Blaze: A Novel

Set in Maine. Written from inside the 'hero's' head, this book was more psychological, sympathetic, and political than a simple thriller. The hero is a 300 pound boy with a dent in his head, a soft heart, moments of deadly violence, and a brutal life story full of cruelty and disappointment. A lost

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soul. Reminiscent of Russell Banks in telling the story of poor white folk with emphasis on psychological detail. Politcal commentary at the end is fair enough, and leaves you wanting to strengthen safety nets of community, church, social institutions. Very sweet, sad story.

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This is what they call a trunk novel; meaning it was an old work that was never published. King revisited recently and even warns readers in a forward to the book that it may not be that good. That is the farthest thing from the truth. This is one of my favorite King books. Written under his

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pseudonym, Richard Bachman, this is extremely well told story. It reminds me of Mice and Men mixed with a haunting ghost story. While not the typical King novel, he does his signature deep character exploration and does a superb job of making you love and care about a 2-bit crook and kidnapper.

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Summary: Blaze is a dummy, as George would say. Bu George is dead, or is he? As he lurks in the shadows and deepest parts of Blaze's mind, he helps Blaze pull of the crime of the century, but when things go wrong George disappears. But Blaze is to far into the crime to stop now, plus what's he

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s'posed to say? He pulled off the kidnapping of the richest family in the area with a dead man! So now, in the cold Manhattan woods Blaze runs, with baby Joey in his arms, the police on his tail, and a one million dollar ransom.
Review: A really good book. Kind of feel sorry for Blaze, some.....adult content.

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There is no doubt that this definitely has the feel of a Bachman book. As is true to the normal style of Kings novels attributed to Bachman, this novel is a gritty pared-down version of what you would normally expect from Stephen King. That is in no way saying that the book is bad, to the contrary,

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it was a very well-written and moving story that I thoroughly enjoyed.

The thing that sets the tone of the Bachman entries apart from other works of King is that, while still very detailed and developed, his Bachman books tend to not stray as much from the main plot line into the extraneous details that are prevalent in so many of his other works. These asides are part of what makes a Stephen King book stand apart as a Stephen King book.

Blaze is a very fast paced read. We get some flashbacks into Blaze's past throughout the book, adding some color and flavor to the story. My only problem with the book was the placement of the final flashback. I think it would have served the book better to have it happen before (or even after) the final scene instead of having it right in the middle of the climax. It kind of slowed things down a bit too much at that point in the novel when tension was high and we were getting ready for the big bang.

Other than that, this "trunk novel" is a worthy addition to the King library and I highly recommend it.

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Blaze is an easy read due to his sympathetic character. I liked the flashbacks to his earlier life spaced through the book. The "treat" is the unrelated chapter from King's new book that follows the Blaze conclusion. conclusion

I'm a big Stephen King fan and loved most of his Bachman books (especially The Long Walk), so it was a no-brainer for me to give this book a try, even if it was originally written in 1973.

The book is split into two different story archs which alternate by chapter, the first and main story arch

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follows Blaze a slightly retarded man as he kidnaps a kid. The other arch tells the story of Blaze's youth and explains how he came to be the man he is today.

This isn't King's (or Bachman's) best book. Even though I enjoyed the flashbacks the main story arch fell a bit flat and couldn't develop the necessary tension.

Still it offered an interesting character study of Blaze and showed how different acts can shape a human being.

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Not the best of the Bachman books, but definitely worth reading

This is an absorbing tale. The protagonist, Blaze, is written very well, allowing the reader to both hate him and love him. I wanted him to succeed and to fail. I knew from the start what would happen to Blaze, but until the last page I had to keep fearing and wondering what would happen to the

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baby. The hints at something supernatural were interesting--I wish they could have been explored a bit more.

The short story Memory at the end is intriguing, and I look forward to reading the book it grew into.

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Not a HORRIBLE book by any means - but rather messed up. I miss Bachman style so this was overdue, but not his best.

It wasn't bad. It wasn't great either. Blaze was an incredibly well developed character that was lovable till the bitter end in spite of the fact he'd kidnapped a child. But what about George? What about George! I loved the idea but it never panned all the way out...

A very different Bachman book. This is more of a look at the life of Clayton “Blaze” Blaisdell Jr. than a compelling story. It feels much like Of Mice and Men, as Stephen King describes in the forward. Blaze is a tragic and sympathetic character who swings back and forth between trying to do

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what is right for himself and trying to do what is right for others. He’s the kind of character that sticks with you.

