Rating: 
Summary: ANOTHER DISAPPOINTMENT FROM A GREAT WRITER
Review: There was a time when you knew you were going to get a great story because the name Stephen King was printed on the dust jacket. But those books are few and far between. I can't recommend this book to anyone. I stick with SK because I hope to get another SALEM'S LOT, GREEN MILE, or MISERY. Every once in a while SK will sneak up on you and deliver a gem, but he's been shooting blanks for a long time. I'm getting really tired of waiting and reading and being sorely disappointed. Only King's great prose carry you through this mercifully short novel.
Rating: 
Summary: Quite a Disappointment from King
Review: "From a Buick 8" actually started out okay, but it eventually went downhill from there. "8" is not like your usual HORROR novel from King. Bottomline: There's no real scary part in the whole book. Except for the Buick spitting out some gross 'things' from the trunk and sucking people in, the whole novel just fell flat.The only reason I stuck to the book was to see if there were any other really scary scene in the novel, only to be deeply disappointed. The ending was abrupt and did not seem like an ending at all. To all first time King readers: Don't read "8". If you are looking for horror, go for older novels by King like "Carrie" or "Christine" instead.
Rating: 
Summary: Just a damn good ripping yarn
Review: It has been some ten years since I have read a Stephen King novel, the last been IT, which although I found chilling, just didn't involve me enough with the story, half way through I got bored and came back to finish "IT" a few months later regretting I'd decided to make the effort. So it was with trepidation that I decided to buy this book, to be perfectly honest its choice was more related to the opportunity of another car story with the hope of Christine Pt2. Its not, but it is worth your time, I soon found myself becoming absorbed with the tale of the Buick as you follow every twist and turn of the page. The characters literally jump out at you, and you're there with them, rooting in their corner right through to the dramatic end. As I have said its ripping yarn that grabs hold, it's rare you put a book down at the end and feel good inside and say "YES NICE JOB", and then swept with a twinge of disappointment that the ride is over.
The master still has it, is it his best? no, but its way far from his worst. So take my advice turn the page and take a peek in the Troopers shed, because there's something parked at the back just out of sight, in the darkness and its well worth investigating.
Rating: 
Summary: Not worth the paper it's printed on
Review: I received "From a Buick 8" as a gift, and I have to say I was appalled at what seemed to me to be a very simplistic novel with easily detectable plot devices, one-dimensional characters and amateur attempts at suspense. I was very disappointed in this book. If you're just getting to know Mr. King, please read the older books first and avoid this one at all costs.
Rating:
Summary: Steve: We still wanna love ya, but...
Review: As a diehard SK fan, I wanted to believe that The Master could still do it after all these years. Just my opinion, but he just has not been the same after the car accident. I'll eat my words (with a bit of salt) if The Gunslinger final three books turn out better. But Steve: time to become William Forrester, if you get my drift.
Rating:
Summary: Interesting attempt that eventually fails
Review: A few weeks ago, my campus newspaper printed a short piece by a student. The author was musing about how there are times in life when one can 'see the boom mike' - in other words, when you realise that life is nothing but a story being told around you. Personally, I couldn't disagree more, and I don't think that anyone who has spent a great deal of time reading wouldn't be able to see how fundamentally wrong my fellow student (who, happily enough, has a math major to fall back on) is. Life has no narrative, no climaxes, and most importantly, no resolution. Life simply ends, sometimes when you're in the middle of your story. This seems to be the point that Stephen King, through his narrator, trooper Sandy Dearborn, is trying to make in From a Buick 8. Sandy is trying to help the teenaged son of his recently deceased friend and colleague accept the senselesness of his father's death, but the boy is convinced that there are reasons for everything, and that if you look hard enough, you will eventually find an answer to any question. Which is where the Buick of the title comes into play. Let this be a warning to readers accustomed to King's more plot-driven novels. The Buick's origin and purpose are never determined, and King's protagonists seem convinced that doing so is impossible. The Buick's nature is not the point of the story, but rather the background, over which King tries to make a point about life. From a Buick 8 is not about heroes, those flashy, infallible sorts who ride off into the sunset when their job is done, but about guardians, whose job, which involves dealing with the ills of this world (and others) so that the rest of us won't have to, is never done, and rarely appreciated. So does it work? King's writing is, as usual, superb. I've never been able to identify what it is that makes King quite so *readable*, but the narrative in From a Buick 8 is as compelling as ever. Also as per usual, the characters are rather thin, and should be familiar to any regular King reader. Unfortunately, King's writing falters exactly where it counts the most - when describing the car and the things that come from it. King tries to hammer in the point that the car is alien, completely out of tune with the world and possibly the universe, but he fails to convince his readers of this. He seems eager to point out that the car's foreigness is indescribable, but we as readers have nothing but description to rely on, and as a result the reader never truly feels the fear and frustration felt by the car's caretakers. And ultimately, most of us read Stephen King for a good story. King tries so hard to make us see that life isn't a story that he forgets that From a Buick 8 is, and the result feels half-baked. From a Buick 8 would have made a fine novella or short story, but as a novel it falls short of satisfaction.
