![]() ![]() ![]() These issues threaten to trap The Running Man in an odd, paradoxical stasis. ![]() Minor characters are drawn so broadly that they verge on stereotype. While we sympathize with Ben Richards at the book's center, it is hard to identify with him. King's usual adeptness at characterization is largely absent. Without a pause for anything approaching depth, however, this style works both for and against the novel. In the prefatory essay for the 1985 anthology The Bachman Books, King states that The Running Man may be the best of the four initial Richard Bachman novels: "it's nothing but story," he comments, "and anything which is not story is cheerfully thrown over the side." For the most part, King's assessment proves out: written over a period of seventy-two hours, The Running Man is generally propulsive. Maybe someone else would pay some dues before it was all over ![]()
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