Like a Hollywood actor or director who’s been in the industry for decades, Stephen King has had ups and downs, and his latest short story anthology is the perfect example of it.
Novel-length stories need a plot, and that’s always been one of King’s biggest strengths as a writer, so even though he’s had some awesome short stories in his career, his long form work has been more consistently cohesive (regardless of whether you like the story he’s telling).
Short stories can be much more about style than substance, and there are a couple of tales in You Like it Darker where it feels like King’s just being experimental, in areas that aren’t his usual wheelhouse, and which don’t really hold up creatively and aren’t very reader-focused.
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