The Beast House by Richard Laymon

The Beast Househttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
By Rhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifichard Laymon
Copyright 1986

The Beast House is the second in a trilogy Richard Laymon wrote about the mansion in the coastal California town of Malcasa Point and its unusual resident. It also works as a stand alone novel.

Author Gorman Hardy, author of a best selling, true, haunted house novel receives a letter from a young woman telling him of The Beast House in Malcasa Point, CA. The Beast House is quite a tourist attraction for its wax depictions of the men and women who were murdered there by some unseen and unspeakable beast. Janice Crogan has acquired the diary of the original owner of the house and wants Hardy to write a book about it. She wants half the profits.

Hardy is intrigued. He writes Janice and tells her that he will be attending a library conference in San Francisco soon and will visit her in Malcasa Point to examine the diary (whose author penned a quite racy account of her encounters with the beast reputed to haunt the house) and to visit the Beast House.

Meanwhile, at the library conference, Tyler and Nora are two bored librarians looking to do something interesting while at the conference. Tyler begins to wax nostalgic about a man to whom she was once engaged who was a police officer in a town several miles up the coast. Nora suggests they make the drive and see if Tyler’s old boyfriend, Dan, is still around.

They travel to the last address Tyler had for Dan and find that he took a job as a police officer in Malcasa Point. His former neighbor provides them with an address and the young ladies head north. As they depart, the neighbor tells them that they must take the Beast House tour, they’ll love it.

While en route north from San Francisco, Nora and Tyler meet with a deranged motorist who runs them off the road in a fit of road rage. As the man prepares to rape Tyler, two men in a Mustang stop. They push the guy’s pickup truck off the road into a gorge, then administer a well deserved beating. To thank their heroes, Nora and Tyler invite the men to join them for a drink at the next bar they come to on the road.

They stop for their drink. They find out the two men, Abe and Jack, are recently discharged Marines at loose ends, looking for a little fun and adventure before settling into civilian lives. Nora and Jack hit it off right away. Tyler, still hoping to find her old flame, is attracted to Abe, yet reticent.She’s honest with Abe and tells him that she has to be sure about Dan before she can start a relationship with him.

The four travel to Malcasa Point to find Dan, who is supposed to be a cop in the little town of approximately 400. They find his address, but it’s obvious that no one lives there anymore. The neighbor, a strange old drunk named “Captain Frank” who tells them cryptically that Dan can be found at Beast House. Tyler and her friends check into the only motel in town, planning to visit Beast House the next day.

Gorman Hardy and his assistant who helped him launch his first true ghost story book by becoming the real life star of it also travel to Malcasa Point. There are there to cut their deal with Janice to get access to the novel. They also check into the motel, owned by Janice’s parents. There, Hardy presents Janice with a contract that promises her 50 percent of all of the proceeds generated by the book about Beast House.

The next day, Tyler and her friends as well as Gorman Hardy and his buddy, take the tour of Beast House. There, they learn the legend of the house that is supposedly haunted by a humanoid creature whose lust for blood is matched only by his lust for sex (as evidenced by the journal Hardy has in his possession). The tour takes them through several rooms of the home, lead by a woman who lost her husband and children to the Beast that supposedly roams within. Ghastly wax statues, maimed and dismembered. One of those statues, is Dan, dressed in his police uniform and badly disfigured. Tyler knows there will be no picking up with Dan and is sad not only for the chance of rekindling a lost love, but for the fate of her former lover.

The four adjourn to a bar that evening to have drinks. Soon they are joined by Captain Jack, well into his cups and his mind and mouth lubricated. He tells them the tale of how the beast, Bobo as he calls it, came to arrive at Beach House. Captain Jack’s father, a seafaring man, brought it back when it was an infant from a remote island inhabited by like creatures. It killed his father and took up residence at the house.

Meanwhile, Hardy and his partner have hatched a scheme to swindle young Janice out of her share. Hardy’s partner, quite the lady’s man, invites Janice to come along to Beast House that night to help him take some pictures. While they’re gone, Hardy plans to steal the contract so there will be no evidence of the deal.

Brian takes Janice to the Beast House and they begin prowling the perimeter fence, looking for the legendary hole in the ground that lets the beast escape the house when necessary. After a short search, Brian begins to seduce Janice. As they are making love, Brian is attacked and Janiced is knocked unconscious.

The next day, Janice’s parents show up at Hardy’s room, wanting to know where their daughter is. They know that she came to his room to discuss business. Hardy tells him that she went with his assistant to the house to get some night time pictures and agrees to accompany them to the house to search. He is worried because Brian has pulled off this type of swindle before without a hitch.

They arrive at the house and begin their search. Soon, they find Brian and Janice’s clothing lying beneath a tree. A further search reveals Brian’s body impaled upon the steel spikes of the fence surrounding the house. Janice’s parents are enraged. When Janice’s father attacks Gorman, he kills him, then kills the mother as well. He’s confident they will be considered just two more victims of the Beast. His book plans are safe.
Tyler and her friends encounter Hardy, whom they’d met at the library conference just a few days before, at the restaurant adjacent to the motel. Hardy – too much the coward to go to the house himself – offers Abe and Jack take him up on the offer and plan to break into Beast House that night to get the pictures.

Abe and Jack make their way into the house and start taking pictures. In an act of chivalry, Abe decides to smash the wax figure of Dan Jensen so people won’t see Tyler’s lost love on display in his death throes. After taking their pictures, they decide to descend into the cellar which is not a part of the tour. There, they find a tunnel that leads off in the direction of the house where the owner and proprietor of Beast House lives.

Meanwhile, Janice awakens to find that she’s alive and other than some deep scratches, physically ok. She is locked in a dark room. She ponders her situation when she hears a key slip into the lock. A young girl comes in with a little bit of food and a can of pop for Janice who is obviously being kept alive for a purpose. The girl tells Janice that she is a willing resident of the house, but her mom, locked in a room down the hall, is not and has tried to escape. Sandy tells Janice that escape from the house is impossible.

Janice overpowers Sandy and knocks her unconscious. She fashions a weapon out of the pop can by tearing the aluminum to make sharp edges. When a woman comes to check on Sandy, Janice ambushes her and escapes into the hallways of the house – but it’s not Beast House. It is a strange residence that sets behind Beast House – the Martha Kutch home – she who owns and operates Beast House.

When Abe and Jack are overdue, Tyler and Nora go to Hardy and tell them they are going to Beast House to look for their boyfriends. Hardy agrees to accompany them. He’s not worried about their safety, but wants to recover they camera and any pictures they took. They take off for Beast House.

Janice creeps through the house, but can’t find the front door which, according to Sandy, is locked anyway. She heads toward the cellar of the Kutch house where she finds her parents and Brian stuck to the wall on spikes like bugs on a pin. As she is taking in this horror, she hears something coming down the steps. She hides and observes as a humanoid creature with long claws approaches her mother’s corpse, takes it off the wall, and begins to devour it. Janice screams and the creature comes for her.

Just as it is about to have its way with Janice, Dan and Jack arrive and put a bullet in it, killing it. They decide to vacate the premises and call the cops.

They exit the house just as Nora, Tyler, and Hardy arrive. They go to a phone and call the police, letting them know that they’ve rescued Janice and that there are dead people inside the Kutch home. They then head back for Beast House and await the police arrival.

The police arrive, but are immediately ambushed and gunned down by Martha Kutch and her family. Abe and Jack decide to take matters into their own hands and rescue Sandy’s mother, who apparently has a newborn baby with her. Hardy wants to accompany them, dreaming of the live action photos that will propel his book to the top of the best seller lists.

