The Long Walk is set in some sort of dystopian alternate reality; maybe a (when written) near-future(?), but one in any case now over four decades past to the modern reader. An annual celebration of a totalitarian regime is taking place, in which 100 young men must walk non-stop, at a pace of at least four miles an hour, to the point of exhaustion, until only one is left standing. The book follows one "contestant" in particular, Ray Garraty (#47), as he suffers this grueling ordeal of hundreds of miles and consecutive days without sleep.
Much of this book is inner monologue, which is perhaps why it's one of the few Stephen King tales not yet adapted into a movie. (There have been a couple of failed attempts, though.) Moreover, it's almost more like a "writing exercise" than a novel. King has set himself the challenge of whether or not such a bare bones premise, with no real opportunities to change the environment or the characters, can actually be sustained over the course of an entire novel.
The good news is, it doesn't actually read as gimmicky as it might sound. Or at least, King rises to his own challenge enough to make the read compelling. The writing does an excellent job of putting you in the mind of its protagonist. You're convinced of the horrific difficulty and suffering of "simply walking," and you get a sense of all the pain -- physical and mental -- involved. Meanwhile, that inner monologue bounces around enough to keep the story from becoming static, while a small cast of characters drawn from the other walkers helps flesh out the narrative.
But there are some shortcomings here. One is a lack of suspense. Maybe that kind of tension has always been more the bailiwick of Stephen King adaptations more than the source material itself, but the life-or-death stakes of the situation aren't really felt deeply for the main character. That's simply because he is the main character, and the narrative never once shifts from his perspective. With that knowledge, the reader deduces that there can be only two endings for the story: Garraty "punches his ticket" before the Long Walk is over, or he is the ultimate winner.
But then, "endings" are famously one of Stephen King's weak spots. He's such a prolific writer that I've read only a tiny fraction of his catalogue, but I've only rarely been impressed by a King ending (fortunately, The Dark Tower series was an exception) -- and fans of his work never try to convince me I'm wrong in that assessment. The Long Walk has... well... let's say one of the better of King's bad endings? It's hardly out of left field, nor tonally dissonant, nor any of the things that I've disliked in other King endings that left me cold. But it is quite abrupt, and feels like it leaves a lot unresolved. It's really the kind of ending where, as you're pulling up on the final pages, you begin to wonder if your copy of the book is maybe missing a few chapters at the end. Basically, the story has put a lot of threads into play, but King seems to be interesting in resolving only one or two of them.
Nevertheless, I still enjoyed the journey, regardless of the destination. I give The Long Walk a B. It's certainly among Stephen King's shorter books, so if you've been curious about him (but avoided him for lack of desire to read a 1,000-page doorstop), this might be one for you to check out.
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