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Summary: The ultimate door to and from somewhere else
Review: Here again, Stephen King goes beyond what he has done in many other books, and yet retains the main dimension of his presentation of that other world, let's say some extraterrestrial world, as being dangerous, as aiming at attacking us, as wanting to destroy us or invade us in a way or another. And yet he finds a formula that is very effective, and highly symbolical. The door to that other world is an old car, a Buick 8. This is a common theme in his books where cars have been haunted, dangerous, where that symbol of America and modern life has been, very often, described as a door to evil, to the uncontrolable evil of the mind or of the world beyond the door of normality. We think of Christine of course, but we also think of the frequency with which cars have been the trauma that brings evil. It is true too that cars are also the means to escape from evil in many other books. The car in US society is ambiguous, maybe because it is both a horse of a new type and a weapon in the hands of those who use them as an agressive tool, to hurt or to kill. But what is interesting in the book is not so much the magic of that evil car, but the reactions of various State Troopers in front of that danger, and here again we find a very precise description of these attitudes, of these psychologies, aven if somewhere there is a sense of fate that no one can escape, and that this fate has roots in another world, in another level of reality, deeper maybe, or just beyond. And this beyondness is embedded in the language of the book by always going beyond normal words and looking for strong expressions, very creative phrases that bring together the color of everyday familiar language and the strength of poetry. This is a real achievement. Dr Jacqyues COULARDEAU ? University of Perpignan
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Summary: The psychology of State Troopers
Review: This level is absolutely amazing in the very fine and detailed approach of State Troopers in the daily life of their profession. They appear as being very humane among themselves, very sensitive even, though at times the males tend to be careless with women, but they know how to make up for their lack of attention and appear to be big children in their procedures. They also appear to be very open on the society around them. They never show any kind of arrogance and condescendence towards the public, even if they have special phrases to speak of them, even if they deeply hate the drunks, those who beat women and molest children. They really look at men and women with a deep feeling of community, of service. They may even become heroes without knowing it, without trying to do it, just because it is a reflex in their nature, in their training to help, to protect, to save even those who are in any kind of danger. They also have their small sides, though their private life is alluded to but never really explored in this book. Some may like alcohol too much, some may like tobacco too much, some may put their service over their families, some may be « married » to their group, but they never live completely cut off from society and other people, and they even know how to lie, or let's say disguise truth, to protect their work or to protect people and their families from the dangers of their work. Stephen King makes us like them because they are really human. And that is a change in Stephen King's books that have put the emphasis on the black sides of such military or paramilitary personnel quite often, from Firestarter to Dreamcatcher. But here the psyche of a teenager is analysed and approached with great care, and a tremendous amount of love, even for his rebellious stand and his vengeful scream in front of the unjust world that deprives him of his father. His colleagues will find the words and the gestures necessary for this young man to get beyond his rebellion and his desire of a vengeance, to build a motivation to live and love other people and even the worst possible events in his life. He will learn to lie to his mother to protect her and his sisters against the horror of his experience. This is a real miracle. Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Perpignan
Rating: 
Summary: Who know what evil lurks in the back of cars?
Review: Mr. King is perhaps the reigning champ of the what if/how/when/why still sucking down air. I've been a fan for a long time (even through those I didn't particularly care for) and must say that this was the first of his books that I actually paused at before buying. Why? Because smack dab on the cover is a car, (the title isn't hiding anything either) and I thought "Hey, didn't he do this before? He wouldn't repeat himself, this guy, would he? Not Stephen King. Nah." I did wonder but curiosity got the best of me and I threw down the green. Nice to say I was pleasantly enjoying this book about two pages in and continued to do so until the end. Perhaps a fear of old cars needs to be introduced to those monkeys who make up new phobias. Like I said before King is the champ at getting people thinking maybe nothing is what we really think it is. From a Buick 8 is proof once again that maybe we should never really trust any one sense too willingly or rely on it too much.
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Summary: The Cure For Insomniacs!
Review: With King's (supposedly) last stand alone book he has accomplished what medical science has been unable to do...he's developed a sure-fire cure for Insomnia. I couldn't understand why whenever I'd pick up this book, I'd fall asleep after reading only a few pages. I wasn't tired when I started reading. Then I realized that it was because From A Buick 8 is mostly very BORING. I'd define the plot as "too little too late." The supposedly scary "stuff" isn't scary. And the characters are not very credible, not well-developed and -- oh yeah -- not very interesting. I've given this book a 2-star rating as a "going away" present to King. During the first half of his writing career, King was my favorite author and I anxiously awaited his next book. It didn't matter what the book was about, just the fact that "the King" wrote it was enough for me to plunk down my money. However, while I've continued to buy most of King's books in more recent years, I've been continually disappointed -- and From A Buick 8 is no exception. It's not really a BAD book; it's just not worth your time and certainly not worth your money. If this book reflects the best of King's creative juices, it's probably best that he made the decision to put down his pen.
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