They enter Beast House and go down to the cellar. They travel through the tunnel to the Kutch House. Hardy takes pictures of the carnage in the cellar, but loses his nerve. He decides to return to the outside on his own, promising to lead Janice to safety. But they are ambushed by one of the creatures that quickly kills Hardy. But it’s not murder it has in mind for Janice. It pins her down, spreads her legs, and reveals its sex organ (equipped with teeth on the tip), and tries to rape her. Then an unlikely hero arrives to kill the creature – Captain Jack – who in his nightly drunken rants always promised to kill the creature.

Abe and Jack, guided by Janice, find Sandy’s mother’s room where she is imprisoned. As they are trying to free her, they are confronted by Martha Kutch and one of the creatures. They shoot Kutch and her creature. They free Sandy’s mom and her baby. They find Sandy where Janice left her, beaten but alive. She fights them when they try to take her out, so they leave her and escape.

They all meet in front of the house. The woman, accompanied by Captain Jack, are safe and Abe and Jack are also safe. The repulsive Gorman Hardy – instead of writing the story of Beast House – becomes part of its lore.

Janice goes on to write the story and make millions for herself. Abe and Tyler marry and operate a motel many miles up the coast from Malcasa http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifPoint. Nora and Jack are still dating hot and heavy. It would seem to be a happy ending.

However, when police explore the Beast House and the Kutch house behind it, the teenage girl, Sandy, is nowhere to be found. She is dwelling deep inside the house, thinking about what to name her unborn child. . . the chilhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifd of the Beast.

I was disappointed to find out after I was well into this novel, that it was the second in a three part trilogy based on Beast House. The first, called, The Cellar, tells the story of how Donna and Sandy came to be there. The third, called The Midnight Tour, tells what happens to Sandy, her brood, and the Beast House.

It worked well as a stand alone novel and I enjoyed it a great deal. Laymon is not much on character development. Tyler, Nora, Abe, and Jack, are really developed only as much as needed to propel the story. Not much is given to development of Sandy in this book, probably because she was developed in The Cellar, as was her mother, Donna, who plays just a bit role in The Beast House.

Since the foursome were new editions to the story, it’s obvious they weren’t developed in the earlier novel. Tyler’s sudden discovery of her desire to rekindle an old flame seems more spontaneous than something over which she has been brooding. The instant emotional attraction the couples develop is also given superficial treatment. Just a bit more interaction between them before they fell in love would have made them more credible characters.

Gorman Hardy is developed enough to make him unlikeable, but he’s too simple. His thinking is simple, his motives are simple, and he doesn’t plot. He just acts one event at a time. A more devious Gorman Hardy would have added to the book.

Janice is the best developed character of the book. Her thoughts, emotions, and planning make her a rich character. Since she is the one who ultimately writes the story of what happened to her in Beast House and it is she who stays in Malcasa Point to run the motel left to her, we must believe this well developed character has a role in the next novel.http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif

Laymon’s writing reminds me very much of John Saul, who writes stories driven entirely by plot. Like Laymon, Saul develops his characters just enough to propel the story, but even Saul provides deeper characters than Laymon.

According to various websites, Laymon wrote particularly violent and gory horror. I didn’t find Beast House that gory or violent – certainly no more so than anything Stephen King writes. I found The Beast House to be a fast paced novel that was a bit thin on character and completely lacking in meaningful subplots.

I write of Laymon in the past tense because, unfortunately, he died of a heart attack in 2001.

Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable book. I may even pick up the first and the third books to round out the trilogy.

The Power that Preserves by Stephen R. Donaldson

The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever, Book 3
The Power that Preserves
by Stephen R. Donaldson
Copyright 1979

Book three of the first trilogy of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever finds Thomas Covenant in bad straits. Despite the fact that he continues to argue with himself that his experience in the Land is nothing but a dream, he is horribly depressed about the death of High Lord Elena, his daughter, as she battled Kevin Landwaster for control of the Staff of Law.

Covenant has let himself go; his leper’s discipline gone. He’s stopped taking the medication that arrested the spread of his disease. He’s stop giving himself the constant physical examinations necessary to identify and treat cuts and wounds promptly. His grip on sanity is tenuous.

He takes daily walks and one day, upon returning to his home, he finds his groceries have been delivered – courtesy of the local grocery store who does not want him to enter their store. He bites into a roll and there is a razor blade inside, placed there to hurt and maim him by one of his neighbors.

He flees into the woods, distraught, angry, and at his wits end. As he wanders aimlessly, he hears a little girl screaming. He races to her and finds that she has been bitten by a rattle snake.

Just as he’s preparing to help her, he feels that discorporate feeling that tells him he is once again being summoned to the land. He appears in the Lords Keep of Revelstone before Lord Mhoram and the assembly of Lords. He pleads to be allowed to return to his home so that he can save the little girl. Mhoram pleads with him, telling him that this is the Land’s darkest hour and they need him to save the Land. Covenant denies the request, saying he must save a girl in his own world. Unwilling to bring Covenant to the Land against his will, Mhoram releases him.

Covenant sucks the venom from the girl’s wound and then carries her to her parents who are camping in the woods. The father immediately recognizes him and begins to pummel him. Covenant surrenders himself and pleads with Mhoram to take him.

Covenant is summoned to the Land, but it’s not Lords Keep where he arrives, but the peak of Kevin’s Watch. His summoners are Triock, the man who loved Lena, the girl he raped years before, and his old friend, the Giant Saltheart Foamfollower.

They take him to Mithil Stonedown, the village he first visited when he arrived in the Land during his first sojourn. The Land is in the grasp of a preternatural winter, contrived by Lord Foul to starve its population. The Stonedowners are barely surviving the frequent attacks by wolves and other Lord Foul minions. It is Triock, no longer the simple sheepherder, who leads the defenses of the village.

While Covenant is taking in the plight of the Land and Foul’s machinations, the Stonedown is attacked. As Covenant takes cover, he sees and elderly woman, defenseless except for a small dagger, attack one of the assailants. Covenant joins the fray to save her and finds that it is Lena, the woman he ravished years before. She is now and old woman, now insane and obsessed with her love of Thomas Covenant.

After fending off the attack, Covenant resolves to be passive participant in the Land’s battle no more. He directs Triock to take a party to the Forrestal at Garroting Deep and to use his powers to send word to Revelstone to let Mhoram know that the white gold wielder has returned. Covenant resolves to go directly to Foul’s Creche to face down and destroy Lord Foul once and for all. Triock and his friends set off for Garroting Deep. Covenant, accompanied by Saltheart Foamfollower and Lena, whom he feels responsible, set off for Foul’s Creche.

At Revelstone, the siege has begun. The Raver, Satanfist, bearing a piece of the Illearth Stone, has assembled an army before Revelstone. He begins his relentless assault. Those within are trapped. There is no escape through the main gate. The upper plains above the keep that were once fertile and supplied the keep with food, are barren with Foul’s winter. There is little food and much fear. High Lord Mhoram struggles to maintain morale and maintain defenses as the raver launches land-corrupting assaults against the keep that destroy the Land and bring pain to the inhabitants.

Triock’s efforts to use his lomillialor staff to contact Revelstone meets with defeat when he is betrayed by a raver.

Covenant and his party move west toward Foul’s Creche and arrive at the Plains of Ra where the prideful, powerful horses known as Rahynyn live. There, he is captured by Ramen, the keepers of the horses. The Ramen have never liked Covenant because of the Rahynyn’s forced supplication to him. They show him the starvation and deprivations endured by the horses since Foul’s winter set in. The once majestic horses have either died or are near starvation.

Living with the Ramen Covenant finds his former Bloodguard, Bannor. Bannor tells Covenant that their oath to defend the Land and the Lords has been broken because of Bannor’s disclosure of Kevin’s seventh ward. Bannor and the other Bloodguard, once immortal, now age and the years have taken a toll on the once implacable Bannor.

