Everyone is a fan of conspiracy theories, i know i am, for many'a reason, its what makes things interesting, especially history. Every historical incident has a good amount of conspiracy theories with it. This book is based around a conspiracy theory, and the butterfly effect.
The Butterfly Effect is a concept in chaos theory, its the sensitive dependence on initial conditions in which a small change in one state of a determinilistic non-linear system can result in a large difference in a later state. Now this may sound all complex and scientific, but it is extremely easy to understand.
This book contains history, science, mystery, fiction, and indeed horror, i mean it is a stephen king book, it wouldnt be one if there wasnt some type of extestential crisis going on inside it. Ive been a fan of King for quite some time now, although ive only recently got into reading his books, ive read Pet Semetary (well as much as my scarediness could handle), and Carrie, and have a few more to get through till i fully have an opinion of him as a writer, but this book was magnificent, it was alot different to his others, although its based in Maine as most (mostly all) of them are, and contains the general idea of his writing, but its just so different to the two ive read.
Before i go on, this book has been made into a TV show with James Franco as the lead character, i havent watched it yet and im planning to, but decided to read the book before hand, my boyfriend, he watched the tv series and we compared differences, and although it was pretty much on the same line there was many a difference to the book, as there always is. But i still want to watch the tv show just to see what its like as i love the book.
The story is based around a man called Jake Epping, who is an English teacher, he has a failed marriage, and is pretty much getting no where in life. Throughout the story there is so many types of lines of stories that are included and again brought up throughout the story. But a couple of main ones; The story of Harry Dunning, an older gentlement in Eppings English class, who wrote a story about the night his father killed his whole family, it was gruesome (just like stephen king likes), and ugly and horrible to read, but gave Epping an initiative later on to see what would happen if things were to change, i will get to that soon though. And the story of course of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy.
JFK was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald on the 22nd of November 1963, this in itself is a conspiracy theory, many have thought that Oswald wasnt the one who did it, it was the CIA because JFK was initially a naughty boy as a president and got himself into a lot of trouble because of his opinions of things, because he was the president, he was allowed to do so, and put actions towards his opinions. Many thought it was the Mafia, many even thought it was his drivers in his car. But in the end it always comes back to Lee Harvey Oswald, and his rifle. Although he was shot with a fatal wound shortly after the death of JFK, by Jack Ruby, so he could not speak upon the matter, so i guess no one knows but the government or the people with the paperwork. I dont know much about the subject, nor the history but this book has ALOT of information in it that adds up extremely well whether its been made up or not. I know Stephen King had to study and fork out alot of information before writing this book and i think it makes sense to why he has done, so he had every bit of factual history in order for it to come across as completely true.
Down the lines of this film, Epping has a friend Al Templeton who shows him the 'rabbit-hole' to the same date and time of a couple of years before JFK was shot, no one knows why but its there. Templeton asks Epping if he can go and do what he couldnt, because cancer caught up to him, and try and save JFK. Templeton was in Vietnam, and was indeed scarred by it, as alot of soldiers were, but thought that if JFK was saved, there would be no Vietnam. Who knows what caused Vietnam? who knows if JFK caused it, but in this story a big change happens, when Epping finally gets his way.
The story gets on, and Epping goes to save Harry Dunning, from his drunken abusive father, the past works against him, it doesnt want to be changed, it does everything and anything to stop Epping from changing it, such as giving him a bad stomach, giving him an accompliss who attempts to stop him, trying anything in the strength of the world to stop him from saving Harry Dunnings family because it will cause a serious problem in the Land of Ahead, if he changes things in the Land of Ago. The first time it doesnt work, but the second time it does, this in turn has caused a butterfly effect in the Land of Ahead, a serious one at that. Once this is done he moves on in his life.
