Like a lot of his fellow wealthy liberal intellectuals in the arts, Stephen King is staunchly anti-Trump. So you can’t help wondering if his latest book might be a sort of veiled political statement about the abuses of power big government can wield in the shadows. The Institute is a bit like The Shop, the sinister unnamed government organisation that pursued Charlie McGee in King’s 1980 book Firestarter.
The Institute similarly kidnaps and imprisons children who show latent talents for mental telepathy and telekinesis, augmenting and amplifying their abilities through abusive and inhumane treatment and forcing them to assassinate political figures remotely. The young hero, Luke, finds himself stolen from his parents and whisked away to a nightmarish new life, but he’s smart enough to plan an escape and bust his incredible new friends out in the process.
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