Rage is the first of King's Bachman Books and can be very hard to find these days. I happened to have a paperback copy of the Bachman Books that happened to include the prologue of why King chose to write under the pseudoname of Richard Bachman. He basically wanted to see if his writing could make it without having the heavyweight punch of Stephen King on the cover. Unfortunately, a book critic from Washington DC started nosing around when he discovered that this new writer, Richard Bachman, wrote an awful lot like that well known fellow from Bangor.
Rage is an interesting tale that comes off as The Breakfast Club meets Columbine/Sandy Hook/(insert your preferred school shooting here). Charlie Decker is a high school student that is teetering on the edge of sanity. After being suspended for whacking a teacher upside the noggin with a pipe wrench, Charlie comes to school to meet with the principal. After a meeting where the usually mild-mannered Charlie lets the principal know exactly what he thinks of him, he heads to his locker in what would appear to be to clean it out before being sent off to have his head examined by the local shrink. Instead, he sets fire to the contents of the locker and pulls out a pistol to head to his first hour class. He is then confronted by the teacher as to if he has a hall pass and to which Charlie promptly puts a bullet into her head and takes over the class. While holding the class at gunpoint, Charlie and the class go into a kind of Breakfast Club setting where they are first made to tell their secrets and then, after a few confessions, the class begins to want to tell their secrets willingly. This sort of cleansing becomes therapeutical and earns Charlie an odd sort of endearment to many of them.
This story predates Columbine by 25 years or so and would not work in today's age of smart phones, social media, and instant access to knowledge and awareness of school shootings on CNN. However, it works really well when the setting is the late 1970s. Rage is an entertaining and thought provoking tale of one student who got fed up with his parents and teachers. We've all been there and Stephen King showed us a small slice long before the rest of the world caught up.
4.5 bloody school books out of 5
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A while back I had heard that, in the light of all the school shootings, Stephen King had requested to have Rage pulled from publication. Ever since then, I had been on a quest to find a copy and read it. Well, I finally was able to find a copy, and I sat down to give it a read through.The story line is relatively simple: a slightly off-balance high school student, Charlie Decker, snaps one day, kills two teachers, and takes a classroom of students hostage and threatens to start shooting if he doesn't get what he wants. The problem is, there's no clear indication of what he wants except to toy with the police and the administration. Then four hours later, he lets them go. Very anti-climactic.Personally, I don't see why this relatively short novel has been pulled from publication. It's tame compared to what's going on in the world today. And the copy on the cover... "His twisted mind turned a quiet classroom into a dangerous world of terror." You don't get that feeling at all. Well, maybe in the beginning, but eventually you get the idea that these kids are all friends and they know Charlie isn't going to do anything to them. Hell, one girl even leaves the room to go to the bathroom. Instead of making a break for it, which any normal individual would have done found in the same situation, she actually comes back to the room and takes her seat. Reading it, I felt more like I was in an AA meeting or something other 12 Steps program, where each student confesses something about their past or their home life, maybe something they're not too proud of. All very touchy-feely. Well, all the students but one -- Ted Jones. He seems to be the only one reacting poorly to the situation, and he harbors so much anger and hatred for Charlie, yet it's never clear why. Yeah, the guy's a psycho and he's got a gun and anything can set him off so we should all be afraid for our lives, but nobody else seems to feel that way. In fact, they all seem to sympathize with Charlie's situation. Sure, he's a troubled kid, but based on what we've learned about him, nothing in his past prepares us for the situation we find ourselves in. **SPOILER** And unless I'm missing something, it's unclear as to why the students turn on Ted in the end. Maybe he's a scape goat, and by tormenting and traumatizing him, they're really transferring their emotions toward Charlie onto Ted, but the reader doesn't get that feeling. It's also unclear as to why Ted had such a reaction to what the students did. Maybe it was something they said to him, but we're not privy to that.All in all, it was a good book, but hardly the scandalous read I had been expecting, especially after hearing so much about it. But then again, that seems to be the trouble with hype. So much stuff fails to live up to the expectations you have after hearing so much praise for a book or movie. Rating: 3 of 5 stars.
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Top reviews from the United States
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on July 2, 2015
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on January 26, 2019
The story line is relatively simple: a slightly off-balance high school student, Charlie Decker, snaps one day, kills two teachers, and takes a classroom of students hostage and threatens to start shooting if he doesn't get what he wants. The problem is, there's no clear indication of what he wants except to toy with the police and the administration. Then four hours later, he lets them go. Very anti-climactic.