The forward by Stephen King also talks about his process of writing as Bachman – why he used the pen name and how the Bachman books were different from his other stories. Worth a read for any King fan.

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I enjoyed the hell out of this book, tho the ending made me sad. There's also a short story included which is a prequel to his new book Duma Key.

In this book, we get a glimpse into King's writing as he developed. George, dead even from the beginning of the book, is actually a more vivid character than Blaze. Yet it's easy to feel for Blaze as he decides to go ahead with the dream heist George cooked up before he died. He doesn't even do it

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for the money. He does it because, after George is gone, he really doesn't know what else to do.

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It took me just a little over a day to read this one. Excellent story.
Blaze and his friend George had planned an abuction of a wealthy family infant child. George is dead now and Blaze decides he will go through the planned kidnapping by himself. Main problem with Blaze is he is a few bricks shy

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of a load. With the help of his "late friend George" Blaze commits what he thinks is the perfect crime.
It's not the typical Stephen King novel and if your looking for horror you won't find it here. A very sad ending.

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Blaze's conversations with George, two years after George's death, left me wondering if Blaze was communing with a ghost or going insane. The flashbacks to earlier times and friends made for an interesting story. I was torn between wanting to see Blaze caught (but not killed) or finding redemption.

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It was a good novel but not great, not a "Grapes of Wrath" or "Of Mice and Men".

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Blaze by Stephen King is what King calls a ‘trunk novel’. One that was written in the past and left as either unfinished or not good enough to publish. This particular book was written during the high productivity period of his pseudonym Richard Bachman, and the tell tale signs of this are all

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over the book. Thus it is ‘authored’ by Bachman.

The book itself, as King states in his introduction, is composed of bare and to the point writing. Not that this is a bad thing, as I have felt that in King’s more recent works that he has been bogged down some what, either by his own belief that the weighty writing is needed, or simply in his evolving writing style.

I hate the cliche page turner, but simply put, that is what this is. And as I mentioned, because the book is composed in the starker style that I prefer of King’s, the story roars along sweeping you up in it’s ‘Of Mice And Men’ inspired yarn. King’s turn of phrase, in some parts is as always, something to be in awe of, and patches of dark humour lighten up what is really a bleak, wrenching, criminal tale.

King’s works are the popcorn of my reading and after getting a few salty mouthfuls recently, this is him back to his balanced best. Or is it? Remembering that this book was written by a 25 year old King back in the 70’s.

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Blaze, a 384-page novel by Stephen King, is a must read for every bibliophile. It is inconceivable that this novel became a trunk novel; it should have been dusted off and published years ago. In fact, many readers that take up Blaze will agree that the text should have never been stashed away in

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the first place. Blaze is truly a remarkable piece of work: one that a reader has come to expect from King. To think that this book remained hidden away for so many years before Stephen King even thought about publishing the text: the notion seems almost criminal.

Written when King was using the pseudonym Richard Bachman, Blaze is a fast read, and like everything King creates, the novel draws the reader into the text immediately. The reader will have no difficulty when it comes time to suspend disbelief and enter into the fictive dream state; and if the reader pays close attention, they can see what seems like the early beginnings of some of King’s novels following the creation of Blaze. Blaze was written before the novel Carrie, the novel that ultimately launched the writer’s career: a fact revealed in King’s On Writing. King himself confesses that he has edited the text extensively before publishing it, so the fragments of King’s work may be inserted as hindsight, or the recognizable elements may be the first seeds of what King would eventually write. Either way, Blaze becomes a work that is easily weaved into the broad and mystifying fictional universe that King has spent his entire career creating.

Stephen King sensitizes the reader to the trials and tribulations endured by Clayton Blaisdell Jr., a.k.a Blaze, by humanizing him despite his criminal undertakings. The reader is therefore forced to struggle with his or her moral compass when attempting to identify with Blaze’s character. Blaze, a not-so-wise small time criminal with a Goliath-sized physique (which far outweighs his mental abilities: big body, little brains), attempts to retire from his criminal career by taking one last big gig: he kidnaps a child with the attempt to get enough ransom money so that he can live out his days in peace. King aptly establishes an illustrative background for Blaze’s character: the ill-fated and abused childhood, and the struggles of daily existence all make the reader sympathetic for the character. In contrast, Blazes actions contradict the reader’s induced sympathies – the reader begins to develop an empathic attitude toward the protagonist while simultaneously viewing him with immense disapproval. Despite the fact that the reader can understand how Blaze grows up to become the individual he becomes, the reader cannot bring him or her self to comprehend his illicit activities.