As they talk, they are attacked by wolves and other minion of Lord Foul. Covenant and Lena escape. Saltheart and Bannor promise to find Covenant once they have thwarted this attack. Covenant and Lena flee west into the cold, barren plains.

Soon after fleeing, cold and starving, they encounter a man that Covenant recognized back in the Plains of Ra. Pieten, the young boy whose mind was captured by a raver at Soaring Woodhelvin years before to serve as a trap for Covenant, Hile Troy, and the Lords greets Covenant. Left with the Ramen years before, he has developed a fanatical attachment to the Ranyhyn that leaves him scorning the Ramen’s careful and deferential care as inadequate. He feeds them and prepares a fire to warm them. He then tells Covenant that he will fulfill his destiny by destroying Covenant whom the Ranyhyn fear, but respect. He tells Lena that her daughter, Alena is dead and that Covenant refused to help her in her time of need. The insane Lena is overwrought and tries to kill Covenant. Pieten then kills her to Covenant’s horror. Covenant drives a dagger into Pieten’s heart. He continues westward, cold, alone, and without provision, his ankle broken in the fight with Pieten.

Back at Revelstone, as morale collapses and the keep starts to fall into chaos, Mhoram is pondering his options, including the Ritual of Desecration, uttered centuries before by Kevin Landwaster to thwart Foul’s goals. He ventures into the Lords’ Keep, now destroyed in a fit of rage and despair by Trell, Lena’s father. He finds that the Krill, the sword that Thomas Covenant drove deep into the stone of the table of the keep many years prior, is free of the stone and the stone in the hilt is aglow. Mhoram knows that Covenant has returned to the land and that the defenders of Revelstone must buy him time to do what he needs to do to destroy Lord Foul.

Mhoram begins to ponder Kevin Landwaster and his hour of despair. He had wrought destruction of the Land – the thing he loved most – to avoid violating his Oath of Peace. Mhoram has an epiphany. It is that very oath that has weakened the defenders of the land from the beginning. Pacifism is a laudable philosophy to employ in life to maintain peace and harmony. But when faced by a daunting and willful enemy, sometimes the goal of peace requires the execution of attack. Mhoram orders his warriors to prepare for a full frontal – and probably suicidal – attack on the raver and his army.

Mhoram and his men leave the safety of Revelstone and meet Satanfist’s legions of ur-viles and cavewights. Mhoram, armed with the Krill, seeks out Satanfist the raver himself for a final confrontation. Just as Satanfist is about to end Mhoram’s life, they both notice that the moon – once discolored a nauseating green by Lord Foul’s use of the illearth stone and the staff of law – has returned to its normal color. Emboldened, Mhoram takes the Krill and thrusts it into the giant raver, killing him. The Warward dispatches what remains of his army and Revelstone is saved.

Meanwhile, Covenant wonders through the frozen waste of the Despoiled Plains alone, starving and injured. He collapses and prepares to die. While in slumber, he is found by an Unfettered One who has devoted her life to the healing arts. She takes him back to her cave in Morinmoss Forest and devotes the very last of her energy to healing him, recognizing him as the last hope for the Land.

Covenant awakens to find the dead Unfettered One and realizes the sacrifice she has made for him. He sets off, more determined than ever, to get to Foul’s Creche and do battle. He continues his journey and eventually arrives at the great stone monolith the protectors of the Land call Coloussus which separates and protects the land from Lord Foul and keeps his power confined within the Despoiled Plains and Foul’s Creche. There, he meets Triock who was dispatched to the south to try to get a message to Revelstone. He is surprised and ask Triock how he got to the plains.

Triock, bitter and angry over all that he has lost at the hands of Thomas Covenant, tells him his journey met with a raver and they were waylaid. Then, two of the Ramen appear and they have been taken over by the other two of the three triplet ravers. They take Covenant’s ring from him.

They have brought with them those Covenant has longed to see for many days – Saltheart Foamfollower and Bannor. But they are controlled by the ravers through the use of their slivers of the Illearth Stone. Triock, his oath of peace long forgotten and his desire to kill Covenant unsated, advances to finish the job. The ravers tell him to halt and direct his and Covenant’s attention to the hillside. There, they see High Lord Elena, Covenant’s daughter by birth and Triock’s by adoption, approach the party.

She informs them that she means to kill them slowly, but not before making Covenant watch his friends die. She carries with her the Staff of Law. With the Law of Death put asunder by her own deeds, High Lord Elena is brought back to destroy that which she loves, the ravers tell Covenant.

But they are momentarily distracted when Elena discovers that the Lords of Revelstone have turned the tide of battle and that Soulcrusher is threatened. That distraction releases Saltheart, Triock, Bannor, and Covenant from their bonds. Triock attacks Elena and knocks the Covenant’s ring from her finger. Covenant recovers it. Elena strikes at him with the Staff of Law. The power of Covenant’s ring reacts to the tainted highwood and blasts it into ashes. Elena is released. Before she dies, she utters the plea, “Strike a blow for me, beloved.”

Covenant, in his desperation, issues a plea to the Forrestal for help. Bolts of lightening discharge from Colossus, driving the ravers from the bodies of the Ramen. Triock is mortally wounded by his battle with Elena. Before dying, he tells Covenant to forgive Elena, that she was flawed from birth.

Covenant, Bannor, and Saltheart now stand at the edge of the Land. Bannor says he will go no further, that his service to the Lords has come to an end as with all the Bloodguard. He shares his knowledge of the Despoiled Plains with Covenant and takes his leave, returning to the Ramen to help them serve the dying Ranhynyn.

From there, Saltheart and Covenant continue their journey. They cross the Despoiled Plains and gain the entrance to Foul’s Creche. Saltheart, immune to damage from heat, bears Covenant across a moat of lava and Covenant enters. Saltheart is seemingly lost in the pit of molten lava.

Finally, Covenant finds Foul in his lair. There, Foul has imprisoned Saltheart Foamfollower by chaining him to a wall. First, Lord Foul tries to bribe Covenant with promises of power, then tries to make him grovel by inflicting upon him the end stages of leprosy. Covenant realizes that Foul is toying with him because he isn’t sure whether or not Covenant has yet mastered his wring.

Just as Mhorman, Covenant has an epiphany every bit as contradictory as Mhoram’s. Just as Mhoram found that one must sometimes employ warfare for the sake of peace, Covenant found that the contradictions of his disbelief and his love of the Land and its people were his essence. He is the White Gold, he’s been told. And this contradiction of love and disbelief is him.

The white gold erupts in a verdant blaze of power. Foul’s godlike appearance is blown aside and his mortal self revealed. The power of Covenant’s ring coupled with the crippled law of death summons the Lords and many friends that have died in the fight against corruption. They implore Covenant to kill Foul.

Covenant looks at Lord Foul in his mortal guise and refuses. Killing him will not stop him, Covenant tells them. They must drive him from the Land with that which he hates most – joy. He asks Saltheart to start laughing. Saltheart starts with a mirthful, painful laugh, but soon summons a belly laugh born of true humor. Soon, the dead join in. Foul, unable to endure the joy unleashed by Covenant, begins to regress in age. He becomes a child, and infant, and this ceases to exist.

Lord Foul is driven from the Land.

The cataclysm that ensues brings Foul’s Creche down around them. Saltheart and Covenant are killed in the collapse.

But Covenant is transported to an ethereal place where he meets the homeless man who, just days prior in his own world, implored him to be true when he returned Covenant’s wedding band to him. He is the Creator.

He explains that, as Creator, he could not meddle in his own creation lest the Arch of Time be destroyed and all law fall with it. He chose Covenant, so willing to part with the white gold wedding band, as his proxy. He offers Covenant a life of peace and leisure, unafflicted by his disease. Covenant refuses. His world is his world and he is a leper.

