Gwendy's Button Box - Review

Author: Stephen King & Richard Chizmar

Genre:  Thriller

Series: Gwendy's Box #1

Format: Paperback

Pages: 171

Huh.

I mean yeah... That kind sums up all my thoughts on Gwendy's Button Box in one word. It's a really good book, and everything I enjoy from Stephen King, but it is a strang little novella. I knew it was going to be weird. My Mom had read it before me and had said it was one of stranger works. Nothing wrong with that in my opinion. I too a strange work. But this is weird.

I did like it though. It was a quick read and hard to put down. It's one of those books where you need to know what is going to happen next. Is she gonna push a button, is the box going to be mad Gwendy's is forgetting, is the Boiler Hat man going to come. Question after question as you flip through each chapter. What happens when you give a child, a teenager, what is basically Pandora's Box?

The plot movies fluidly and covers nearly a decade in time for in barely a hundred pages. Enough to see the type of things the Button Box can do, could do. To wonder how much was fate and how much was the box. To wonder who Mr. Farris really it, or really what is he. It's not hard to keep up with the time jumps. They happen chapter-to-chapter, using Gwendy's School Grades as a timeline.

Despite having two authors it feels like it was written by one. This is the Castle Rock we all know, and it seems like Gwendy fits right in. It isn't hard to see how this story could fit into all the weird that happens around that town. It also fits well into the Stephen King genre. Though I have to say I thought the ending would go a little differently than it did.

Though, I'm not mad. This was one of those stories where it was nice that everything got tied up with a little bow. I really liked Gwendy as a characters, and how she took on the role of the caretaker of the box. She never left the power of what it could do over rule her. Instead she kept it safe, and only used it when she had too after so found out what it really could do.

Because how do you blame a child for wondering if a magic box is really magic without trying it out?

All-in-all, I really enjoyed Gwendy's Button Box. So much so I picked up the second book in the duology to see what comes next for Gwendy.

HAPPY READING!!