REVIEW: The Mist (novella) by Stephen King

The Mist is a horror novella originally published in 1980. I bought my copy new.

Review:

A terrible storm hits western Maine, although thankfully the damage to David and Steff Drayton's home is relatively minor. In the aftermath, David decides to go to the supermarket to pick up a few things. His 5-year-old son Billy comes with him, as does his neighbor, Brent Norton. Steff stays home in order to continue working on cleanup.

Immediately after the storm, a thick fog starts rolling in. By the time David is in line at the supermarket, the fog has swallowed up a good portion of the parking lot, making him uneasy. But the true fear doesn't start until a bloodied man stumbles in from outside, and others try to leave. Something is moving around in the fog, and whatever it is is deadly.

I don't think I've ever read this story before, although I remember my dad gave me a full-cast radio play-style audiobook of it years ago, and I freaked myself out by listening to it with headphones on. Some of the sound effects sounded like they were literally happening right outside our apartment building.

Initially, David and the others in the supermarket have no idea what they're dealing with, and several people refuse to believe that there's anything going on at all. The monsters do make an on-page appearance, though, and then part of the issue is figuring out the scope of the problem, as well as dealing with the effect that fear is having on several of the people in the supermarket. Ugh, Mrs. Carmody. I really disliked that woman.

King leaves the ending somewhat open, which is not something I'm generally fond of. That said, this could easily have ended extremely depressingly, and I'm kind of glad he didn't go that route. Things don't look good at all, sure, but there's still a slight thread of hope.

My copy says on both the front and back cover that this edition includes an excerpt from King's Fairy Tale. I don't know if I got some kind of misbound copy, but there's no evidence of any excerpt here. I'm 99.99% sure that all the pages of The Mist are here, though, and that's what really matters to me. I'm just a bit peeved that cover mentions something that isn't there.