Blaze - Stephen King - 3 stars

I read this book as a buddy read with a friend. This was the only Bachman book I had not read by King, so I thought I would give it a shot. Was this a masterpiece? No. not even close, but I did find it somewhat entertaining and it does seem to fit in with the Bachman books. If you read King or you are a fan, you learn his writing style pretty quickly and you can tell that this is one of his earlier novels. Even though, I still thought that the book moved along with a decent pace and with the mix of dark, dry humor, it kept me engaged in the story.

Our characters are rather eccentric, and I think they were wrote this way on purpose, kind of like the good cop, bad cop routine. George, the evil go getter who thinks he is entitled to everything, and then there is Blaze, who is not very bright to start, due to beatings he received as a child, becomes a small time delinquent throughout his life, meets George and now worships the ground he walks on and would do anything he says. Blaze is wrote in a way that readers will feel bad for him at one point, and then angry at him the next, so they end up on a fence, do I like him or do I not? You get a decent amount of backstory on Blaze, but next to nothing on George, which is ok since Blaze is our main character.

I still would recommend this book to others who like King just because it is was the 'lost' Bachman book. I also think this really allows us to see the growth in King's writing. This is probably not for everyone, but king fans will definitely appreciate it.