The Creator tells Covenant that he is lying in a hospital bed dying because he has taken in some of the rattle snake poison and is allergic to the antivenin. The Creator tells Covenant that he will make it possible for him to survive his physical injuries in his own world.

There, Covenant awakens. He learns that he is a hero for having saved the small child and that through the efforts of his lawyer, he will be able to keep his home. Covenant lays back, prepared to resume his life as an outcast leper.

So ends the first trilogy of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever.

This was the first fantasy trilogy I ever read – even before Lord of the Rings. It immediately hooked me on fantasy literature.
Donaldson’s work is hailed as one of the great fantasy works of all time. What sets it apart from most fantasy literature is how it sets itself apart from Tolkien’s work.

Too many writers rely on Tolkien’s framework for a story. The heroes are all heroic. The mystical magical items are readily employed. The journeys from place to place are long and there is always the ultimate villain to slay.

Donaldson’s hero, such as he is, is the antithesis of Tolkien’s hobbits. The reader loathes him because he is a self-pitying, whining, coward – and a rapist. He has no courage, no core values except his leper’s rules of survival. Conjuring Thomas Covenant and making the reader root for him is an accomplishment that puts Donaldson at the pinnacle of fantasy character creators.

The other primary character in Covenant’s trilogy is the Land. Tolkien had his Middle Earth, but it was Middle Earth’s inhabitants we loved. Donaldson’s characters were not inhabitants; they were servants of the Land. The Land was the beginning and end of their purpose. From that purpose flowed power, unlike most fantasy literature where magic and power flow from a conjuring being.

Finally, Donaldson writes a well plotted, well paced novel. Never are we in one place too long. Never are the characters too ponderous or given to overlong philosophical debate. The story stands well against any told in fantasy literature.

I have to admit, Foul’s demise reminded me just a little of that horrible Star Trek episode, Day of the Dove, when the Enterprise crew and the Klingons who have invaded all drive out an alien life force by laughing at it. It’s not quite that foolish because Donaldson has set it up nicely. All through the trilogy, joy is center of all the characters’ lives. They live to bring joy to each other. They find joy in their service to the Land and the earthpower that flows from the Land brings them joy. It is not improper, therefore, for joy to be the ultimate weapon deployed against their tormentor.

Donaldson’s trilogy was well received at the time. Liner notes praising the story come from legends of fantasy and science fiction such as Clifford Simak, Robert Bloch, and Marion Zimmer Bradley. That is high praise indeed.

Few books have brought me as much pleasure as these. I don’t recall exactly how many times I’ve read the first trilogy, but it has been at least five and familiarity with the story has not reduced the joy of taking in Donaldson’s fantastic story told with astounding prose.

Shadow: Five Presidencies and the Legacy of Watergate

Shadow: Five Presidencies and the Legacy of Watergate
By Bob Woodward
Copyright 1999

Introduction
Bob Woodward played a formative role in the downfall of President Nixon, therefore is fully qualified to examine the legacy of Nixon’s deception of the country (as well as that of Lyndon Johnson) and how those lies and deceit changed the nature of the relationship of the presidency, the men who held the office, and the media.

The presidents who followed Nixon withstood greater scrutiny than their predecessors. They withstood it to varying degrees. Woodward examines the scandals that befell the Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton presidencies and how each president dealt with them.

He also examines the “Ethics in Government Act” and how that law that created the office of special prosecutor dramatically changed the relationship between the president, his attorney general, Congress, and the American people.

Gerald Ford
Woodward opens with a narrative account of a meeting between President Nixon and his chief of staff, Alexander Haig on August 1, 1974. Nixon has spent the evening prior listening to tapes of conversations he held with his then chief of staff, Bob Haldeman in June 1974. Nixon, who still believes he’s innocent of any wrongdoing, is a smart enough lawyer to comprehend the damning nature of the Smoking Gun tape. He knows it will end his presidency. He’s preparing to resign he tells Haig.

Al Haig immediately contacts Vice President Gerald Ford’s staff and informs them that they need to be prepared for a transition. He asks for permission to meet with Ford to prepare him for that transition. That meeting is set for the next day.

Inexplicably, Haig shows up at that meeting, not with notes on how an unprecedented transfer of power will take place, but with a list of pardon options for the man who will soon be president of the United States. He starts to list for Ford his options and the precedents of presidential pardons. Ford listens for awhile before telling Haig he will consider pardons later.

That meeting would cause Gerald Ford and his staff great trepidation in the months ahead.

Ford would assume the presidency on August 9, 1974 upon the resignation of Richard Nixon. Approximately one month later, Ford would grant Richard Nixon a full and unconditional pardon for all crimes that were committed in Watergate.

Woodward examines the behind the scenes battles among Ford’s staff over Nixon’s pardon. Most of Ford’s staff – especially his younger staffers – were against the pardon. They saw it as political suicide. Ford argued that constant questions about Watergate and Congress’ ongoing obsession with the scandal were hindering his ability to address the country’s problems which were vast and deep at the time. He wanted to put Watergate behind him and behind the country.

There was also a personal aspect to the Nixon pardon. Gerald Ford genuinely liked and cared about Richard Nixon. They had been colleagues in Congress for years and Ford had worked closely with Nixon’s White House. The reports he was receiving from San Clemente (Nixon’s home in political exile) were alarming. Nixon was physically frail, emotionally exhausted, and seemingly had lost the will to live. Ford was not going to allow the scandal to physically kill Richard Nixon the man as it had Richard Nixon the president.

The political backlash against President Ford upon his pardon of Nixon shocked him and even his most cynical staffers. Immediately, rumors of a secret deal between Ford and Nixon whereby Nixon would relinquish the presidency in exchange for the pardon developed. Congress was demanding a full scale investigation of this alleged deal.

To meet the challenge, Ford resolved to take the unprecedented step of going to Capitol Hill and testifying before a House subcommittee investigating the matter. Ford disclosed his meeting with Haig on August 2, but did not reveal its true substance. As Woodward put it, Ford hid the truth in plain site.

The pardon and the rumors of a secret deal haunted Jerry Ford throughout his presidency and for many years after. Time and the forgiving nature of the American people erased that ire, but there is little doubt that the pardon of Richard Nixon was the largest factor that cost Gerald Ford the presidency in 1976.

Jimmy Carter
Through the primaries of the 1976 election, Jimmy Carter’s stock line had been, “Hi. I’m Jimmy Carter and I’m running for president.” After the primaries, when everybody knew he was running for president, he came up with, “I’ll never lie to you.”

After Watergate and the uncertainty around President Ford and the pardon of Richard Nixon, it had a nice ring to it. It was simple and from the heart. But Carter’s campaign people – and even Carter’s own mother – tried to discourage him from using it. It was not a standard any president could meet.

Carter came to DC a decided outsider. He spurned the Washington establishment and brought in his own people from Georgia. Among those he brought with him was a banker named Bert Lance who was to serve as Carter’s budget director. Lance was Carter’s close friend and the two prayed together to start every morning.

It wasn’t long before Carter’s sterling reputation for honesty and squeaky clean deportment would take a serious hit. Bert Lance came to him one day in late 1977 and told him he was in deep financial trouble. He was heavily leveraged, heavily mortgaged, and Congress would soon be asking questions. Before the situation could taint Carter and his administration, Lance wanted to resign.

Carter thought it was nonsense. He refused to allow Lance to resign despite Lance’s reservations. It wasn’t long before Congress schooled Jimmy Carter in the ways of Washington.

The scandal broke into the mainstream when former Nixon speechwriter William Safire wrote a column in the New York Times about mismanagement at Calhoun First National Bank in Atlanta. Safire revealed assets double and triple leveraged, schemes to fool bank inspectors, and sweetheart loans for friends. The column won Safire the Pulitzer Prize.

