Les premières phrases

«  On the second day of December in a year when a Georgia peanut farmer was doing business in the White House, one of Colorado’s great resort hotels burned to the ground. The Overlook was declared a total loss. After an investigation, the fire marshal of Jicarilla County ruled the cause had been a defective boiler. The hotel was closed for the winter when the accident occurred, and only four people were present. Three survived. The hotel’s off-season caretaker, John Torrance, was killed during an unsuccessful (and heroic) effort to dump the boiler’s steam pressure, which had mounted to disastrously high levels due to an inoperative relief valve.

Two of the survivors were the caretaker’s wife and young son. The third was the Overlook’s chef, Richard Hallorann, who had left his seasonal job in Florida and come to check on the Torrances because of what he called « a powerful hunch » that the family was in trouble. Both surviving adults were quite badly injured in the explosion. Only the child was unhurt.

Physically, at least. »

Circonstances de lecture

Acheté à Londres chez Hatchards. Parce que c’est la suite de « The Shining » !

Impressions

C’est avec plaisir que l’on retrouve le petit garçon de « The Shining », devenu adulte. Succombera-t-il aux mêmes maux que son père, à commencer par son problème d’alcoolisme ? Parviendra-t-il à vivre avec son don ? Et qu’arrivera-t-il lorsqu’il rencontrera une petite fille encore plus douée que lui ? « Doctor Sleep » n’est pas aussi angoissant que « The Shining ». C’est plutôt un roman fantastique où le mal n’est jamais bien loin…  Une bonne suite cependant, qui se lit d’une traite.

Un passage parmi d’autres

 Two years later, on the day before the Thanksgiving break, halfway up a deserted stairwell in Alafia Elementary, Horace Derwent appeared to Danny Torrance. There was confetti on the shoulders of his suit. A little black mask hung from one decaying hand. He reeked of the grave. « Great party, isn’t it? » he asked.

Danny turned and walked away, very quickly.

When school was over, he called Dick long-distance at the restaurant where Dick worked in Key West. « Another one of the Overlook People found me. How many boxes can I have, Dick? In my head, I mean. »

Dick chuckled. « As many as you need, honey. That’s the beauty of the shining. You think my Black Grampa’s the only one I ever had to lock away? »

« Do they die in there? »

This time there was no chuckle. This time there was a coldness in Dick’s voice the boy had never heard before. « Do you care? »

Danny didn’t.

When the onetime owner of the Overlook showed up again shortly after New Year’s – this time in Danny’s bedroom closet – Danny was ready. He went into the closet and closed the door. Shortly afterward, a second mental lockbox went up on the high mental shelf beside the one that held Mrs Massey. There was more pounding, and some inventive cursing that Danny saved for his own later use. Pretty soon it stopped. There was silence from the Derwent lockbox as well as the Massey lockbox. Whether or not they were alive (in their undead fashion) no longer mattered.

What mattered was they were never getting out. He was safe.

That was what he thought then. Of course, he also thought he would never take a drink, not after seeing what it had done to his father.

Sometimes we just get it wrong.

Doctor Sleep – Stephen King – 2013 (Hodder & Stoughton)