Rating: 
Summary: A SNOOZE FEST!!
Review: I have read this book a couple of month's ago. It was in Holland already published.
I picked it up after the very, in my opinion, poor black house and wanted it to be a wonderfull book....I'm sorry....it isn't!
The story lacks tension and I found it to be a bit of a bore.
It didn't " come alive " for me, the characters didn't do anything for me...quite frankly...I just didn't care for them.
And the story just went on, and on, and on..a complete let down. It's not that I dislike books who builds up ,( i finished " the emperor of ocean park" Great book!!) but this just isn't going anywhere.
I wrote it before, no more king for me, alas.
Rating: 
Summary: The King Remains on Top!
Review: People have already begun chastising Stephen King because From A Buick 8 is about a strange car. He actually tangled the possessed-car storyline with Christine and so people think he has begun repeating himself. Those people have not read From A Buick 8, because it is a truly original work that displays some of King's best writing, and more!Ned Wilcox has grown up without a father. You see, his father was a trooper who got killed while on the job. Ned is now 18 and kind of lost in his life. So he gets a job at the very same station his father worked at before his death. It is here that Ned will discover what Troop D has kept hidden in Shed B since the late seventies; an old buick that is everything but. As Ned listens to Sandy (the chief) tell the story of the old Buick (with the help of a few other troopers), he will soon learn that appearences are, more often than not, highly misleading. But most importantly, he will finally be able to learn about his father and about the things he did before his death. Ned will finally be able to start the grieving process now that he knows who his father really was. The car itself isn't haunted or possessed. It is just... weird. It looks real but isn't. It keeps silent most of the time, but then sometimes wakes up to cause havoc. It makes things disappear and makes monstrous things appear. The book is so well written that it practically reads itself. Written in the first person, reading this book is like listening to someone tell a great tale while sitting around a campfire on warm summer night. From the very first page, you get lost into the story. First thing you'll know, you'll be reading the very last page, something you'll do with regret because this is one story you won't want to see end. The book is often funny, touching, very scary and extremely suspenseful. This is Stephen King at his best. Take Bag of Bones, mix it with a little bit of IT and a little of The Dark Tower books and what you'll get is something resembling From a Buick 8. It's a shame that King is thinking of retiring when he is writing the best stuff of his career!
Rating:
Summary: YUCK!
Review: Yet another piece of impish immmature drivel from the master of bad grammer. I would have thought by now the man would have learned the basics of sentence structure and grammer. Since he has a great following, he must hold some quality for the masses which intices them to buy his books. It is obviously neither great writing nor flawless logic as this book demonstrates once again.
Rating: 
Summary: A peephole into the Other
Review: If, as King has declared, this will be his last published novel (a declaration to which the response of his fans is bound to be, "Come on, Stephen, tell us another one!"), then he is going out on a pretty high note. Not with one of his half-dozen classics, but with a memorable and satisfying finish. In his book length study of horror fiction, _Danse Macabre_, King wrote that he wanted to instill horror in his readers, and if he couldn't manage that, he'd go for terror, and if he couldn't manage that, he'd try for shock, and if he couldn't manage that, he'd settle for grossing them out. In _From a Buick 8_, he pulls out each of those stops at one point or another. But this time out, true horror occupies the story's center: the absolutely other, the absolutely alien, the sense of being confronted with the indescribable. Somehow the book's wise and weary cops manage to communicate the author's conviction that in the final analysis, all special effects and spooky stories aside, that's what ordinary life has always confronted us with. The book is nothing like _Christine_. If King is repeating himself this time (and he isn't), what he's repeating is the marvelous novelette "The Mist". In that story, the Other surrounded the world and closed in on it. In this one, our own world surrounds a pinpoint of the uncanny: the Buick that's not a Buick in the state troopers' Shed B. The unBuick is only a peephole into the Other, but a peephole is all that's required to rip apart the scaffolding of reality. The troop's mascot, Mister Dillon, whimpers in fear when the peephole periodically widens, yet scratches to get into its shed. The Buick is demonic, but whatever is demonic, as Rudolf Otto taught us, is also "holy" - it induces not just a mysterium tremendum but also a mysterium fascinans. And the troopers, in their varying degrees, experience both of the effects that Mr. Dillon feels. Entwined with the horror story is an appreciative study of life in a rural Staties' barracks, of the matter-of-fact heroism of the men who stand in the thin grey line, shielding John Q Public from all the disruptions of his comfortable order that he would rather not know about, be they alien or earthly. What would be a solid police procedural if only any of the police procedures applied. But in the case of the car with the crocodile smile, none of them do.