Carter piously held onto Lance, despite the overwhelming appearance of impropriety. (Lance was later found not guilty of all charges related to Calhoun First National). Republicans were eager to take shots at Carter who, before the scandal, enjoyed high popularity. Democrats in Congress, whom Jimmy Carter immediately alienated upon his arrival in Washington, were not willing to expend any political capital on his behalf. Lance was doomed and eventually resigned – but not before putting a hit on Carter’s sterling reputation. Carter’s poll numbers went up and down for another year before starting their final plunge, but the American people never looked at Carter the same way again.

The combined congressional classes of 1974 and 1976 were eager to prevent future Watergates and future Saturday Night Massacres (referring to when Nixon fired special Watergate prosecutor Archibald Cox on Saturday, October 20, 1973). They authored the Ethics in Government Act which required a three judge panel to appoint an independent prosecutor to investigate wrong doing by administration officials. The threshold for triggering the act was exceptionally low (painfully low as Democrats would find out decades later). It didn’t take long for the law to find its first test case.

Hamilton Jordan was a young, brash good ole boy from Georgia who worked in the Carter administration, eventually becoming Carter’s Chief of Staff. But in 1978, his world came crashing down around him when the owners of New York’s notorious Studio 54 night club claimed that Jordan had used cocaine and tried to purchase cocaine at the club.

Forget that the charges were leveled by two men facing multiple felony drug and conspiracy counts. There was an appearance of wrong doing and an independent prosecutor was named. Jordan endured six months of hell as a lawyer armed with a staff of lawyers investigated the claims. Only two witnesses claimed to have seen Jordan use cocaine. Neither could provide specific dates, locations within the club, or other witnesses to corroborate their story. Eventually, the prosecutor cleared Jordan. But not before his reputation was smeared.

With weakness and political ineptitude being the hallmarks of the Carter presidency, Carter might have looked to hang his hat on the political peg of honesty. Despite the fact that no one had ever proven any of the charges against Carter’s men, his well known penchant for honesty in government was a joke by the 1980 election.

Ronald Reagan
Ronald Reagan’s ordeal with the independent prosecutor’s office would last much longer, be much more painful and result in real convictions – and deservedly so, because Reagan’s national security staff subverted Congress and the law to trade arms for hostages and to divert profits from illegal weapons sales to the Contra rebels in Nicaragua.

However, before Iran-Contra, was the quixotic investigation of EPA counsel Ted Olson. Olson’s case demonstrated how the Ethics in Government Act could be deployed for political purposes.

Democrats in Congress alleged that, in testifying before a congressional committee, Olson had deliberately withheld information about EPA policy. Of course he did. Testifying before a hostile Congress, the opposing party doles out as little information as possible. In 1986, three years after his testimony before the committee, some Democratic congressmen alleged that Olson had withheld documents and provided false and misleading testimony. The accusation had been made, creating an appearance of impropriety. A special prosecutor had to be appointed, even though Olson had been out of government for nearly three years.

Olson had the temerity to challenge the constitutionality of the Ethics in Government law. He claimed the law essentially established a fourth branch of government and usurped the congressional authority to oversee and check the executive branch. He lost in the Supreme Court with only Justice Scalia agreeing with his arguments.

The special prosecutor dissected Olson’s life. Olson had made casual remarks to some friends at a basketball game. They were summoned to testify. Olson himself withstood hours of grilling by the prosecutor and his staff. Millions of dollars were spent. The conclusion: Olson had been artful and evasive, but had not perjured himself or deliberately mislead Congress.

Another special prosecutor was needed to investigate Iran Contra in 1986. I have dissected and examined Iran-Contra in my review of Lou Cannon’s President Reagan: The Role of a Lifetime. Clearly, there was wrongdoing within Reagan’s National Security Council and Judge Lawrence Walsh was appointed as special prosecutor to oversee the investigation.

Walsh’s investigation would set the gold standard for slow, inefficient, sometimes mindless examination of facts and witnesses and would cost the taxpayers millions while yielding few convictions. Many of the convictions Walsh did obtain were overturned on appeal because of prosecutorial misconduct.

While Walsh managed to convict Admiral Richard Secord (overturned), Lt. Col. Oliver North (overturned), and Admiral John Poindexter (overturned), for trading arms to Iran in exchange for hostages held in Lebanon, and then taking cash earned in these transactions and diverting it to Contra rebels, he was never able to nail Reagan with the charges.

Reagan was in deep political trouble in 1986 at the height of Walsh’s inquiry and a competing congressional inquiry. There was talk of impeachment. Reagan’s standing with the public had taken a severe nosedive. However, Reagan did something that no president had ever done. He went on television and told the American people that what he’d told them earlier was not true; that people within his administration had misled him and the American people.

That solved Reagan’s political problem and got him through his presidency. It was not until 1991 that Walsh got around to cross examining Reagan. By then, it was too late. The Alzheimer’s that would eventually take his life was already at work on the former president. Not only could he not remember details, he could not remember the names of his closest aides. He did not provide any information the prosecutors could use. Walsh concluded that Reagan set the tone, allowed the crimes to be committed, but had not instigated any criminal activity nor been a participant in it.

But Walsh wasn’t done yet. A new president was soon to take office and Walsh set his sights on George Bush.

George Bush
If the Lawrence Walsh couldn’t nail a president in his years and millions of taxpayer dollars investigating Iran-Contra, perhaps he could nail the vice president. After it was clear to Walsh that Reagan’s declining mental faculties had put him out of reach, he set his sights on George Bush.

Ronald Reagan often complimented George Bush as the most effective and most engaged vice presidents in history. That was a true statement at the time. pessimists would argue that VP Dick Cheney was the power behind the George W. Bush presidency and one could make a strong case for the effectiveness of Joe Biden. George H.W. Bush was certainly the most engaged vice president since Richard Nixon served Dwight Eisenhower.

Yet, when suspicion began swirling around the vice president just as he was launching his own pursuit of the presidency, he fell back on the traditional role of the vice president as not being a figure in policy making. Bush argued he was “out of the loop” in Iran-Contra decision making.

History seems to have borne out the fact that Bush (despite his intelligence background) was not involved in the planning or execution of Iran Contra, his own journal entries as well as the testimony of Reagan advisors put him in the loop and in the know.

Walsh was desperate to show something for all the time and effort he’d put into his investigation. He decided to indict former defense secretary Casper Weinburger on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice for providing misleading testimony regarding Bush and Reagan. Walsh hoped to get Weinberger to divulge what Bush knew and when he knew it.

Walsh announced the Weinberger indictment on October 30, 1992, on the eve of the presidential election. Furthermore, Walsh’s statement directly implicated Bush in the plot, despite any tangible evidence other than Bush mentioning the episode in a couple passing diary entries.

Bush had run behind Clinton throughout the entire campaign, but had been closing the gap. The Walsh announcement took the wind out of the sails of the Bush campaign. George Bush, bitter and angry upon losing the campaign, took the wind out of Walsh’s sails, pardoning Cap Weinberger on Christmas Eve of 1992.

The Walsh investigation was a travesty that should have demonstrated to Congress just what a poor mechanism for oversight the special prosecutor was. Walsh didn’t release his final report until 1993 – seven years after he was appointed to investigate.

Walsh should have come away with more convictions than he did because there is no doubt that those within the Reagan intelligence community had thwarted the will of Congress. But because of his ineptitude, nobody got punished.

Bill Clinton
President Bill Clinton was destined to be a special prosecutor’s delight. An affable man who was exceptionally intelligent and as politically shrewd as any in Washington, he often had trouble telling the truth – even in the simplest of matters. Clinton’s series of half truths and outright lies soon landed him in the sights of the most onerous and prolonged investigations in American government history.

