Doctor Sleep
“Life was a wheel, its only job was to turn, and it always came back to where it started.”
Like his father, Dan has grown up to be a bad tempered drunk, and he uses the booze to blot out his psychic powers as he drifts from town to town working menial jobs. The early part of the book focuses on Dan hitting bottom, and then trying to pull himself together with the help of Alcoholics Anonymous. He winds up with a job as an orderly at a hospice where he earns the nickname of Doctor Sleep for his ability to provide an easier death for the patients.
Dan becomes aware of a little girl named Abra with a shining ability that dwarfs his own, but unfortunately Abra has also come to the attention of group of vampire like creatures calling themselves the True Knot. They pretend to be humans who roam the country as a harmless pack of tourists in RVs while they track down and feed on the psychic energy collected from torturing children with the shining, and Abra would be like an all-you-can-eat buffet to them.
This book is almost two separate stories. One is about Dan Torrance struggling to come to terms with the legacy of his father, his abilities and his alcoholism. The other is about the battle to save a little girl from a pack of vicious monsters. King does a decent job of trying to make these two tales intersect while revisiting some elements from The Shining, but it ends up feeling like less than the sum of its parts. Frankly, I was far more interested in Dan’s battle with the bottle than another Stephen King story about a child in danger from a supernatural threat.
No, what transforms Doctor Sleep from a horror infused potboiler to memorable fiction is its thematic richness. Like The Shining, Doctor Sleep is a gripping, empathetic portrayal of addiction. King has been honest about his own battles with alcohol, and the work he’s done to keep his sobriety. In his presentation of Dan Torrance, he seems to be writing from a very personal place. His recreations of Alcoholics Anonymous meetings are careful, particularized, and almost reverential. They feel written by a close observer.
There is also a surprisingly potent meditation on aging and death integrated into the main plotline. Along with his other mental gifts, Dan Torrance has an ability to ease the suffering of those about to die. Utilizing this talent, Dan takes a job at a hospice, where he earns the nickname that gives the book its title. Unlike the Grim Reaper with his scythe, Dan is a comfort to those about to take the last, great step of life
