Stephen King from the Start, Part I: Carrie

A reader's journey through the fiction of prolific horror author Stephen King, for better or worse.

note: my copy of carrie by stephen king was gifted to me by vintage books, thanks vintage!

First published over 50 years ago, Carrie is Stephen King’s first novel and it introduced us all to a telekinetic teenage girl in small town Maine who remains part of the cultural conversation today. I am naturally beginning my King journey here!

Before we review, some fun facts:

While Carrie is Stephen King’s first published novel, he wrote three novels before Carrie that were all rejected by publishers*. He actually also thought Carrie was so bad he threw his only manuscript of the book in the trash. It was saved from oblivion by his wife!

And now, the review:

Carrie gives me feelings all across the spectrum of emotion. The most famous scene has to be the opening where we meet Carrie: the shower scene in the girl’s locker room where she gets her period for the first time. She has no idea what is happening to her and she panics. She thinks she is dying.

The lovely girls that are her classmates do not help her or show compassion in any way. They point and laugh at her like they have been pointing and laughing at her for her whole life. They call her names, throw tampons and pads at her, and yell. This is high school bullying extended to its cruelest and anyone would feel sympathy for Carrie. It is deeply uncomfortable to read. The third person narration really allows the reader to understand how much contempt every character has for Carrie, even the adults tasked with her care.

My Feelings Grow Complex:

It is incredibly weird for me to think about a man writing these scenes of teenage girlhood. From the outset the shower scene feels pretty male gaze-y. King describes the girls’ sweat as, “light and eager” and describes the shower scene by writing, “Girls stretched and writhed under the hot water.” It got weirder still when King chose to have Carrie undress before a mirror and examine and describe herself.

I could maybe leave these feelings at the beginning of the book and move on if it weren’t for so much of the story depending on the power Carrie derives from her newly menstruating body. And not just power, but the power to destroy. I wonder about the message. Is it something about the destructive nature of womanhood? Am I reading too much into it?

But again and again, Carrie’s first period is pointed to as the event that sets of her powers. The telekinesis gene, it seems, is only dominant in females. “The telekinetic gene produces female Typhoid Marys capable of destroying almost at will….”

Even when we aren’t in the realm of the supernatural, periods appear to be a problem. The principal at Carrie’s high school who is tasked with disciplining the girls who attacked Carrie and doesn’t want to talk about periods at all reflects, unprompted, that, “maybe there’s some kind of instinct about menstruation that makes women want to snarl.”

But I *get* Carrie:

As weird as it is to think about the writer behind the character, it isn’t hard to understand the motivations behind the character. Carrie feels properly motivated as a character to fight back as she has been abused he whole life. King also nails the meanness of teens and how some bullying isn’t kids being kids but it instead a precursor to further and more extreme violence. This is properly scary and something I hope I see again in his later books.

There are a lot of aspects of Carrie that aren’t done very well but signal the talent Stephen King presumably becomes. The third person narration for example flattens the tone of the entire book. Though we are getting multiple perspectives, everything feels the same. The result: it is hard to feel deeply about any character. There are also sections of news reporting that further remove the reader from the story and in many cases don’t add anything we don’t already know. The news articles are written in the same generic voice that all the characters are written in.

Still, there is something amazingly compelling about this story. Carrie is neglected and bullied when all she wants is even the chance to fit in. Relatable. She is so docile for most of the story the killing-spree at the end almost doesn’t feel real. It is hard to fear Carrie even though she would certainly have been a fearsome sight to behold.

Is she the hero of the story or its villain?

In the end, my feelings remain mixed. My jury is out on Stephen King so far but my journey will continue.

Carrie isn’t the type of story a reader forgets, but I’m eager to move on to the next story Stephen King offered, which is ‘Salem’s Lot. My interest skyrocketed after learning it is King’s offering in the vein of Dracula.