The Clintons – both Bill and Hillary – came under investigation after the New York Times reported the accusations of a Little Rock Banker, David Hale, that, while he was governor of Arkansas, Clinton had pressured him into providing loans to Jim and Susan McDougal.

The McDougals were partners in a land investment along the Whitewater River in Arkansas. The deal soured and the Clintons lost money. A federal investigation had implicated the McDougles in illegal doings, but found no evidence that either Clinton had done anything wrong. Nonetheless, there was an appearance of wrongdoing and that was enough to trigger the appointment of a special prosecutor. Robert Fiske

Fiske investigated the land deal. He was also handed the investigation of the death of Clinton aide and long time family friend, Vince Foster, who had apparently committed suicide in a Washington, D.C. park. Some speculated that Vince Foster may have been murdered and that records from when he and Hillary Clinton had worked together at the Rose Law Firm.

Fiske quickly disposed of the Foster investigation, concluding that there was no evidence of any foul play and that Vince Foster had indeed committed suicide. His ambiguous suicide letter, where he declared that Washington was a place where people were ruined for fun and sport, was the source of much speculation long after Fiske wrapped up his investigation.

On the same day Fiske released his report on the Foster death, Clinton signed a new law that changed the title of special prosecutor to independent counsel. With the change of title came a new investigator -- Ken Starr.

Starr soon found his operation the repository for a number of accusations of wrong doing by the Clintons. Starr was called upon to investigate the firings of employees of the White House Travel Office – allegedly ordered by Hilary Clinton. When some of Vince Foster’s files mysteriously appeared in the White House residence, seemingly out of thin air, Filegate as it came to be called, landed in Starr’s lap.

Ultimately, Starr would get convictions of Jim and Susan McDougle was well as Arkansas Governor, Jim Guy Tucker, for their roles in the botched Whitewater land investment. That alone gave Starr a better track record than Walsh.

Meanwhile, in Little Rock, an Arkansas government employee by the name of Paula Corbin Jones was suing Bill Clinton for having sexually harassed her in a Little Rock hotel room, groping her and inviting her to perform oral sex. A federal judge ruled that the lawsuit could go forward, ruling that the president of the United States was not immune from civil litigation. A criminal investigation was also proceeding.

Clinton was forced to provide grand jury testimony in the case. He testified that he’d not behaved in the manner in which Jones described. Prosecutors were trying to establish that Clinton had a pattern of behavior with women that lent credence to the Jones allegations. They had a list of women they suspected Clinton of having affairs with. One name on that list was a former White House intern named Monica Lewinsky. Clinton denied ever having a sexual relationship with Lewinsky. The die was cast for one of the most dramatic showdowns in U.S. government history.

Lewinsky’s name got on the list because a woman by the name of Linda Tripp had informed prosecutors that Lewinsky, a friend and coworker with her at the Pentagon public affairs office, had confided in her that she’d had a physical, sexual relationship with the president. Furthermore, she had tapes of phone conversations with Lewinsky discussing the relationship and how Lewinsky acted to make sure that evidence such as gifts exchanged could be returned to cover up the relationship.

Lewinsky had signed a false affidavit in the Jones case, saying she did not have a physical relationship with the president. Starr knew he had this young girl cornered before she even knew that the independent counsel was looking at her.

Starr forced Lewinsky to recant her affidavit, offering her immunity from prosecution. Lewinsky would go on to testify, in graphic detail, each sexual encounter she had with the president.

Bill Clinton was once again forced to testify in a grand jury. This time, they were looking into the possibility the president had committed perjury and obstructed justice. The testimony, later released to the public, was not one of Clinton’s finer moments as he parsed the meaning of the word, “is” and gave evasive answers.

When the case went public, Clinton’s people opened up a new front in the battle. Through Whitewater, Vince Foster, Travelgate, and Filegate, the fights had all been handled by lawyers and courts. Now, the Clinton people started an all out war on Starr politically, trashing his reputation and making him appear to be an overzealous partisan on a witch hunt.

That was not true of Ken Starr early on. Woodward’s sources demonstrate a Ken Starr who respected the president and the presidency and pursued his investigation doggedly, but within the confines of his mandate and without an accompanying political campaign. The turning point, which one can conclude, turned the investigation into a truly sordid episode in American history came when Ken Starr attempted to resign to take a job as Dean of Law at Pepperdine University.

Clinton’s political attack dog, James Carville, took to the talk shows, calling Starr a coward and demanded that he stay and finish the job he started. Had Carville let Starr go, another prosecutor may have been more measured in his behavior than Starr was after the political attack. Instead, an angry, bitter, Ken Starr agreed to stay on. But he was angry at having his reputation besmirched by the likes of Carville. Starr’s tactics changed. Instead of an impartial lawyer, he became a political warrior.

From that point on, Starr’s release of information was timed to bring maximum embarrassment to Clinton. Finally, Clinton was backed into a political corner when it was revealed that semen on a dress owned by Lewinsky contained his DNA.

Clinton took to television and, in an angry, bitter address, admitted that he had had an improper relationship with Lewinsky. He denied he’d done anything illegal and from that point on, the matter was one between himself, his family, and his God.

Starr wasn’t going to let Clinton or his friends off that easy. He prepared a report to the House Judiciary Committee detailing what he believed to be incidents of perjury and obstruction of justice. The law stated that he needed to advise the committee of any impeachable offenses he found. But Starr went one step further in his report, actually advocating impeachment. He then released his salacious report which was 50 percent legalese and 50 percent cheap romantic novel. It was a bombshell.

The rest was history of the highest drama. The House Judiciary Committee voted out four articles of impeachment. While they deliberated, someone released information that Rep. Henry Hyde (R-IL) who chaired the judiciary committee had carried on affair thirty years prior. Allegations of an affair came out against Clinton’s chief antagonist in the House, Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN). Eventually, allegations of an affair took down House Speaker Robert Livingston who had just taken over the job from the disgraced Newt Gingrich who had a litany of moral and legal issues that drove him from office. Livingston promptly resigned from the speakership and the House, inviting Clinton to do the same.

The House voted on and passed two articles of impeachment, mostly along party lines. In a moment of historical high drama, Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-IL) and his delegation met Senate Majority Leader, Trent Lott (R-MS) in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol and formally delivered the articles to the Senate.

A trial was held in the Senate. All through the trial, public opinion showed that the American people thought that Clinton was a scumbag, but had made a good faith effort to conduct his office in a legal manner. His approval rating was in the 60s. Democrats in the Senate knew they had the political cover to vote for acquittal no matter what kind of case prosecutors put forward.

Wary Republicans and Democrats not too pleased with their president tried to find a means through which the drama of a president on trial could be avoided, yet see that Clinton was properly rebuked for his behavior. The idea of presidential censure was bandied about.

One of the most outspoken opponents of censure was my boss at the time, Sen. Mike DeWine (R-OH). DeWine, a trial lawyer and a man well acquainted with the Constitution, said that the Constitution laid out the remedy for a president who had broken the law and that censure was not a constitutional remedy. DeWine and his colleagues won the day. The trial went forward.

The senate voted not to remove Bill Clinton from office. But the Clinton presidency and his place in history are forever tainted. Soon after the vote, Starr wrapped up his investigation.

What emerges from the Clinton episode is that Bill Clinton was the cause of all of his own problems. He admitted that his administration, early on, were amateurs who bungled the travel office firings, the handling of the Vince Foster files, and the Rose Law Firm files. Clinton, like Nixon, sometimes parted ways from the truth and got away with it. Like Nixon, Clinton made enemies that would gladly use a sword thrust into their hands by the target of their ire. The political shenanigans of the Clinton White House in its early years coupled by Bill Clinton’s behavior with Monica Lewinsky and the lies he told to try to get out of it were the stuff of such swords. While his enemies did not slay him with that sword, they certainly did permanent damage.

