 Hello everybody, E here. Welcome back to another Stephen King book review today. We are talking about Billy Summers. This is Stephen King's newest release and We about to go all in on this book. Now I know this is not going to be a popular opinion already from the comments that I got when I did the book birthday because so many of you expressed how much you were Loving the book already. I went back and read your comments after I finished the book and I did not have that experience so what is Billy Summers Billy Summers is a book about a hitman who's supposed to be the best in the business Who plays dumb so that people? not Under appreciate him, but people don't expect him to be smart or to do smart things Which is right off the bat of a problem because why would you hire somebody? That you think is incompetent. I don't understand that part Another thing I want to hit this right off the bat and that is this book is cartoonish to the point of Unintended hilarity the name of the mobsters several things that happen in the book this assassin who's trying to Get in with the community playing Monopoly with two little kids Spends the rest of the book regretting it. It's there. There's a lot. There's a lot wrong with this book But the I think the main thing I want to hit on is how cartoonish it is Especially the disguises he wears Speaking of the disguises he wears There is a lot of Fat shaming in this book All of the bad guys are fat. They're disgusting All of the even Billy Dresses like a fat person To get away from the police There's a lot of that in here more so than I think any other Stephen King book I Wasn't really offended. I just sit back and like why why did it? Why do all the bad guys have to be fat people? Why why do they have to be so disgusting or described as if King hates fat people? I don't know. Maybe he does. Maybe he doesn't I don't know. I didn't like that aspect of it, but To go into detail about what I Feel is wrong with the book. We have to go into spoiler territory. So here it this is my rating I'm giving it one star. This is easily the worst solo Stephen King novel Ever over 500 pages. This is the the worst of them Sleeping beauties I would probably prefer to read that one, you know before I ever read this one again but Still, I don't know man. I'm just throwing that out there. I feel it's his worst yet period The the issues that I have like I said are spoilers. So we're gonna get into that So if you want to click away, you know how I feel about the book I'm not gonna write an extended review of this one I kind of just want to forget that it even exists, which is very very sad on my part But it's the truth. I can only ever be honest with you guys. So in three two One spoilers, okay, we're going to we're gonna discuss in depth the character of Alice Billy the halfway through the book. This is a two-story book meaning that there's one story at the beginning kind of like the outsider And he doesn't really do that do a two-story book Well, he never has I don't feel the outsider is the one exception to that rule I feel but the first half of the book is about the assassination the second half of the book is some kind of rent rape revenge plot Now the issue that I have here And yes, I was a bit offended by it I cannot see too many women not being offended by it, but here we go So they this woman is raped and dumped in front of Billy's apartment While he's hiding out from the cops why he chooses to go out there. I don't know He's running away. I guess his altruism defeated his need for his own self-preservation I don't know. I wasn't convinced on why he would go out there but the the main problem is she's just been raped and He brings her in and nurses her back to health and they start some kind of I don't know if it's a budding relationship I don't know if he'd call it that but Billy She does try to talk him into sex at one point in time but the biggest offense here is Billy uses a rape victim as bait for a pedophile That just that just completely I was just sitting there going why I don't understand it and I know King I Know King is of a certain era a certain time frame and this book very much feels like it was it was supposed to be set in the 50s or in the 70s or whatever Because he stumbles all over Technology like he usually does I always prefer when he doesn't write about technology because it comes off as honestly, it's embarrassing But another another aspect of this book that pisses me off is the fact that everything that everybody Complains about with his work He validates in this one every single misstep. He's ever made in his career. He makes it here the sex the Writing young people as if they they all you know, well, he writes young people well, but young people of a certain era And he definitely doesn't do I think the Institute is the one Exception to this rule because I believed in those kids those kids acted a lot like my own kids So when people say kids don't act like that, I just whatever your kids don't act like that But in this one, it's all the cliches all the issues that everybody ever has with Stephen King books except for the supernatural We're gonna get to that in just a second is on display here The book feels the book is loaded with Easter eggs, which I appreciated, you know Thursday theorists of Stephen King theorists I love piecing together all these things and the Thursday theorist episode will be fun to do because of that Was the book fun? No, I struggled. I haven't struggled this hard to finish a Stephen King book in ever That's why I'm giving it a one-star It's it's just loaded with with with BS and Billy Summers anyways In fact, that'll probably be my review on Goodreads. This is BS because yeah, it is now Let's talk about the supernatural or the lack thereof again. We're in spoiler territory There's nothing supernatural in this book. The overlook hotel is mentioned and there and there's a picture that changes There is a little itty-bitty bits, but as far as the entire plot, there's no nothing supernatural Now I blame all of you out there now. I'm kidding, but I kind of do only half serious here Everybody complains about Stephen King going for the supernatural when the story is otherwise realistic You hit you heard it in when he did the outsider if it bleeds The the tail end of the Mercedes trilogy had supernatural elements But in this one, you don't have anything and I think that's what was lacking here was the Stephen King weirdness the the making the surreal realistic The those those are my main problems. There's so much there's so much more wrong with this book But I really don't want to delve too deeply into it The reasoning for it is is most of it is subjective Most of it is just me nitpicking an author who has written, you know, oh 70 novels 70 books Whatever you want to say He's published over 70 books and you know, he can write whatever the hell he wants to and I'm glad he's doing that But when you experiment like this You're gonna have missteps and I think this one was a misstep There is very little of the There's really no characters to care about here except for maybe Alice But she's used so oddly that you can't really even get a vibe with her And I know that everybody experiences trauma differently, but to have Billy use her as bait for a pedophile Who does that so but the the reason why that's a problem is by the end of the book We're supposed to care about Billy enough to care what happens to him This is a major spoiler major major spoiler the last few pages Because Billy is writing a book while he's doing all this the last few pages are Alice finishing his book and Having him live at the end But he actually dies and that's the twist of the book is that Billy doesn't make it at the end That would have hit so much harder harder had I cared about literally anybody in the book I didn't care about Alice. I didn't care about Billy and this is so odd So out of character for Stephen King to write characters that I can't find a single good thing to say about But that's my review for Billy Summers or Billy bummers as I've been joking with a friend of mine It's I don't know you're probably gonna have different mileage Especially people like Dane if you're here Dane reads. I know you don't like it when he goes supernatural. So you probably love this one Many people have been enjoying it, but I of course disagree But I'm always on the odd side of things. So maybe this will go down in history as one of his best I don't know but I have you read Billy Summers I'd love to hear from you Comment down there in the doobly-doo whether or not you loved it whether or not you hated it Whether or not you felt meh about it But explain why you felt those things so that we can have a discussion and until next time I have any you've been you This has been another Stephen King book review. I'll talk to you guys later. Bye. Bye