I found The Green Mile on the bookshelf at work a few days ago, just finished reading it late last night. I’ve never considered myself a Stephan King fan before because I always perceived him as a horror writer, a genre which doesn’t interest me in the slightest. But after reading this book, I started thinking about some of his other stories that I’ve read–Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption (from Different Seasons), The Running Man (under the Richard Bachman psuedonym), and The Shining. Of these, only ‘The Shining’ really has much of a “horror” feel to it. I think I may have to pay a little more attention to this author, even if he is extremely popular–I hate following a fad, but in this case there may be a reason (other than marketing) for his wild popularity.
Books I’m going to look for by this author include The Dead Zone and The Stand, both of which are available from the Sacramento Public Library.
I’ve seen the movies based on all these books, except for ‘The Green Mile’. I read ‘Shawshank Redemption’ and ‘Running Man’ after seeing the movies, and liked both the movies and the books. I saw ‘The Shining’ after reading it, and was disappointed with the movie. This is almost always the case with me, regardless of author–as long as I haven’t read the books upon which they’re based, the movies stand well on their own, while the books add depth to the story once I get to read them. Because of this, I probably won’t see the movie rendition of ‘Green Mile’.