Starr’s conduct later in the scandal was also beyond the pale. The notorious Starr report should never have been released in the manner in which it was written. Starr wanted to stab back at the Clinton people who had dragged his name through the mud. Much like Lawrence Walsh, he acted vindictively when he laid out the case for Clinton’s impeachment, far beyond his legislative mandate.

It was an episode that should have never happened. Clinton’s enemies were overzealous in taking advantage of the special prosecutor/independent counsel statute. They could produce just the flimsiest of evidence to trigger an investigation.

Clinton just could not bring himself to tell the truth when cornered. His entire career was checkered with lies and half truths. He also left a trail of women who alleged they’d had sexual relationships with him and at least two women came forward to say that Clinton forced himself upon them. Whether or not they were all true, some were. And Bill Clinton put himself in that position of not being believable. Then to be so reckless as to engage in a sexual relationship with an immature intern and put the country through nearly two years of political trauma was Clintons’ greatest misdeed. He and his behavior put this country through a needless constitutional crisis when it should have been enjoying some of the happiest and most tranquil times in its history.

I am fortunate to have actually lived day to day with this historic event. I worked in one of Sen. DeWine’s state offices, answering the phones and discussing events with hundreds of people as they unfolded. I was but a minor staffer and speechwriter, but I consider it a rare privilege to have been on the front lines of such historic events, however unpleasant and tawdry they might have been.

Conclusion
Woodward states that none of his successors truly learned the lessons of Watergate – that every deed committed in good faith or bad, was subject to the scrutiny of this ambiguous fourth branch of government. Woodward concludes that Watergate diminished the presidency inviting unprecedented scrutiny of presidential behavior – official and unofficial. I disagree.

To be president is to make huge decisions with huge ramifications. Sometimes, especially in crisis, those decisions can take a president outside the boundaries of the law. Ford may have not been truthful in talking about pardon discussions with Al Haig, but history has borne out Ford’s decision to pardon Nixon as the correct one.

I make no secret that I find Jimmy Carter to be a poor president and loathsome person. However, he made the correct call in standing by Bert Lance at least early on. A president willing to jettison aides at the first hint of scandal will not earn his staff’s loyalty. The Hamilton Jordan fiasco followed by the Ted Olson non-scandal should have served as evidence that the Ethics in Government Act was a horrible statute that was as effective in ruining the reputations of the innocent as anything perpetrated by the Red Baiters of the 1950s.

Iran-Contra certainly deserved scrutiny. But instead of employing a half-assed, vindictive jerk like Lawrence Walsh, Congress should have used the Watergate model of appointing a committee to investigate, take testimony, and forward it to the justice department for action. Yes, there was an Iran Contra committee, but Daniel Inouye’s committee did not come close to achieving the results of Sam Ervin’s Watergate committee. Walsh’s political indictment of Cap Weinberger will always taint him as a bitter man willing to influence elections and ruin reputations to justify his own incompetence. The fact that so many who were guilty escaped punishment while Walsh pursued what he regarded as big fish put the exclamation point on that tarnish.

The book ends shortly before the end of the Clinton presidency. Like Nixon, Clinton turned to foreign affairs where he had unmitigated influence. But Bill Clinton – the leader of domestic tranquility was diminished badly. No major legislation passed after the scandal. Domestic policy seemed to have shut down. Meanwhile, bubbling within the dark chambers of Wall Street, was the dotcom fiasco. Clinton’s people never made a move to defuse the crisis that would destroy the retirement plans of so many Baby Boomers.

Thankfully, the independent counsel law is dead. We still have the Constitution that clearly provides Congress with the legal means to investigate the actions of the executive branch.

Book to Movie: Stand By Me (1986

Book to Movie: Stand By Me (1986)
Screenplay by Raynold Gideon and Bruce A. Evans
Directed by Rob Reiner
Based on the Stephen King novella, The Body

Stephen King’s novella, The Body, from Different Seasons, was made into a movie entitled Stand By Me in 1986. It starred River Phoenix, Wil Wheaton, Corey Feldman, and Jerry O’Connell. The movie was an instant hit, established Rob Reiner as a serious director and producer, and introduced Stephen King to mainstream movie audiences.

While the story closely follows the novella in its actions, its primary focus is changed. The novella, told as a first person narrative by character Gordie LaChance (played as a child by Wheaton and as an adult by Richard Dreyfuss), is a character study of four 12 year old boys and an examination of how the transformation from childhood to adolescence brings about changes that erode old friendships.

The movie is a character study of LaChance alone. Although the four boys all retain their formative roles in the story, the character of Gordie LaChance is fundamentally altered to make the story revolve around him.

We know from the very beginning where the story is going to end. At the end of the novella, Gordie relates to us the sad ending to the difficult life of his buddy, Chris Chambers (played by Phoenix). In the opening scene of the movie, we see the middle aged Gordon LaChance sitting along the country road where they found the dead boy years before, holding a newspaper. The headline of one of the stories visible in the paper tells of the murder of local attorney Chris Chambers. From there, Dreyfuss leads us into the narrative.

In King’s novella, Gordie’s older brother, who died in a military Jeep accident, is a remote figure in Gordie’s life. So much older than he, his brother and him had little in common. In the movie, through flashback scenes, we are shown that Denny LaChance is young Gordie’s hero. While his parents heap praise on Denny at the dinner table for his sports exploits and his attractive girlfriend, Denny tries to divert their attention to a new story Gordie has written. Gordie’s parents are dismissive, but Denny knows his brother is talented.

In another scene that is not in the novella, before he ships out, Denny gives Gordie his Yankee’s ball cap. We find that Gordie treasures that cap when, as he is walking through town, he and Chris Chambers are accosted by bullies Ace Merrill and Eyeball Chambers. The bullies steal the cap and Gordie is willing to fight hard against the town’s nastiest bully to get that cap back.

The changes strengthen LaChance’s character and sets up the movie nicely to center around the changes he experiences in the coming of age story.

Almost without deviation, the story of the trip down the train tracks proceeds. The other significant deviation from the King story comes at climatic confrontation between the four boys and the bullies over the dead body of Ray Brower. Instead of Chris Chambers producing the gun and firing at the feet of Ace Merrill, it is Gordie. The sullen Gordie is suddenly hard and animated, standing off Ace and his buddies and scoring a moral victory for himself and his friends.

Reiner ends his film nicely. Richard Dreyfuss tells us of how the four friends drifted apart over the next year, just as Chris Chambers had predicted they would and how Chris has opted for the college track, fought hard, and made it through high school, college, and law school. In the novella, Chambers was still a college student when he died and we had no foreknowledge of Chambers’ fate. But, Dreyfuss relates the sad tale of how lawyer Chris Chamber met his sad end.

The movie wraps up as author Gordon LaChance sits at his monochrome word processor typing the final words of his story. He states that the best friends he ever had were the friends he had when he was 12. He then shuts down the word processor and heads off with his wife and kids.

The Body and the book Different Seasons were Stephen King’s first published efforts at mainstream fiction and Stand By Me was the first movie based upon a King work that was made for the mainstream. Audiences who shunned King’s work and movies based upon it were amazed to learn who had penned such a marvelous character study.

Three of the four boys who starred in the movie went on to great fame. Jerry O’Connell never achieved the fame that Phoenix, Feldman, and Wheaton did, but is still a working actor and recognized talent in Hollywood.

Rob Reiner has, of course, gone on to achieve great things, make great movies, win many awards, and establish himself as a great director and producer. He had directed and produced several films before Stand By Me, but none as important.

Stand By Me is one of those rare movies that I enjoyed as much as the story upon which it was based. This is remarkable considering the fundamental change in the nature of the story that I enjoyed so much. Reiner’s interpretation of King’s work was not necessarily an improvement to the King story, but it made for a much more engaging and emotionally uplifting movie. That is why it is still recognized as one of the finer films ever made and ranks near the top of all King’s screen adaptations.