The way he started getting his money was betting, obviously coming from 2011 Al wrote down all of the football games, baseball games, boxing matches and every other sport you could think of that could be bet on just so he could get some money during that era on gambling. Alas this got Epping into trouble because he didnt bet safe, he bet stupid amounts of money on the games and in turn got one of his houses burnt down, and later on in the film got himself nearly killed by a beating. But sooner or later he started to notice that gambling wasnt an easy income, he couldnt gamble all the time it was near impossible and unsafe for him to play that game, so because he was an English teacher in the Land of Ahead, he decided to become a subsitute one in the Land of Ago, in a school in Jodie.
During his time in Jodie, he was also living in certain houses which could easily keep an eye on Oswald when he shortly arrived back from Russia, and then from Cuba later on. He always went back to his houses just to keep an eye on him, listen in on his conversations although most were in russian, witness the beatings that Marina got off him, and seen how he acted when it got closer to the important moment in history. He watched him constantly on and off when things were going well in Jodie, he saw June, Oswalds daughter grow, he watched Marina get comfortable with some russian neighbours, and he saw Oswald get close to, what Epping thought, was an accomplis. Epping didnt want to make a move, because of the amount of conspiracy theories surrounding the assassination of JFK, he didnt know if Oswald was a lone gunman or not, he wanted to make sure, hense the secretive mics in the lamps, and living close to him to watch his actions, he wanted to see if it was just him.
In Jodie he met Sadie, sadie was a beautiful woman the way King described her, she was tall, blonde, extremely clumsy but all in all a lovely girl. Epping obviously fell in love with her, the way their love unfolded was beautiful, it was such an amazing relationship they had going on, and alas because its a King book, it didnt last very long, there was lots of problems, the major one being Sadies ex-husband, or was still her husband but was seperated from him, he was psychotic, he never slept with her thought she was disgusting hated the thought of even looking at her, Sadie recalled to Epping that he actually put a broom between them in the bed because he was disgusted by her. Epping was worried, he had a feeling that the husband would come back and hurt Sadie but no one would listen to him, until he obviously came back and threatened to kill Sadie unless Epping would turn up so he could kill them both, at the end he disfigured Sadie cut her cheek wide open, and left some serious hospital bills and facial reconstruction to be done from it, then slit his own throat. Throughout this Epping decides to confide in Sadie about his mission, the fact he was from the future and proved it with his gambling skills, and the fact that he knew JFK was going to come into town and through the street he was killed on before anything was even decided, that proved it for Sadie, although Epping didnt tell her everything, he didnt want her to get attached or invovled because the past works against itself and has already got him in to trouble before, he didnt want her to get hurt too.
So pretty eventfull relationship i say, then Epping gets beaten up by gambling thugs, and is partially brain damaged, in a coma for a while and can barely remember what hes in that country for, he gets the Land of Ahead confused with Ago, he gets Sadie mixed up with his ex-wife, he believes he has something important to do but cant remember what and the last stages of the book it is all about him remembering, going to the places that will help him remember, and doesnt tell Sadie what he is actually remembering but Sadie soon finds out. Epping goes back to the house he lived below Oswald in, and then stays in Junes old bedroom the day before the incident, he wakes up to Sadie, there are the right time because if she wasnt he would of more than likely slept through it.
So both him and Sadie fight against the past in order to get to the Book Depository where Oswald was working and shot JFK at the time, and was faught against majorly, first by his Chevy's wheel completely breaking off its axel, then by a truck majorly crashing in to the bus they were attempting to take, they then stole a rusted busted old car into as close as they could to town and walked half the way until he found his old car, well not his but exactly like his in a different colour and thought it was the past harmonizing with itself, they stole the car and drove the rest of the way they could to the depository. They climbed the steps and low and behold Oswald was sat on the 6th floor left hand window with his rifle aimed at the car JFK was riding through the street, Epping and his .38 police gun missed twice whilst trying to aim for him, and unfortunately as Epping fell over whilst Oswald had his rifle aimed at him the shot went through and through Sadie, and unfortunately, it was only a consequence of the past not wanting to be changed. Sadie passed away because they changed an initial and most likely important part in history that shouldnt have been changed, as Epping soon found out when he went back to the land Ahead. Before doing so he got a call from the president and Jackie Kennedy herself thanking him for saving their lives, although for Epping it wasnt worth the fact that he lost the love of his life, it wasnt a fair trade, and he knew what to do.
