I didn't love Stephen King's The Shining

 I listened to the audiobook narrated by Campbell Scott who did an excellent job doing so, but I'm talking about the actual content within the book. I'll say that the build up and middle segments do a really good job of painting the Overlook as this foreboding presence that overshadows everything; not just Jack but Wendy, Danny, and Hallorann as well. The worst parts of the novel were Jack's inner monologues which mostly consisted of him remembering his abusive father, his weak willed mother, and the various bad things he's done to people including his son and a student at the school he worked for. 

The major issue with Kings writing is that he goes on tangents and that's where the Kubrick film succeeds in my opinion. You didn't need to know every single thought, memory or feeling that Jack was going through in order to get that the hotel was changing him and manipulating him for its own nefarious purposes. King's novels tend to over explain everything thus losing what makes horror interesting. I had this issue with Christine too which came off as very slap dash in its execution and writing. The third part is where all of this becomes obvious. The set up to Jack's breakdown are decent, but get hampered by constant inner monologues that really lead to nowhere. 

Jacks death is also oddly played off as comedic and when he exclaims "I won!" Before the hotel gets blown up is both lazy writing and very antithetical to tone that King was setting up. Instead of a somber yet hopeful ending, you get an ending that feels out of place and very slap dash instead. The epilogue is much better, but the way the story gets  there is meandering and very lackluster. I think for all intents and purposes I've come to appreciate Kubricks vision for The Shining. The ending is very cold and detached, but it fits the overall narrative about a man driven to insanity by his own failures and personal demons. 

King wants you to identify with Jack and care about his story, but Jack in the book comes off as a jerk who for some reason gets away with it most of the time. His constant use of racial slurs, hateful language towards others, and his sexist attitude towards women make him a wholly unlikable and terrible person who unfortunately gets redeemed in the sequel book Doctor Sleep. Meanwhile I feel like Nicholson while still being wholly unlikable feels more like a real person to me. There are many real life Jack Torrance types who do murder their families or try to. 

As for Wendy in the book she's an idealized trophy that King wants you to know constantly is way above Jack's league. Shelley Duvall on the other hand portrays a woman who's broken. Broken by life, by her husband, and eventually broken by the Overlook Hotel itself. She's not idealized or a bombshell blonde trophy that stands up to Jack. She's a broken woman trying her best to keep herself and her son safe. She fights back in a realistic and frayed manner that resembles real life. I know King lambasted Shelley's portrayal, but I feel like she was the better representation of Wendy compared to the book and mini series. 

Danny. I liked book Danny but he felt genuinely too old mentally for me to believe him as a character. You can explain that the shine made him wiser, but he's still a kid and kids still act like kids when their lives are falling apart. Danny Lloyd did a great job portraying that he was a gifted kid, but still dealt with trauma from his dad and from the Overlook Hotel. He wasn't some superhuman child, he was just a child with a gift that he barely understood and that's exactly how the character should be. 

Hallorann. I think Hallorann was portrayed well in both the book and movie. I liked that he survived in the book too, but again it feels kinda idealized. Jack just hitting him with a Roque mallet and expecting him to not get back up is a dumb idea. While in the movie he ends up getting killed by Jack with an axe and comes back as a spirit that helps Danny in the movie version of Doctor Sleep. Scatman Crothers is excellent as Hallorann in The Shining and Carl Lumbly was also great in Doctor Sleep. 

The Overlook Hotel. I like the ambiguity of Kubrick's story more than just outright saying the hotel is haunted. There's a cold, indifference to everything and everybody that inhabits the Overlook Hotel. I think that fits better than just saying it's ghosts. It leaves people to decide if Jack is just going crazy instead of actually interacting with ghosts. King just throws all of his weight into the supernatural that it loses the reality of the horror happening. 

Something else that works in Kubrick's version is that he lets audience members decide what's going on rather than explaining everything which King does and in the process ruins what could have been a great story. I should have liked the book more, but I feel like it just loses my interests after the second chapter ends and the third act begins.