Personally, I don't see why this relatively short novel has been pulled from publication. It's tame compared to what's going on in the world today. And the copy on the cover... "His twisted mind turned a quiet classroom into a dangerous world of terror." You don't get that feeling at all. Well, maybe in the beginning, but eventually you get the idea that these kids are all friends and they know Charlie isn't going to do anything to them. Hell, one girl even leaves the room to go to the bathroom. Instead of making a break for it, which any normal individual would have done found in the same situation, she actually comes back to the room and takes her seat. Reading it, I felt more like I was in an AA meeting or something other 12 Steps program, where each student confesses something about their past or their home life, maybe something they're not too proud of. All very touchy-feely. Well, all the students but one -- Ted Jones. He seems to be the only one reacting poorly to the situation, and he harbors so much anger and hatred for Charlie, yet it's never clear why. Yeah, the guy's a psycho and he's got a gun and anything can set him off so we should all be afraid for our lives, but nobody else seems to feel that way. In fact, they all seem to sympathize with Charlie's situation. Sure, he's a troubled kid, but based on what we've learned about him, nothing in his past prepares us for the situation we find ourselves in. **SPOILER** And unless I'm missing something, it's unclear as to why the students turn on Ted in the end. Maybe he's a scape goat, and by tormenting and traumatizing him, they're really transferring their emotions toward Charlie onto Ted, but the reader doesn't get that feeling. It's also unclear as to why Ted had such a reaction to what the students did. Maybe it was something they said to him, but we're not privy to that.
All in all, it was a good book, but hardly the scandalous read I had been expecting, especially after hearing so much about it. But then again, that seems to be the trouble with hype. So much stuff fails to live up to the expectations you have after hearing so much praise for a book or movie. Rating: 3 of 5 stars.
It's All the Rage
By M. J. Evans on January 26, 2019
A while back I had heard that, in the light of all the school shootings, Stephen King had requested to have Rage pulled from publication. Ever since then, I had been on a quest to find a copy and read it. Well, I finally was able to find a copy, and I sat down to give it a read through.By M. J. Evans on January 26, 2019
The story line is relatively simple: a slightly off-balance high school student, Charlie Decker, snaps one day, kills two teachers, and takes a classroom of students hostage and threatens to start shooting if he doesn't get what he wants. The problem is, there's no clear indication of what he wants except to toy with the police and the administration. Then four hours later, he lets them go. Very anti-climactic.
Personally, I don't see why this relatively short novel has been pulled from publication. It's tame compared to what's going on in the world today. And the copy on the cover... "His twisted mind turned a quiet classroom into a dangerous world of terror." You don't get that feeling at all. Well, maybe in the beginning, but eventually you get the idea that these kids are all friends and they know Charlie isn't going to do anything to them. Hell, one girl even leaves the room to go to the bathroom. Instead of making a break for it, which any normal individual would have done found in the same situation, she actually comes back to the room and takes her seat. Reading it, I felt more like I was in an AA meeting or something other 12 Steps program, where each student confesses something about their past or their home life, maybe something they're not too proud of. All very touchy-feely. Well, all the students but one -- Ted Jones. He seems to be the only one reacting poorly to the situation, and he harbors so much anger and hatred for Charlie, yet it's never clear why. Yeah, the guy's a psycho and he's got a gun and anything can set him off so we should all be afraid for our lives, but nobody else seems to feel that way. In fact, they all seem to sympathize with Charlie's situation. Sure, he's a troubled kid, but based on what we've learned about him, nothing in his past prepares us for the situation we find ourselves in. **SPOILER** And unless I'm missing something, it's unclear as to why the students turn on Ted in the end. Maybe he's a scape goat, and by tormenting and traumatizing him, they're really transferring their emotions toward Charlie onto Ted, but the reader doesn't get that feeling. It's also unclear as to why Ted had such a reaction to what the students did. Maybe it was something they said to him, but we're not privy to that.
All in all, it was a good book, but hardly the scandalous read I had been expecting, especially after hearing so much about it. But then again, that seems to be the trouble with hype. So much stuff fails to live up to the expectations you have after hearing so much praise for a book or movie. Rating: 3 of 5 stars.
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 8, 2017
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 22, 2015
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David Gibbs
I do not speak French sadly.
Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on November 27, 2019