Rating:
Summary: Strong King entry
Review: In 1970, a car stops at a gas station in the small western Pennsylvania town of Statler. The driver asks the attendant to fill up before he disappears in the vicinity of the bathroom. When the customer fails to return, the attendant calls the state troopers. Troop D company impounds the vehicle and take it to shed B as they realize that this car is dangerous and not of this world. In 2001, a drunk driver kills Trooper Curt Wilco. His son Ned starts hanging around D Troop and Curt's peers take care of him. It's only a matter of time before he sees the 1957 Buick in Shed B. The troopers all take turns telling the high school senior what the car has done over the years including causing one trooper to disappear. It periodically gives off a weird light show and from time to time it regurgitates strange objects and life forms. Ned becomes caught up in the story as deeply as his father was enthralled by the car. It is always amazing how Stephen king can take an ordinary object like a car and twist it into such a frightening terror that readers will never be able to forget it. The '57 Buick is more than just a car, but what it is become is the subject of reader imagination. The structure of FROM A BUICK 8 is absorbing as each trooper tells Ned about his dealings with "the car" leading the audience to think twice before entering a strange vehicle. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: Keep your eyes on the car.
Review: A sad boy, a bad car and the twists of fate... Sounds like a rehash of "Christine", right? Wrong. "Buick 8" is nothing like "Christine". The Buick is from another world, maybe even another dimesion. Christine was definitely from hell. Ned Wilcox is grieving but he's no high school loser, like Arnie Cunnigham. Christine deliberately destroyed anyone who messed with her or Arnie. The Buick occasionally eats people who just happen to be around. So enough about Christine. "Buick 8" is quite different from Steven King's other works. 90% of the novel is told in flash backs and by several different people, living and dead. The book gets off to a slow start, (this is deliberate, I think),smacks the reader with great big gobs of horror and then pulls up to an abrupt end. As usual King takes ordinary folks, puts them in a hideous situation and makes the reader care about them. The good, the bad and the pathetic are all lovingly portrayed. I loved Curtis Wilcox, I liked Sandy and pitied George and Eddie and Mr.Dillon (especially Mr. Dillon). My major complaints were about young Ned and Arky, both of whom seemed a bit overdrawn to me. My only other real complaint has to do with logic. In all the years that the monstrous Buick sits in Shed B and after witnessing all the ghastly things it could do why didn't any of the troopers try to destroy it? I enjoyed Buick 8 but it didn't thrill me or keep me up all night. It's a very good book full of great characters and incredible scenses but it doesn't have the same power or magic that King's earlier books had. Still, it does entertain and I'm sure it will be appreciated by Stephen King fans both old and new.
Rating:
Summary: King enters the Twilight Zone
Review: When first picking up this book it sounded like Steve was recycling his old stuff, sort of CHRISTINE meets THE TOMMYKNOCKERS. It also took me a little while to get into it but once it got going it was enjoyable. He's gotten back to basics with FROM A BUICK 8, a tale of an old car housed at a military base which also serves as a portal into another dimension through its trunk (cue Twilight Zone music)and soon all manner of bizzare objects materialize from beyond, thus giving the soldiers the opportunity to conduct strange experiments. But it seems that the car is actually alive and can feel pain & bleed... and also feel hunger, but for what?
Once again King has crafted an absorbing story which zips back and forward in time but which is easy to read and also thought provoking. Finally King just wouldn't be King without his obligatory "gross outs" which will inspire revulsion and delight in the adolescent part of every reader's psyche. This will keep fans happy until the publication of the next two DARK TOWER books next year.
