34, NG21, M17, E34

Stephen King, If it Bleeds

Ich hatte den neuen King-Band schon vor einiger Zeit blind vorgestellt und guckte auch jetzt nicht vor dem lesen in die Synopsis. Darum war ich etwas überrascht, dass es sich hier nicht um einen Roman sondern um längere Kurzgeschichten oder, im Fall von der Titelstory, eine Novelle handelte. Und dann noch überraschter, als sich die Titel-Novelle als neue Holly Gibney-Story entpuppte. Die anderen drei Stories hätten mir auch schon gereicht, aber spätestens da hatte ich das Gefühl, es könnte nicht besser kommen. Okay, vielleicht mit noch einer Holly-Story - aber wir wollen mal nicht zu gierig sein...
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Man, talk about your trips down Memory Lane. I saw emails from long ago, photos of my dad from before his hair started to go gray, and IMs back and forth between me and Billy Bogan. No news in them really, just jokes, and illuminating information like I just farted, and incisive questions like Did you do your algebra. We'd been like a couple of kids with Del Monte cans connected by a length of waxed string. Which is what most of our modern communications amount to, when you stop to think of it; chatter for the sake of chatter.
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(aus: Mr Harrigan's Phone)
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"I love you, Mom," Holly says, and ends the call.
Is that true? Yes. It's liking that got lost, and love without liking is like a chain with a manacle at each end. Could she break the chain? Strike off the manacle? Perhaps. She's discussed that possibility with Allie Winters many times, especially after her mother told her - proudly - that she voted for Donald Trump (oough). Will she do it? Not now, maybe never. When Holly was growing up, Charlotte Gibney taught her - patiently, perhaps even with good intentions - that she was thoughtless, helpless, hapless, careless. That she was less. Holly believed that until she met Bill Hodges, who thought she was more. Now she has a life, and it is more often than not a happy one. If she broke with her mother, it would lessen her.
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(aus: If it Bleeds)
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I love Holly. It's as simple as that. She was supposed to be a minor character in 'Mr. Mercedes', no more than a quirky walk-on. Instead, she stole my heart (and almost stole the book). I'm always curious about what she's doing and how she's getting along. When I go back to her, I'm relieved to find she's still taking her Lexapro and still not smoking. I was curious, frankly, about the circumstances that made her what she is, and thought I could explore that a little ... as long as it added to the story, that is. This is Holly's first solo outing, and I hope I did it justice.
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(aus: Author's note)
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(Stephen King, If It Bleeds, 2020)
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