It was when Bobby read the inscription on the inside cover of the paperback, from Ted to Carol. And although there are touching moments throughout most of these stories (“Why We’re In Vietnam” is probably the exception), it was this story that finally brought tears to my eyes. Bobby Garfield returns home for his old friend’s funeral. “Heavenly Shades of Night are Falling,” the final story in the collection is the shortest of all of the stories. That’s not to take anything away from the story, but when good stories are in great company, even the good ones have difficulty keeping up. I think “Why We’re In Vietnam” was my least favorite of the bunch. It has even occurred to me that they do exactly what Bill Shearman did in this story. It was completely unexpected and yet, in some way, I’ve often wonder about the “Blind Willies” of the world and what they do when the sun starts to go down. Stephen King also read the next story, “Blind Willie.” Much shorted than the first two stories, I really enjoyed this one.

But as a reader, I just loved what King did. This takes nothing away from Linsday Crouse’s reading.

He knows better than anyone else what he meant, what he envisioned, the voices of the characters that spoke through him. Listening to King read his own story in the audio book convinced me that all things being equal, he is probably the best possible person to read his stories. Stephen King narrated “Hearts in Atlantis” and as I suggested in my earlier post, he got it just right. It was helped along by the fact that I could related to the dorm life in some way. “Hearts in Atlantis” was a good story in the holistic sense of the word. I did the same, working in various parts of the dorm cafeteria, dish room, server, custodial, you name it, for the better part of four years.

Peter and Carol both worked in the dorm cafeteria. But I couldn’t help picturing my college campus, and the dorms I lived in the first two years, in 19. The story takes place on a college campus in Maine in 1966. What I liked about the story was the way all of the characters, all of them, came to life. My favorite story in the book turned out to be the second story, the title story, “Hearts in Atlantis.” Unlike “Low Men” there was nothing particularly surreal about this story, except for perhaps the never-ending card game going on in the men’s dorm. As it turns out, it was close, but not quite. I was sure that it was going to be my favorite story in the book. I’ve already written about my thoughts on the first story in the book, “The Low Men in Yellow Coats.” This story, and the last story in the book are the two stories upon which the movie was rather loosely based. I finished reading Hearts in Atlantis while on my walk today.

Stephen king book hearts in atlantis