Before heading back to the Land of Ahead, a man who was introduced in the first moments of Ago, the 'green, yellow, orange, and black card' man, was there waiting, the cards sooner or later were found out to be his psychosis, the way his mind was handling being on these different 'strings' of rabbit-holes in history. Two different men, one at the beginning was trying to stop Al and Epping when he got there to change the past, as it was tangling the strings of history and sooner or later those strings would snap, as the man at the end of the book told him, he told him that if he continued to change the differences in time, whether that be talking to a certain person, buying something from a shop, the likes of saving Harry Dunning, or saving JFK, whichever change, big or small it all has an effect, and if there is alot of changes in one timeline the effect it has on the Land of Ahead is excrutiating, and dangerous. When Epping goes back into the land of Ahead the world is completely different, the amount of differences there actually is, is ridiculous. Most of the world is radiated by the bombs that have been dropped by America, there are earthquakes on a daily basis, and weird sounds in the sky that could only be what the card man said, the world is being destroyed because of the different strings. He meets Harry Dunning for the last time, in this new Land of Ahead, and Dunning continues to tell Epping what the world has come to since the saving of JFK, and it was major, major enough for him to want to go back, not just to save sadie but to save the world in general. The card man had told him he needs to come back and break the circle, but he didnt know which route to go down yet.
He chose that the only way he could do it was to break the circle, did he want the world he was living in now be destroyed just because a president had been assassinated? would it be the same with Lincoln? or Martin Luther King Jr? or any important person that was killed. All because an old chef, Al, didnt want Vietnam to happen. Vietnam had to happen, all the wars in my opinion had to happen or we wouldnt live in the country we lived in today. Epping did think that was someone else on other strings changing the world, hense 9/11 or the many terrorist attacks, or any of the world wars. He went back to the Land of Ago, a complete reset of that time, and did nothing but write the book i have read, he then buried it next to the river he threw his phone into, wrote a letter to sadie then ripped it up, wrote a letter to the school and deke warning them about sadies husband, but then burnt it. Many things he did in that time back in the Land of Ago, but not one thing changed the world that he had to live in, he let Harry Dunnings father kill his family, he let JFK die just as the history was supposed to happen, then went home.
As he was home he got his job back as a teacher, tried his hardest not to find Sadie, but in the end he did his research and found out that her husband did what he had to do, and scarred her for life, but she became citizen of the year in Jodie in 2011, and Epping soon found out they had a dance on, in which he attended, and met Sadie for the first time in the Land of Ahead. She had no idea who he was, but she felt as though he knew her from somewhere, but to Epping it didnt matter if she was 80, or scarred, she was alive, and thats all that mattered to him.
This book guys honestly, i know ive just ruined this story probably but you need to read it, it is a must read. Even if you dont like Stephen King i feel as though this book doesnt match to the other horrors hes wrote, its history at the end of the day. And after reading it its made me want to research the assassination, buy a bunch of books about it and study it, historical fiction makes me do that.
11.22.63 is a brilliant book and i advise anyone that loves history, fiction, horror, mystery, romance, any type of genre ever to read this book. Bring on the TV series! in my next blog i will be commenting on it once ive finished it!
At the moment im waiting for the new Harry Potter and the Cursed Child to arrive so i can read it, although im sat wondering if i should just start Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman, ill decide if it arrives tomorrow.
The other amazing thing thats happened, my FAVOURITE and i mean FAVOURITE book at the moment, American Gods by Neil Gaiman is being made into a TV Series also, ive already seen the trailer that was aired at Comic Con this year, and i nearly cried, im so excited it looks exactly what im expecting it to be but i doubt theyll put every story into it that is included in the book but the main story is enough for me, i really hope it turns out to be what i expect!!The picture next to this paragraph is of a shot from the new TV series, it includes Shadow, Mr Wednesday and Mad Sweeney when they first meet eachother.
Stay rad!
MKM x