Rating: 
Summary: "The King Of Strange Reads"
Review: I have to honestly admit that I usually do not enjoy most books in this category as they tend to be a bit too strange for my tastes. I know, I know, like dah, huh! Hey, this book was a gift (the reason I am reviewing it.) I am a person who doesn't receive that many gifts, and if you knew me better you could plainly understand why. Moving Forward... "From a Buick 8" although a strange story wasn't that bad. I think I liked it better than my last read by Stephen King. If you are a King fan this story is right up your alley.
Rating:
Summary: AN ALL-STAR READING
Review: A blockbuster cast of vocal artists brings excitement to Stephen King's take on a car that spells danger. Among the readers are James Rebhorn, Bruce Davison, Becky Ann Baker, Peter Gerety, Fred Sanders, and Stephen Tobolowsky. It all begins in 1979 when a man drives into a service station in rural Pennsylvania - his car is a Buick Roadmaster. That's obvious, what's also soon obvious is the fact that the driver has disappeared. State Policemen Ernest Rafferty and Curtis Wilcox receive a call to pick up the abandoned car. A bit of a car buff, Wilcox immediately knows that all is not right with this car. For instance, it has no workable engine. Then, in a few hours Rafferty also vanishes. The car is stored in Shed B behind police barracks and, despite efforts, Rafferty's disappearance is unsolved. As the years go by the car remains a mute reminder of a taunting mystery. Jumpstart to 2001 when Wilcox is killed in an auto accident. A few months pass, and then his 18-year-old son, Ned, drops by the barracks from time to time. He soon becomes an accepted part of the troop's circle. It's not long before Ned looks into the window of Shed B, and takes on his father's unfinished task - solving the mystery of this strange car. This reading is a top production number. - Gail Cooke
Rating:
Summary: A pit stop on the way to the Tower.
Review: I've never read a King book I didn't like, and I've read most of them. Maybe that makes me sort of biased. This is not a major King work. It could have easily fit into a compilation piece as a novella, but that doesn't mean it's not worth your while. A lot of people have been comparing this book to Christine, but other than the fact that both books revolve around cars, there are few similarities. While both of the cars are nasty villainous contraptions, the title Buick spends most of it's time parked behind the barracks of a troop of Highway patrolmen, not stalking would be victims. This isn't a cut and dry story about good vs. evil, but rather the unknown and how we deal with it. Of course, there's a lot of fear, and maybe even some to boot, but the story isn't so much about the mean car as it is about the people who've taken on the responsibility of protecting John Q from whatever nastiness lurks inside it. As a Dark Tower fan, it's impossible for me to read any King novel or story without comparing or connecting it to the series itself. While the author is never so ham-fisted as to make any direct connection to the series, fans will notice some pretty strong connections. From the very beginning, I connected the Buick (and it's enigmatic driver) to "Hearts in Atlantis," more specifically the short story "Low Men in Yellow Coats." Anyone familiar with Ted Bratigan, the Low Men and the breakers might make the same connections I did. As the story progressed, I was certain that the Buick had some connection to the Tower, or at least the multiverse King has created outside our own familiar world. Without giving away too much of the story, it becomes obvious early in the story that the car is not of this earth. Where it's from, or more importantly, why it's here are questions that never quite get answered. That leads into the major theme of the book: how we deal with the unknown. Generally, we fear it, and King gift has always been playing with that emotion. Unlike a lot of King's books, this one doesn't try to be a strait forward scare fest. While it is reminiscent of a lot of King's earlier scarier books, King explores the question of fear rather than the fear itself. Like many of the characters in the book, King spends his time dissecting and analyzing the fear. While small in scale and the author is a little conservative when dealing out the shocks, King's ability to manipulate the reader is stronger than ever. Instead of dumping a bucket full of pig's blood on our heads all at once, he holds us down and applies one tiny drop at a time. To me, King has aged like wine. While some of his earlier fans were turned off by his direction in the mid nineties, I thought he produced some of his greatest work. One thing is sure, King has lost none of his edge, but has instead gained a lot of new tools which he uses as expertly as ever. This isn't his opus or anything but it's still a great read. I can't wait for the final three volumes of the Dark Tower series.
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