What makes this novel stand out stylistically is the dialogue and different perspectives that are the main backbones of the story and not so much about the setting. I was surprised by how much dialogue and the different fonts that appeared throughout the book. It was a bit long in the beginning, but the pace picked up during the middle of the book, all the way to the end. The paragraphs were also broken up to the point where I can easily read the text and see what was going on in the book. Examples: “Christine’s duals suddenly came on, pinning him in harsh white light…The undercarriage scraped and shrieked and shot off a swirling flicker of sparks.” (307)
“He himself was the only one (other than Cunningham himself) who could appreciate the incredibility of what had happened: the car’s complete and total regeneration…Will only sat there looking politely interested, and after a second or two the old man shook his head and went away.” (389)
I also got to see a few references from the WW2 era and the 1940s/1950s era when the book talked about the old veteran before he died and possessed Christine. Examples: “Ah shit. Ancient history, kid. I’m bending your ear as it is. But every time I think of that sonofabitch LeBay, I see red. I’ve still got the scars on my hands. Uncle Sam had three years of my life during World War 2 and I never got so much as a Purple Heart out of it, although I was in combat almost all that time. I fought my way across half the little shitpost islands in the South Pacific…I felt a couple of bullets go right by me, and just before we broke that charge the guy right next to me got his guts rearranged courtesy of the Emperor of Japan, but the only times I saw the color of my own blood over there in the Pacific was when I cut myself shaving. Then…” (508)
“Aw, it was a kid’s trick. But nobody really liked the sonofabitch, you know. He was an outsider, a loner—”
Like Arnie, I thought.
—and we’d all been drinking,” McCandless finished.
“It was after the meeting, and LeBay had been making an even worse prick of himself than usual…We all get behind the far corner of the building, because we know that’s where he’ll finish backing up the car before he takes off. He always called it by a girl’s name, I told you it was like he was married to the fucking thing.” (511)
I’ve read another of King’s novels (Sleeping Beauties) and the writing styles of both books are totally different and unique. For example, Sleeping Beauties was about a mysterious sickness that spreads throughout the town of Dooling, only affecting the women as they were wrapped in these cocoons. If you attempt to rip through them to get to your wife/sister/girlfriend, they turn savage and attempt to kill you. At the same time, a mysterious woman appears in the town when a bizarre murder happens. The murder was two men running a meth lab out of their mobile home who are then beaten to death by a mysterious woman, who sets fire to the lab before allowing herself to be arrested.
As for Christine, it’s about a love triangle involving 17-year-old misfit Arnie Cunningham, his new girlfriend, and a haunted 1958 Plymouth Fury. Dubbed “Christine” by her previous owner, Arnie’s first car is jealous, possessive, and deadly. His best friend, Dennis, immediately recognized that the car was bad luck even before Arnie bought the car from its previous owner. As murders suddenly climb in the quiet town of Libertyville, police are suspecting Arnie as the killer, when in reality it was Christine possessed by the angry, deceased veteran Ronald LeBay. As Dennis and Leigh team up to destroy Christine once and for all, Arnie goes out of town for a college visit with his mother. What they also didn’t realize was that Arnie’s father got killed when he went inside the car, despite Dennis warning him not to go near the car.
Overall, I think reading different genres and writing styles of different authors has made me improve my writing skills outside of the classroom. I’ve learned how to use proper grammar, write different POV’s, settings, and use motifs/language. I also tried stretching out my genres a bit too.
Great American Novels 2020 