Listeners are introduced to 12-year-old Gwendy Peterson atop a cliffside stairway to Castle View, a park in the town of Castle Rock, Maine. There Gwendy meets Richard Farris, a strange man who knows just a little too much about her, and receives a gift that for a decade brings her good fortune and unthinkable terror. Maggie Siff narrates with touches of nostalgia, wonder, and insecurity that beautifully capture Gwendy’s adolescence. Though the horror elements are effective, it’s Gwendy’s coming-of-age that truly resonates. Siff characterizes Farris as blandly likable but with intangible menace—listeners, like Gwendy, will be both wary and intrigued. In the bonus short story, “The Music Room,” Siff’s highfalutin accents perfectly complement the story’s mix of black humor and wickedness. A.T.N. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award © AudioFile 2017, Portland, Maine
Summer means different things to different people, depending on their age, their life situation, their life goals—and their reading habits. Some folks read their one book a year over the summer, lazing on a beach. Others sail into June with a reading list arranged alphabetically and by length. Some just like to wander into bookstores […]
Around 15 years ago, Stephen King promised the world he was ready to retire, claiming the words weren’t coming to him as quickly as they once had. Cue pause for laughter.
Hulu’s Castle Rock is shaping up to be one of the most talked-about new series of the year, for many good reasons. The cast? Superlative: André Holland, Sissy Spacek, Scott Glenn, and Bill Skarsgård (just to name a few). The source material? Classic—it’s an original story, but draws on the sprawling shared universe of Stephen […]