt it was slow at times with unnecessary parts that weren’t needed. About halfway through, it seemed every other chapter had my heart racing. The last 75-100 pages or so was when the real action happened, but by that point I just wanted to finish the book.


Overall:
After reading these three books, I’m not sure I particularly like SK’s writing style. The way sentences and paragraphs were formatted was a bit confusing at times. However, I can appreciate the amount of detail he goes into, and he definitely has some interesting topics for stories.

A big book with Carrie, Salem's Lot and the Shining. 3 of my all time favourites. I enjoyed reading it though it was a bit much in the end. I think one King book at a time and something different in between is better for your health.

This voluminous hardcover includes Stephen King’s first three novels:
-Carrie (1974)
-’Salem’s Lot (1975)
-The Shining (1977)
Each one just really a masterpiece and treat to read for itself!

In Carrie you are thrown into the world of a teenage girl that has, on top of having a very powerful ability to learn to handle, a more than a bit crazy mother and really tough days in school. What happens when shit hit the fans is simple chaos and destruction. An intense and mind-boggling journey the reader is accompanying Carrie throughout the pages.
Stephen King’s first novel (apart from his two-part self-published “The Star Invaders” ten years before Carrie) is surprisingly written from a young troubled girl’s point of view, yet perfectly believable and realistic – despite the supernatural element to it. As in his later works as well, King is portraying the life in a small town area and the dynamics within nicely – along with the on-goings of the local high school. All together I find it to be a very honest and direct book and in its core and story-telling wonderfully chilling and interesting.

With ’Salem’s Lot Stephen King surprised me with a vampire story. Haven’t read too much about it before starting reading, I wasn’t expecting the “vampires” to be actual “vampires”, but rather something other, slightly different, supernatural. Positively surprised, I may add. Vampires like they should be: classic style, menacing and yet oh so sophisticated!
The character development of the main characters is not only interesting but very convincing, no action seems out of nowhere and really understandable and comprehensible. From the writer, the magnificent boy, the priest, the teacher and the woman who wants to become a famous artist (and falls in love with the writer, by the way) up to the evil enemies the reader knows where they are coming from and why they are going where they are going. Though, as it should be, you’re honestly surprised and shocked about certain turns of events. Of course most importantly: the entire book is absolutely catching!

The Shining is my favorite of the three novels. Written in the seventies it is set around the same time. No cell phones on every person yet, no internet and up in the mountains there is an awful lot of snow in the winter. Enough snow, if the mountain is up high enough, to get snowed in and completely cut off from the rest of civilization – for months. That’s what happens to the Torrance family when father Jack Torrance takes on the job as winter caretaker in the Overlook hotel. From the start Wendy, the wife, and their 5-year old son Danny find something fishy about it. Especially Danny, who has “the shine” starts soon to get all kinds of weird signs about and from the hotel. Are they gonna survive the winter up there?
The story is thrilling and just exciting to follow. The characters are perfectly written and you are compelled by each chapter and eager to find out what happens next, hoping all the best for Danny and his family. It does give you the creeps frequently, which I enjoyed a lot while reading. Sometimes headlines of chapters alone (e.g. “Inside 217”, which is a very significant room right from the start) give you the creeps and a bad gut feeling. Brilliant book!

CARRIE
With a first half that does nothing more than build up to a 100 plus page climax, this is a fantastic first effort that only hints at King's ability to stretch out a tale to its limit and beyond.

'SALEM'S LOT
The updated vampire mythology found in this book is so much better than anything that has come since. Sticking as faithfully as possible to the Dracula mythos, King manages to create a similar world with far more interesting characters and a much darker tone.

THE SHINING
So much better than the movie, and with a much better ending. This book marked King really getting to grips with atmosphere working to be scarier than actual supernatural creatures.

Recommended for readers who have decided to read King for the first time (there are so few of you) or ones who want to finally read the real version of what was put on the screen. There are significant and important differences in the story King told and what moviegoers eventually saw. Of course, Stephen King fans will want to have a copy (or another copy) in their library of horror masterworks.

Currently reading The Shining. Haven't read the other two yet.

I didn't get a chance to finish reading this book before I had to take it back to the library, and considering the fact that it's been languishing on my Currently Reading list since--what, 2008? 2009? Something like that. At any rate, I doubt I'll bother to check it out again so I can finish it. So my rating here is based on the parts of the book that I did finish, which were Carrie and Salems' Lot.

Carrie gets two stars from me. It's an interesting enough little story that I feel is largely allegorical; the chaos and destruction wrought outwardly by Carrie to me represents the anger and the negativity that gets internalized as self-destructive behavior by so many adolescents in similar situations. (Not the telekinetics with mommy issues who flip their shit and kill everybody situation, but the outcasts who just can't seem to catch a break no matter how hard they try situation. Just to be clear.) The problem is that, stylistically, it's obvious this is one of King's freshman efforts. His prose simply doesn't have the same fine-tuning and finesse as his later work, and I didn't particularly care for the narrative device he employed here. I heard somewhere that King added the faux newspaper articles and book excerpts after his editor, or someone, told him the story wasn't long enough to be published as a novel. If that's true, then I wish he had found a better way of lengthening the story, because this method just doesn't work for me. It gives away too much too soon and ruins any suspense or sense of build-up, since you go through the entire book already knowing what's going to happen.

Salems' Lot, on the other hand, only gets one and a half stars. The writing was better, in my opinion, and the story was both sufficiently creepy and intriguing, but unfortunately it seemed like only half a story to me. I was completely dismayed when I got to the end of it, and I actually spent some time investigating whether this was an abridged version of the book for the compilation, because it felt like I had just finished part one of what should have been a two-part novel. I was left wanting and unsatisfied, which displeases me greatly, and I cannot in good conscience give it a higher rating. Salems' Lot is not a novel; Salems' Lot is the set-up of a novel, which requires a lot more elements to make it complete.

So, since Goodreads doesn't allow half-scores, I give this book an adjusted score of three stars for the two-thirds I did finish.

Meh... I love Stephen King books. However, I'm glad I didn't read them back in the 70s (not that I could have), or as my first Stephen King books because I don't think I'd have read more books from him. I know it's his first 3 novels, I'm well aware of that, but, I thought they were simple, not as complete, definately not as scary/bonechilling as some of his later books.

It took me a while to finish this book because I had to take break from the stories. They kind of felt like a chore at times. I still enjoyed them, but something was missing and they definately haven't aged as well as some of the others.

If you are a Stephen King fan, it's definately worth reading them, but don't get your hopes up too much and don't expect them to be his best as they definately aren't. It's also definately worth having in your collection, but that's pretty much it.

I am reviewing one book of the series: THE SHINING

The Overlook Hotel has been a famous resort for over seventy years- and has a history of both good and bad. It is closed for tourists during the winter months, and a caretaker is required to oversee the boiler/heater. Jack Torrance and his family, wife Wendy and son Danny, go there to live in the isolation of the snow, closed off from the outside world by winter’s wrath. The hotel comes alive with its evil past and tries to draw in the Torrance family, and Danny becomes a pawn because of his precognition or The Shining.
This book was, of course, O My God Incredible! I love the details.

Well, I've been on quite the Stephen King reading marathon. I've never read Carrie or Salem's Lot before. I thought they were both excellent. The Shining I would have appreciated more if I'd not seen the movie (multiple times: it's one of my favorites). I read the Shining before and didn't like it for that reason, but this time I enjoyed it a bit more. I'd give Carrie 5 stars, Salem's Lot 5 stars, and The Shining 3 1/2 stars. To be fair, I think this three classic novel 1400 page extravaganza deserves a solid 5 stars.