Book to Movie: The Shawshank Redemption (1994)

Book to Movie: The Shawshank Redemption (1994)
Screenplay by Frank Darabont
Directed by Frank Darabont
Based on the novella Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King from the collection, Different Seasons

In 1994, Frank Darabont, a writer of some low budget, low quality horror such as Nightmare on Elm Street 3, took on the project of adapting Stephen King’s novella of hope, Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, to the big screen. He captures the essence of the King story and is true to King’s theme of hope not lost through decades of struggle. But his motion picture is substantially different than King’s novella.

The opening of Darabont’s movie sees Andy on trial and convicted for murdering his wife and her lover at a remote cottage. As the prosecutor delivers his summation, we’re treated to cutaway scenes of a drunk Andy sitting in his car, pondering his gun. Darbont never conclusively states that Andy is innocent, but one comes away from the scene believing he’s been unjustly convicted.

Andy and the new “fresh fish” arrive at the prison to the taunts of other prisoners who scream and yell at them as they are paraded through the yard to be processed and imprisoned. Inmates, including our narrator, Red, take bets on which of the new cons will break down first.

We’re introduced to two characters who are important to King’s story, but are not developed as Andy and the other cons are introduced to prison. In the novella, Andy’s stay at Shawshank is overseen by a few wardens. In the movie, the warden who comes out to greet the prisoners is Andy’s overseer for the decades he spends at Shawshank.

The other new character who is much more a part of the movie is the captain of the guard, Captain Hadley, played by the large, baritone-voiced Clancy Brown (a native of little Urbana, OH). An inmate who dares ask when they are going to eat is beaten badly by Hadley at the warden’s command. The villains of the picture are established.

In the night, one of the new fish breaks down and begins sobbing for his mother. The inmates cheer until Hadly shows up to silence the frightened man. He drags him into the middle of the cell block and beats him badly. The inmates are silenced by the raw brutality of the beating. They learn the next day the man died in the infirmary.

From here, the movie moves much as King’s plot with the strong friendship between Red and Andy developing and Andy’s desire first for a rock hammer and then for the poster of Rita Hayworth.

For the picture to work, it’s obvious that Darbont was going to need to develop just a few more characters beyond Red and Andy. He incorporates a number of prisoners who bear scant mention in King’s text and adds a pitiful old prisoner who serves as the librarian. When Andy makes his move to help Hadley protect is finances, Andy is assigned to help Brooks Hatlen run the library. It is from the library that Andy runs his finance program. He’s also invited by the warden to help with the finances of his new inmate work program; to launder the proceeds and make the warden rich.

Later, poor old Hatlen (played by James Whitmore) is paroled into a world he doesn’t know or understand and ends up committing suicide.

What is remarkable about Darabont’s Shawshank Prison is that it is populated almost entirely by white people. With the exception of Red (played by Morgan Freeman), the inmate population is exclusively white. Whoever cast extras for this movie (and most of the extras came from the Mansfied, OH area where the movie was shot) really botched the job or Darabont is not up on historical or modern criminal sociology.

What is also not believable about Darabont’s picture is the nature of the criminals who are housed at Shawshank. The notorious Sisters of King’s novella are there, and they are ugly, but most of Darabont’s criminals are noble men. Deep friendships and mutual support exists among the core group of inmates. Again, it belies what is commonly known about prison, even in the 1940s. Most men incarcerated in prison are bad dudes and many of them are sociopaths. We don’t see this side of prison life in Shawshank Redemption.

There is a minor deviation from the story regarding the fate of the young, cocky kid who comes to Shawshank and tells Andy that another man has confessed to his wife’s murder. In the novella, when Andy pleads with the warden to be allowed to retain a lawyer, the warden has the young inmate transferred out. In the movie, the warden schemes to have him shot. I like this change. It demonstrates how cold and ruthless the warden and Captain Hadley are.

Andy’s escape from Shawshank and the search that results play out as King wrote them, but the set up is different. In the movie, Andy steals a suit and shoes from the warden and smuggles them back to his cell and secrets them out of the prison. We see a neat and tidy Andy, with spit shined shoes walk into a local bank and remove money from a savings account. Red tells us that there were many of these accounts in many banks in the area.

In King’s story, Andy had a friend set all of this up for him. In the movie, we learned that Andy, in the course of handling the warden’s ill gotten gains, sets up accounts under fictitious names. As Andy jokingly tells Red, he was an upstanding citizen on the outside. He had to come to prison to become a criminal.

Darabont, having established how ruthless, evil, and corrupt the prison administration was, injects a bit of revenge into the climax as well. We see an envelope arrive on the desk of a newspaper reporter. Red tells us that the contents documented the ongoing corruption and brutality at the prison. We see the Attorney General and state troopers rush into the prison and arrest Hadley. The warden puts a pistol to his head as the troopers break down the door. On the wall hangs an embroidered scripture that reads, “His judgment cometh and soon.”

Red gets his parole and just as in the story, goes searching for that volcanic rock secreted under a tree in a Maine field. He finds it and heads south. The novella ends with Red waiting to cross the border. The movie ends with Red locating Andy on the shores of the Pacific Ocean in Mexico.

The movie is the highest regarded of all of the movies based on Stephen King’s work and ranks as the number one movie of all time on IMDB.com’s list of the top 250 movies of all time. It is a delightful movie bordering on great. But it is not deserving of such lofty praise.

King’s story inspires hope and contains a positive message. Darabont’s film goes one step further into sappiness. The story is a first person narrative told by a man with a simple way of telling a story. The narrative written for Morgan Freeman flows as if written by a poet. The strong bond between the cons belies the reality of prison life.

Perhaps the most telling scene of how Darabont goes just a little too far in his quest for uplifting melodrama is when Andy receives a shipment of records for his library. He puts an Italian aria on the turntable and turns on the prison intercom so everybody can hear the shrill voices of the opera singers. Everyone stops what they’re doing and looks into the air, transfixed by the music as if they were all enraptured by opera. The scene is foolish and stupid and made me laugh when I saw it.

But just as that scene was stupid, the scene of Andy, having crawled through half a mile of raw sewage, standing in an open field, arms to the sky, taking in the rain as it showers him clean, is powerful and iconic. Bravo, Mr. Darabont for giving the film such a powerful, iconic image.

The movie undoubtedly has shortcomings, but it is still a great movie. Tim Robbins turns in the best performance of his career as Andy and Morgan Freeman peformance soars, both as an actor portraying Red and as the narrator of the movie. And despite the necessary new characters and plot deviations, Darabont captures King’s theme of “Hope springs eternal,” that he established so masterfully in his short tale.

This would not be Darabont’s last King adaptation. He would take on King’s second prison story, The Green Mile with what I regard as much more success. He would go on to masterfully recreate the King novella, The Mist. When one examines the totality of King’s work translated to the visual media, one can only conclude that, in totality, no one did it better than Darabont.

The movie was a tremendous box office success and garnered 12 Oscar nominations and seven Oscars. Mainstream audiences flocked to see the film, not knowing that it was based on a work written by the man snobbish literary critics dismiss as America's Schlockmeister. With the movie, Stand By Me, which also came from Different Seasons, King proves that his work can entertain, move, and inspire audiences of all types.
The movie was filmed at the Mansfield Reformatory in Mansfield, OH. The outside scenes were filmed in the city and a rural area near Malabar Farms State Park near Mansfield.

On August 1, 2011, high winds from a thunderstorm knocked down that famous tree where Red found the keys to his salvation. The oak tree, estimated to be 175 years old, hat rotted from within and half of it fell to the ground. Although half of it is still standing, its survival is very much in doubt. The story of the tree's demise received nationwide coverage.