#1 New York Times bestselling author Stephen King’s timeless novella “The Body”–originally published in his 1982 short story collection Different Seasons, and adapted into the 1986 film classic Stand by Me–now available for the first time as a stand-alone publication. It’s 1960 in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine. Ray Brower, a boy from a nearby town, has disappeared, and … nearby town, has disappeared, and twelve-year-old Gordie Lachance and his three friends set out on a quest to find his body along the railroad tracks. During the course of their journey, Gordie, Chris Chambers, Teddy Duchamp, and Vern Tessio come to terms with death and the harsh truths of growing up in a small factory town that doesn’t offer much in the way of a future.
A timeless exploration of the loneliness and isolation of young adulthood, Stephen King’s The Body is an iconic, unforgettable, coming-of-age story.more
Most readers may be familiar with the 1986 film “Stand by Me.” But how many realize that this memorable film was based on a terrific Stephen King novella titled THE BODY? This story of four kids on the edge of manhood who embark on a journey in search of a dead boy may be the best evocation in print of the nature of adolescent male friendships. King’s breezy narrative voice rolls out the prose, and the dialogue is spot on. The film ends with a line not in the book, but perhaps it should have been because it sums up perfectly the sentiment of the story: “I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was 12. Jesus, does anyone?”
Confession—for all the Stephen King that I’ve read (and that’s no small amount), I’ve never read this Novella before. Of course I grew up on the film ‘Stand By Me’, and I owned a copy of “Different Seasons”, in which ‘The Body’ Novella originally appeared. But I’d never actually read the words until recently. I was at Target with my little ones over the summer and saw this on the shelf, begging to be added to my King collection. I finally read it over the course of three days, largely because my work-in-progress borrows some of the same themes, and I’m so glad that I finally took the plunge.
For anyone who wants to see a master writer in the early part of his career, or for anyone who wants to remember the joys and horrors of childhood.
Four pre-teens hike out into the woods to see a dead body. Basic enough for a premise 😉 But in today’s world, you have to wonder… could a twelve year old kid today manage this? Could they light a fire and grill using what they found in the woods? Could they sneak out of their houses and away from their parents without anyone checking their smartphones’ location? And what would we say about their parents if they could?
I’m not saying we should all kick our pre-teens out into the wild in search of cadavers! But…would they even have the ingenuity, the guts, or the sheer luck to pull it off the way these four characters did? And a bigger question: what, if anything, are we robbing this generation of by keeping them tethered so close? Without adventure, without daring, can we learn to risk more sacred things, like our truth?
“The most important things are the hardest things to say.” This is at the core of King’s The Body. And here’s my thought: Without friends, without someone to share our journeys and our truths with, we have no way to speak them. Without adventure, we never learn to risk vulnerability.
The Body is an adventure. There’s truth, genuine characters, danger, and bravery. There’s the normal goings-around of four pre-teens boys. And there’s something deeper held within these pages, something worth considering.
Happy reading!
One of King’s best short stories. These characters epitomize the easy friendship of youth. The dialogue and song references alone will take you back in time.
Probably one of my all time Favorites by King.
It’s one of those stories that stick with you forever.
Stephen King at his best
I loved these boys! This story brought me back to my own youth {back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth} when an adventure such as the one these kids went on was the most important thing in the world. Each of the boy’s personal stories are incredible,and you come to love each of them. When they finally attain their goal that is when you see the true character of these kids. One of the best stories I’ve ever read.
Another King classic
This is the third time I’ve read this novella and my love for it has not diminished one bit. But for this review, I wanted to take a closer look at the structure of the story and try to discover why I love it. Structurally, this novella is flawed. There are some things about it that I do not like at all and detract from the overall plot and narrative. But even with its flaws, it is an amazing story with literary flourishes and fully-formed characters. It has a touch of nostalgia and reveals an endearing remembrance of a friendship whose power is not diminished over time. It’s an affecting depiction of the power of friendship. “The most important things are the hardest things to say…” is the mantra of this story. Stephen King repeats this mantra a few times, even parses it at one point, then admits to the irony of an author declaring that words diminish the important things in our lives.
Here’s the brief book description: It’s 1960 in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine. Ray Brower, a boy from a nearby town, has disappeared, and twelve-year-old Gordie Lachance and his three friends set out on a quest to find his body along the railroad tracks. During the course of their journey, Gordie, Chris Chambers, Teddy Duchamp, and Vern Tessio come to terms with death and the harsh truths of growing up in a small factory town that doesn’t offer much in the way of a future. This novella is the basis for the classic movie Stand by Me.
King shows great descriptive flair and the dialogue is snappy and true to life. Gordie (the narrator and one of the boys as an adult) is likeable and an effective storyteller who reveals the goodness beneath the hard exterior that is beginning to form during this formidable time in their lives. The story is both an adventure and a coming-of-age tale with a bit of mystery. We, the readers, never find out how or why exactly Ray Brower is killed, neither at the time or in hindsight. But the initial spookiness of his death and the morbid desire of the boys to see his body eventually turns into a meditation on life, what Ray Brower will be missing, and what the four friends unintentionally have to look forward to in their own lives. The connection between the four friends is palpable, particularly between Gordie and Chris. They eventually find the wherewithal to do better in school so they can escape the oppressive blue-collar life of the town of Castle Rock. And the connection they have begins with this adventure to find Ray Brower.
Structurally, I feel the novella fails in a couple of areas. First, two short stories are included—in full—within the novella that are examples of what Gordie publishes as an adult when he becomes a professional writer. Unfortunately, they do not add anything to the story of the four, young friends; and the “pie eating contest” could have more effectively been told by young Gordie as a campfire tale within the main narrative. Second, the ending is a letdown. It feels—to me—like King didn’t know what to do with a story like this, as it was way outside of his wheelhouse at the time of its original publication. The morbid Ch 33 and deflated Ch 34 (the last two chapters) seem as if King decided to “right the ship” and steer the plot to an ending that would ultimately satisfy his horror-loving readership, rather than find meaning in the things he was exploring in this story: friendship, camaraderie, and many of the important things in one’s life. “The most important things are the hardest things to say…” And as we are reminded of this time and time again in the story, King chose not to say them, or even to try to attempt to say what he really wanted to say. A period of great friendship in a person’s life can have a lasting effect, one that resonates long after the friendship is over, as is evident in a story like this. In the end, King was and still is known as a horror writer, and there was no way he was going to end this story on a positive note.
But again, even with these flaws, I love this story and novella. The friendship between the boys is the heart of the story and I love their adventure and the way they lookout (mostly) for each other. I love that an adventure like this can be known only to its principal actors, as no one in Castle Rock was aware of what they did during their time looking for Ray Brower, and it’s a secret we share with the boys. And I love being reminded that any preconceptions you can have about a writer can be shattered with a curveball like this. King summarizes the story best at the end of Ch 11. “I never had any friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, did you?” Now that is the true conclusion of this wonderful novella.
A classic – became the movie Stand By Me.
Great book and loved Stand By Me, too.