Duma Key, book review. (Stephen King)

Unlike Cell, which felt like a shortened version of a long story, Duma Key, felt like a longer version of a short story, something which is borne out by comments I have read on the internet.

Eddie Freemantle, is an ex-construction guy, who's lost an arm in an accident. He wakes up in a spiral of depression, beats his wife, who then files for divorce, and has an itching limb that no longer exists - something which I understand is true for some amputees.

So, on advice from friends and his doctor, Eddie make for Florida and ends up renting Salmon Point, (Big Pink), a large detached villa, with the most amazing views across the Gulf of Mexico.

To date, Eddie has no more than sketched a few doodles, but suddenly, and with great gusto, he begins to draw; an activity which brings him much relief.

He draws his daughter with the man she is engaged to, (even though he's never met him), he draws his old accountant, dead, calls his ex-wife and convinces her that he thinks the old boy is about to commit suicide, and saves his life. He draws his ex-wife's new flower tattoo, the one he's never seen, and he draws the face of a stranger, a man who's kidnapped and murdered a young girl, but he draws him without a nose or mouth, and the next day, said kidnapper has suffocated.

There's a lot of weird stuff going on in Duma Key, nothing more strange than the, ‘Girl in a Boat’ series of paintings, which have an uncanny resemblance to his youngest daughter, and seem to be drawing her ever closer to an old sailing boat in the distance.

I love the build-up in this book: Eddie gradually regaining his strength and purpose, the friendship that grows between him and his neighbour, (a stranger by the name of Wireman), who of course has secrets of his own, and Elizabeth, owner of Salmon Point.

Wireman is there to look after Elizabeth, the daughter of the man who used to own the whole island, and whose sister drowned, many, many years before. But there's a spirit on the island too, an evil spirit; a spirit that gives Eddie the ability to paint exquisite seascapes, to paint possible futures, but a spirit that could end up destroying everyone he loves, taking the island and much more with it.

A bit like in, ‘IT’, this spirit has been tackled before, but now, years, decades later, it is back and getting stronger, so, Eddie, Jack (Eddie's personal assistant), and Wireman must face it together.

There are some really good bit in this book: the early realisation that his drawings might be influencing real life, his relationship with his daughter and ex-wife, the art exhibition he's talked into putting on, and towards the end, the crocodile in the swimming pool incident, but overall, repetition start to creep in and spoils it a bit.
Not quite a four star book then, three and a half, but spooky enough in places to satisfy those that like a fright, and descriptive enough to make me feel like I'd been to the Florida Keys and that my arm was itching!