2.5/5

This is not a properly thought out review, just a few key points that I wanted to write down. Please don't yell at me in the comments if you love this book! You can of course disagree, but please do so respectfully.

First of all, Annie calling a black character the n word and Paul not batting an eye even in his internal monologue is... quite something. I was so confused by it that I honestly thought I'd read it wrong. It was so jarring and unnecessary. And I know I could write so much more on this and the entire Africa plotline of the novel, but I don't know how to put it into words because it just made zero sense.
Secondly, I am a big fan of gore in horror. I adore it, I adore descriptions that make me feel nauseous, I adore beautifully written gore that contrasts so well with the blood and guts of whatever's happening. However, King's writing disappoints not only on a prose level here, but on a craft level as well. The gore had no meaning behind it, it had no shape or reason, it barely impacted anything. At a certain point, it just became, 'Oh, here Annie comes to do something horrible and then knock Paul out once again'. I was never bored exactly, but it became quite predictable and monotonous. I just didn't feel that the gore had any weight behind it or any deeper impact on either of the characters.
Thirdly, the entire book reeks of misogyny. From the constant calling her a bitch (which extends to more than just Annie, the main antagonist), to the descriptions of women all over. It's just dripping in it and left such a sour taste in my mouth all throughout.
But lastly—and I think most importantly, as it is brought up the most—is the incredibly harmful representation of psychosis and mental illness. I know this was written in the 80s, but I don't think that that means it should be free from criticism. (If anything, if you love a piece of media that has harmful elements, you should criticise those elements within it all the more.) I despised, despised, despised the way it was done, and it is this, along with everything else I have mentioned, which sinks this book into a lower and lower rating for me. I found the representation unendingly deceitful and gross in its villainous depiction, and hated all of the harmful rhetoric that came from it. It was baked into Annie as a character and therefore into the very bones of this story, it could not be extracted from it or excused or hidden away, and therefore it was all I could see. It permeated every word and I could not escape from it to a place of enjoyment.

I can understand how others can enjoy this story in spite of all of these elements, and I am by no means attacking anyone for liking it. But these elements were too much at the forefront for me to push them aside for even a moment. (I also found the characters and plot beats quite dull as they never changed and neither did their situation, it was all very stagnant.)
I'm disappointed that I didn't like this more, I really wanted to get the Stephen King hype and the premise sounded brilliant. I'll give him another shot, but this has definitely made me wary. Maybe I should try one of his newer works to hopefully avoid these things, or maybe a more fantastical/supernatural story would be better? I'm not sure.