King’s talent for portraying round characters is evident in this novel; Blaze possesses amazing psychological complexities. Blaze is unquestionably a page turning novel; one that keeps the reader thoroughly engaged in the plot. While it is not necessarily written in the usual creep-me-out style that many of King’s fans welcome and appreciate, Blaze is not a novel that should be passed up. In fact, for those readers that may stray from reading King’s more terrifying works, Blaze offers such readers an opportunity to enjoy his masterful writing abilities. More tragic than terrifying, more poignant than uncanny, Blaze is a tale that will become permanently etched in the mind of the reader.

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More Bachman than King, this story was a quick read set up like a classic crime thriller. I enjoyed it but it isn't something I'd call life-altering.

Very fun, fast paced, thrilling book. An old trunk novel that King decided to revive from his Backman days, very glad that he did. A little too short and predictable, however could not put it down, loved it.

An interesting very early King book. I believe he calls it a "trunk" book, being one that had been stored away in a trunk long ago then recently pulled out and published. Certainly not the typical horror type King book. Really the story of a nice kid with a lot of bad breaks that is just trying to

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make his way through the world.

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Not Stephen King's best, but definitely better than he himself thought it was. I am sure the rewriting he did later helped it along!
This story revolves around a mentally challenged man and his distorted view of morality. The story moved along fairly quickly and I found it enjoyable.

Not scary, only mildly supernatural, and perilously close to being as bad as Cell. Not quite, though. But if the author himself denounced the book as unpublishable 30 years ago, it's really a mark of the author's fading passion for his work and his fans that it suddenly and inexplicably is now fit

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for public consumption. It wasn't awful, but it's hardly worth the time it takes to read it. At least it's a modest improvement on his last few stillborn literary abominations.

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Clayton Blaisdell, Jr. (Blaze) has never had an easy life. A drunk driver killed his mother when he was three years old. His father was a drunk and when Blaze was in the first grade, his hungover father threw him down the stairs three times in a fit of anger. Although Blaze survived, he suffered

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brain damage and was made a ward of the state. He was sent to live at Hetton House, which was home to him for much of his youth, although several families did take him in when they needed their crops picked. After leaving Hetton House Blaze drifted along, moving from job to job and pulling various petty crimes. It's not until Blaze meets George Rackley that he starts pulling regular con jobs. George has an idea for a big con - kidnapping the baby of a wealthy family and holding it for ransom - but he dies before they can pull it off. But that doesn't matter to Blaze, he can still "talk" to the dead George and he decides to kidnap the baby himself.

Since this was a "trunk" novel by Stephen King (King himself warns readers of this in his introduction), written in 1973 and published under the name Richard Bachman, I wasn't expecting much, especially since I'm not a big fan of the books put out under the Bachman name. I was, however, pleasantly surprised. When King is at his best, he's a great storyteller and "Blaze" is a good example of his storytelling skills. Told in both the present and through the use of flashbacks, I liked the flashbacks best as they helped develop Blaze as a character. King has a knack of creating characters that come alive and readers care about one way or the other and Blaze does come alive for better and worse. He is at times a sympathetic character, especially in the way he has been treated, used and abused throughout his life and at other times a very brutal character who kills several people. You know from the beginning that the book can't end well, but King still has readers turning the pages both to learn more about Blaze's past as well as what is happening in the present. The book is not perfect, King goes a little overboard in creating Blaze's miserable childhood and a plot line involving a family called Bluenote was a bit too convenient and melodramatic. Although Blaze is a fully developed character, the others aren't as full developed, with only Blaze's childhood friend John Cheltzman coming close. King may have done this on purpose as the book is from Blaze's viewpoint. However, I would have liked to know more about George, he was an interesting character, but there wasn't enough about him, even in the flashbacks.

Fans of Stephen King, especially those that like to collect everything he writes, will enjoy "Blaze".

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I loved how I was hoping Blaze would get away with Joe but I suppose he couldn't really. I thought the sad thing though was how everyone thought that Blaze was such a horrible person but really he loved Joe so much that he was willing to give his life for him...