Back in my younger days I was a dedicated Stephen King fan but I found my interest waning after September 11, 2001. Too much real-life horror kept me from the fictional kind. But recently I couldn’t resist picking up his newest book. 11/22/63 is the story of Jake Epping, a 35 year old English teacher who is given the opportunity to step into the past. His goal is to prevent Lee Harvey Oswald from entering the Texas School Book Depository on that fateful November day. But, as all science fiction readers know, time-travel is never easy.

As a child of the ’60s, and with an interest in the role West Virginia played in the 1960 election, I’ve always been fascinated with JFK and Jackie. And this detail-rich account is surprisingly satisfying. The writing reveals a mature, thoughtful King who obviously did a considerable amount of research to pull this off. At 800-plus pages it is a tome, but I found myself reading every spare minute for two weeks. Is it too long? Yes, but I didn’t want it to end.

I’m going to give Mr. King another chance. If you are looking for a good story that will see you through the cold winter nights, check it out. You won’t be disappointed.

Tags: Stephen King; time travel; Lee Harvey Oswald; JFK

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 11:05 am and is filed under Fiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.