The Institute

 

The Institute – Stephen King

Although not all Stephen King books have been about the “supernatural”, the vast majority of his works do have a touch of the “woo woo”.  Stephen King is such a great author, that in most cases, even the most hardened realist can enjoy his works.  Most people don’t believe in haunted cars, clowns in sewers, nor animal graveyards that can resurrect our pets, but we enjoy reading about such stuff as we suspend our disbelief.  What makes The Institute so powerful, is that this story came across as very real and believable to me, yet it still managed to scare the crap out of me.

The story starts out a bit slow and, for me, pointless.  We read about a drifter, a former cop named Tim Jamieson, who’s basically trying to erase his life as an ex-cop due to some unforeseen circumstances and finger-pointing.  He ends up wandering far from home in a small town in South Carolina working part-time as a “door knocker”; essentially a cop-like occupation with very little pay nor responsibilities.  I was dreading reading about this for 500+ pages.

But fortunately, this isn’t the real story (Tim shows up later; much later).  The real story concerns a 12-year-old boy who is a genius.  Luke is smart enough to be accepted into M.I.T. at his young age.  Luke also has a rare gift of being TK (telekinetic).  The government has known this since birth, and the government wants him.  Actually, they NEED him. Kids that have this gift (along with the gift of TP, telepathy) are essential to the survival of the free world.  Sadly, though, these kids are essentially used by the government, and then used up. And then disposed.  So the government kills Luke’s parents and kidnaps him, relocating him to “The Institute”.  Luke’s nightmare begins.

There are other kids here as well, and this place is a nightmare. Sure, the kids are treated o.k. in some aspects, but word gets circulated within this circle as to the purpose of the place and these kids know their future is essentially doomed.  Well, since Luke is a genius as well as having the rare gift of being telekinetic, if anybody can figure out a way out of this barbaric institution, Luke has that ability.

And a great, suspenseful story ensues.  This is one of those books where I had to “skim ahead” several times. Normally when I do this it’s because I’m bored with the story. Not in this case though.  My reason for rapidly moving through the pages was because the suspense was so nerve racking, I was too impatient to read all the details that were coursing through the narrative.  I simply HAD to know what happened next. This book kept me on the edge of my seat.

As mentioned, eventually drifter Tim makes his way back into the story and all sorts of events ensue. This book was extremely intense, but deliciously addictive and entertaining.  I should confess that had I known this was a story about “kidnapped” children who are essentially tortured, I would probably have passed on this one.  Such stories are too hard for me to stomach (I had similar sentiments about “Rose Madder”, King’s graphic book about a woman being abused by her husband).  The uncomfortable scenes in the book didn’t damage my tender heart too bad nor too often, fortunately.  We also see these kids bond together, and their grit and determination make the overall experience not as unpleasant as it could be.  The fact that these kids are mostly teenagers or pre-teenagers also takes a tad of the sting away.  True, no “torture” should be acceptable, but for some reason it’s easier to read about bad things happening to 14-year-olds as opposed to 4-year-olds. Note I stated “easier”, not “easy”.

I’ve read just about every Stephen King book released.  As I write this review, there probably have been about 70 or 80 that he’s released since the mid-1970s.  This one is probably in my top 5 of all time. Top 10, for sure.