Blockade Billy

I think I'm in the minority among King's readers: I think that some of his most powerful writing comes when he avoids using supernatural elements in his stories, and that his short work is much better than the longer stuff he's better known for. The modern publishing industry hasn't been knd to the novella, but King is an absolute master of the form.

As a result, I was pretty excited for Blockade Billy, which for the most part is a classical Americana story – two old men sittinig down to talk about baseball. Then, near the end, the story twists, adding a horrific element to it. It was a pretty good story, familiar but not predictable: my only quibble was that I didn't see how the consequences of the story's climax necessarily followed from the climax itself.

Even creepier was the ‘b-side' story, Morality, a story about what people will do for money and how difficult it can be to escape those decisions.