Finished: July 30, 2024
Why I read this
Simply put, Stephen King is my safe author. Out of everything I’ve read in my life he is by far the single author I am the most familiar with, and coming back to his works again and again is a bit like putting on a well worn in pair of shoes. However, in some of his more recent works I’ve found myself a bit dissapointed. Fairy Tale and The Institute, for example, felt flat and uninspired compared to some of his earlier, and scarier, horror classics like Salem’s Lot or The Stand. There’s probably a reason that when people talk about Stephen King it is always this period. They don’t bring up Finder’s Keepers, opting to talk about 70’s and 80’s classics like The Shining, Carrie, Pet Sematary, or of course Cujo. So after my recent positive experience diving back into King with Misery I decided Cujo might be just the thing to warm back up to him.
What I learned
Cujo marks the thirtieth King story I’ve either read or listened to (and it is shocking to think that this doesn’t even touch half of his overall content). I was hoping to find again that classic King writing that makes you just a little scared when you walk outside at night. After all, are there many things more frightening than a mad dog? Unfortunately, Cujo, while fairly entertaining, failed to deliver that extra spark. The setting, is our familiar rural Maine (as always), and the main narrative consisting of the Trenton family dealing with multiple crises (Father, a marketing man, trying to save his company after a product recall, Mother trying to fix her marriage after having an affaire, and son growing up with a larger than normal and more than justified fear of the dark) leading to a days long stand-off with the titular Cujo, allows the story to flow along steadily, but it does not produce a riveting story. It was juste not one of those great stories that each time you have to put it down you’re left asking with anticipation “well what next”?
So, instead of focusing on the mild horror of the narrative, I was instead curious to find how my mind continued to stick on themes that felt almost unrelated to the overall story. One such example was during an argument between our father (Vic Trenton) and our mother (Donna Trenton) over her infidelity, Donna complained of men’s continuous quest for “why”. She was bothered that he couldn’t just take the affaire at face value. That he needed to know why, and once he knew why, to improve, to optimise. She made the claim that men were this way, and for some reason this specific sentiment stuck with me. When you think about it, it’s a strange comment for someone to make. In this situation it is obvious that knowing “the why” is very important. You don’t have an affaire and then just say “oops” and move on. Secondly, it discredits women (herself) to make the point that curiosity, exploration, discovery is for men. Sure, history has more examples of scientists and philosophers who are men, but that is a result of the times, not a biological fact. We hear often of the small sexisms, or how our system is constructed to direct slowly, but concretely, the two genders in certain ways, but I’ve not noticed so many blatant instances such as this one. Cujo probably sold millions of copies in the early 80’s and into the 90’s. How many people were ever subtely affected by this statement, from a leading author of the period, to believe that the question of “why” is the domain of men?
A second thing that stuck with me more than it probably should have had to do with Vic’s solution to his marketing challenges. It stuck with me because it sounded just like a story I had heard in How to Win Friends and Influence People which is possibly my most frequently pinged mental reference. Not to give it too much away, but the idea being that people want accountability and companies can go a long way by simply saying “you trusted us, and we messed up, we are sorry and we will do better.” Frankly, that phrase or idea is magic. As long as said company is not doing this every day and constantly screwing up, it is hard to argue with it. I think humans want to be forgiving, it makes people feel magnanimous and that makes them feel important. Its also something I feel that is very rarely used by large corporations/politicians and I do not know why. Emphatically saying you’re sorry can be a get out of jail free card, yet most people would rather stick themselves with a shitty situation than to admit we are wrong. I do wonder the extent of how far this could work though. For example, if a perpetual liar such as Donald Trump were to admit he were wrong, or had lied, or had made some mistakes, would it hurt or help his approval ratings? How much of a hole can “sorry” get you out of? Honestly, I would bet it can get you out of a lot more than most people would imagine.
Overall, I think Cujo was fine for a beach read, but it left me with very little that I will take with me going forward. I usually like King stories. They are richly descriptive and narratively complete, making them easy, ejoyable reads. However, Cujo has gone to show me even further a suspicion I’ve had for a while that King’s stories often lack the depth I’ve started to be exposed to in other authors. Cujo himself was frightening, but even after a 16 hour audio book on the subject of rabid dogs, I think the scene in To Kill a Mockingbird where atticus kills the rabid dog lurching down the street will remain my reference for life of what a rabid dog looks or acts like.
What I didn’t like
Honestly, I felt this book was so close to being something better. Each individual piece had the makings to come together to form a really nice story, but I felt that the connections between them didn’t quite stick. For example there were constant references to a certain Frank Dodd, a serial killer in the same small town as our story, who may or may not have been a malignant spirit controlling Cujo, but this was never addressed. Normally Kings best horror involves the other wordly, people who are psychokinetic or telepathic. The idea that someone could be so evil, so deranged that their sould could continue to haunt a place years after their death and to invade the minds of creatures of people alike (such as a St. Bernard with a weakened mind from rabies) is a really scary idea. Instead, the story rolled out as more or less a standard case of rabies that fell with exceptionally bad circumstances (hot summer, family on vacation, car in need of repair, etc.) with only vague references to this supernatural, and truly frightening idea.
Questions I asked
Do authors understand the enormous cultural impact that they have? King sells millions of books, does he think about how his messages might impact the public before writing his characters?
Why are we so bad at admitting we are wrong?
Do things get more or less frightening over time? Are certain generations more likely to be scared of a rabid dog for example?
My Favorite Quote
“The world was full of monsters, and they were all allowed to bite the innocent and the unwary.”
Vic Trenton
Books I liked like this one
Salem’s Lot : Stephen King (for the best of original King)
To Kill a Mockingbird : Harper Lee (for a more impactful story including a rabid dog)
Book Reviews for Mom 