A tranquil library filled with books on wooden shelves, offering a warm, inviting atmosphere.
by: AnniePosted on:

The Stand, by Stephen King

The Stand cover
The Stand

I’ve read The Stand before. The first time I read it, I had to stop every 60 pages or so and read something light and frivolous, simply because the story was really creeping me out. This time though, I was really paid attention to the sociology of the whole thing. The first time I read it, I remember being irritated by Glen Bateman’s dissertations on society. This time, I was fascinated by them. Perhaps I’m more of an armchair sociologist that I used to be, but I find it fascinating to watch how humans build their societies—especially when they set about putting together governments from scratch. I’ve always thought that, besides their entertainment value, books are also thought experiments. You can throw characters and situations together and see what happens. (If you read Laurell K. Hamilton’s blog, you’ll realize that authors are not always in control of their creations. Hamilton frequently writes about how her characters simply won’t do what she wants them to, and decide to go off in another direction.)

Right after I finished reading The Stand, I read Dies the Fire (S.M Stirling). It’s a fantasy that explores what might happen if something altered the way the world worked and electricity, explosives, and steam power stopped working and people were reduced—mostly—to medieval technology. As I read these books, I was reminded about how removed most of us are from the basics of life. I know a few people who grow some of their own food, as a hobby. But you have to go a long way to find someone who can provide for themselves from what they can grow and hunt. When we need food, we go to a grocery store. The store gets the food from warehouses, and the warehouses are supplied by farms from around the world. If you look closely, you can see that your bananas might come from Ecuador, some of your spices may come from Asia. Both The Stand and Dies the Fire look at what might happen if the whole system grinds to a halt. And it’s pretty scary.