A Devilishly Good Read: Revisiting "Needful Things"

 

 

Recently, a few of my coworkers were interested in starting a book club, and (knowing I am a big King fan) they elected to begin with something by him.  The selection?  Needful Things.  Now, this is a book I had already read—roughly ten years ago—but I was interested in revisiting it.  I remembered the book having at least a few excellent characters, an intriguing tone, and the premise is one that I continue to find fascinating.  Plus, this is “the last Castle Rock story,” or at least had been at the time.  And with the Hulu series “Castle Rock” in development, I’m eager to refresh myself on the goings-on of that particular locale within King’s literary universe.  With all those factors in mind, I figured I might enjoy a reread. 

So…did I? 

You bet I did.  Needful Things is a book that begins with a highly intriguing premise.  In effect, the Devil sets up shop in a small town with the intention of utterly destroying it.  The implications of such an idea should produce a very dark, violent, and horrific endgame.  And it does.  But the early passages of Needful Things strike a lighter tone.  It is frequently funny and entertaining, particularly the way King crafts the dialogue between the nefarious shopkeeper Gaunt and his unwitting customers. 
 
Things don’t stay humorous for long (and eventually they become very dark indeed), but it is interesting to find how nimbly King shifts between tones and feelings in this book.  Ultimately, the emotional core of the story is a darkly tragic one.  But it is interesting to note how frequently King looks for ways to inject the story with dark comedy.

The cast of characters King assembles is quite large.  Not everyone is exceptionally well developed, but there is a definite sense of personal history in this story—of the feuds, the friendships, and the more intimate relationships.  Even if it is not perfectly conveyed at all times, King himself is certainly well versed in how things have evolved between the residents of Castle Rock. 

It’s impressive that King is able to suggest the bonds and resentments so persuasively, and with so many good details.  Creating a convincingly layered and textured milieu to stage his action against was clearly important to King, and he has fun with his characters.  But I also think filling the book with so many characters, and ushering them all into Gaunt’s clutches, was important as a way for King to establish a primary idea in this book: that human nature is universally corruptible.  King accomplishes this by showing the various motivations of customers seeking their prized possessions, as well as the fact that everyone in town is susceptible, even the religious--and therefore presumably more pious--folks. I can imagine someone thinking the book needlessly spins its wheels for a while, particularly in the midsection – and one of my book-club peers did feel that way – but I think there is intentionality behind King’s repetitive pattern of: new customer comes in, Gaunt tempts them, they play a prank, etc.  Again, I think this is King’s way of showing us that no one is immune from temptation.  No one is exempt from the capacity to kill.  Gaunt even eventually gets to Alan (the one character who seems untouchable) and that was a moment of special power for me.  The thing he “needs” is particularly potent, and rooted in tragedy.       

That’s what the book is about for me.  It is a “supernatural” story in a sense, but more so of the “spiritual” variety.  The threat the townspeople face is an insidious one, because it results from the way they give in to temptation.  Gaunt preys on their wishes and fears, and causes them to act out in heinous, murderous ways.  It is to King’s great credit that he got me to believe all of these people would lash out with violence.  King served himself a tall order in getting the story from point A to point Z, from the seemingly innocuous to the horrible and blood-soaked, but he pulls it off.

 
What worked extremely well for me this time around?

·  Sherriff Pangborn’s depressive “voice.”  This element of the novel adds wonderful dimension to Alan’s character, and it stings every time King utilizes it.  I particularly like the way Alan’s depressive thoughts intrude on him.  This is an insightful angle with regard to the cognitive impact of depression, and the sneaky, lingering way guilt continues to nag at a person, wearing them down.

·  Polly’s physical pain.  King manages to make Polly’s ailment seem terribly burdensome and pervasive.  He also conveys not just her physical discomfort, but also the embarrassment she feels in having it revealed.

·  How convincingly King writes about addiction.  This, of course, is a subject that appears in, and enhances, a variety of King’s works.  Here, King does some good writing around the mental preoccupation that comes from being dependent on something, and the way those tendencies grow into obsessiveness.

·  Brian’s story.  I won’t say much about this for fear of spoiling it, because it is one of the most affecting parts of the novel.  I will simply say it devastated me, even the second time around.

·  The history embedded in Wilma and Peter's marriage.  This is some of the sharpest, most complex, most substantial writing King has done.  He reveals the capacity marriage has to be a battleground, and in this case, he shows how resentment coupled with profoundly intimate knowledge over a long history can create destructive patterns of relating.  The idea of having Peter slip his wife a sedative is a twisted notion of love that makes a strange sort of sense in the context of the kind of deep understanding that comes from a longstanding, if dysfunctional, relationship.  I tip my hat to King for the cleverness it took to come up with this, and for his devotion to packing it into the story.  It wasn’t necessarily needed, plot-wise, but it enhances the quality of the story considerably.

All in all, I think this is a terrific book.  In an effort to be objective, I’ll admit that it is probably a little too obscene at times.  It tends to be fairly vulgar and gross in places, but ultimately, that doesn’t detract from the good stuff.  Despite being a fairly thick novel, there is a strong through-line that keeps the book focused, and by the end, I found that King has made his point very strongly.  Gaunt is a fascinating villain, and Alan is a worthy hero.  The book manages to end with a definitive climax, but also retains an air of uncertainty about the future.  For my money, a solid ending.  Which is not always the case with King, particularly with his longer works, when the payoff doesn't match the time and energy you put into reading it.  Hard to go wrong with this one!