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Mistakes I noticed in The Long Walk
This page is dedicated to YouTuber Edward Lorn
for this review on The Long Walk where he mentioned there is a lot of mistakes.
After hearing that, I started taking notes on all mistakes I found.
NOTE: Page numbers are from Kindle for Windows.
Red Cover Mistakes
 |
1. Not wearing the canteen and wide food-concentrate belt
2. The numbers they pressed onto their clothing were not that large
3. The soldiers drove a halftrack, not a tank. The halftrack has tread in the back, wheels in the front
4. The halftrack should be dun-colored
5. The halftrack has many toy-sized dishes on it. That one dish looks larger than toy-sized
6. The boy on his knees has no shirt. That would be Stebbins since this is the end scene. Stebbins did not take his shirt off. Abraham and Scramm take their shirts off.
7. Stebbins is dead by the time the Major steps out of his Jeep
8. Stebbins had blond hair and purple pants
9. The Major should be wearing "simple khakis", not the military green pants
10. There should be a dense crowd of people on either side of the road
11. #47 Garraty should be wearing a faded fatigue jacket
12. #47 Garraty was not wearing sneakers
13. #47 Garraty had no shoes at the end
14. The road center-line should be white, not yellow. "the Major's jeep had stopped diagonally across the white line"
15. They started out on a composition surface (black) road but Route 1 is expansion-jointed concrete "The road was now expansion-jointed concrete"
16. They are on a highway at the end, four lanes wide, not a back road
17. It was raining at the end, so everything should be wet
18. The Major should either be standing in the Jeep holding a stiff salute, or walking toward Garraty to greet him. Excerpts: "The Major stood in the jeep. He held a stiff salute.", "the Major was getting out, coming to him"
19. This is the end of the book, and the Major does not appear until Garraty is the last one alive but obviously there is another boy alive
|
Blue Cover Mistakes
 |
1. Not wearing the canteen and foot concentrate belt
2. The soldiers' uniforms should be dun-colored, not military-green
3. The halftrack should be dun-colored
4. The boys shirts have the numbers imprinted on them when in fact, the number was a decal
5. The vehicle following them appears to be futuristic, but it was only described as an ordinary halftrack
6. #3 Art Baker should have a red-striped shirt "Baker was up ahead - he could tell it was him by the flapping red-striped shirt"
7. #47 Garraty should be wearing a faded fatigue jacket
8. The vehicle is lighting the road. This never happens in the book.
9. The vehicle is travelling behind them. The halftracks always drive along the side of the road.
|
I only count 97 tickets but there should be 99. Check out the
timeline for full list of tickets and counts.
TICKET 83 Marty Wyman 97 At 11:40 Marty Wyman bought his hole
COUNT 83 And someone whispered, that was Wyman. And someone else whispered, that's eighty-three, isn't it?
<-- Count dead matches ticket count. It's correct up to this point
TICKET 84 Unknown At quarter past the hour, Bobby Sledge tried to scutter quietly into the crowd under the cover of the dark and the driving rain. He was holed quickly and efficiently.
TICKET 85 Unknown The guns were shooting again / someone else was dead, facedown in the rain.
TICKET 86 Unknown One more bought out before three o'clock
COUNT 85 Of the other ten
<-- There should be 14 walkers left because there are 86 tickets. It should read "Of the other nine" because Garraty, Baker, McVries, Stebbins, and Abraham are still alive.
TICKET 87 Unknown 1 of 3: Just before dawn, three of them went down at once.
TICKET 88 Unknown 2 of 3
TICKET 89 Unknown 3 of 3
TICKET 90 Abraham #2 (fatigue) It ended with Abraham crawling on his knees
COUNT 91 There were only nine Walkers left.
<-- There should be 10 walkers because there are 90 tickets.
TICKET 91 Bruce Pastor The guns blasted and Pastor rolled over dead.
COUNT 93 When they crossed into Massachusetts, they were seven: Garraty, Baker, McVries, George Fielder, Bill Hough, Rattigan, and Stebbins.
<-- There should be 9 walkers because there are 91 tickets
TICKET 92 George Fielder (insanity) Garraty could not even hear the gunshots when Fielder bought out
TICKET 93 Bill Hough Bill Hough ("you pronounce that Huff") bought a ticket at quarter of eleven
TICKET 94 Rattigan and Rattigan at eleven-thirty
TICKET 95 Art Baker #3 (nose bleed) Something inside Art Baker had hemorrhaged. His nose was gushing blood. / He hoped he wouldn't hear the shots. But he did.
TICKET 96 McVries #61 (sat down) McVries opened his eyes and smiled again. The next instant, he was gone.
TICKET 97 Stebbins #88 (collapsed dead) Behind him, they finished by shooting the already-dead Stebbins
<-- This should be ticket 99
The easiest way to fix the ticket count is add two more tickets.
1. Change "Of the other
ten" to "Of the other
nine"
2. Change "
three of them went down at once." to "
five of them went down at once"
3. Change "
nine Walkers left." to "
eight Walkers left."
- Some digital versions replaced "arms" with "anus" so it reads "Her anus around his neck".
- My print copies did not have the error. My ePub and Kindle did not have the error. My text and PDF files did have the error.
That had been something more than a nice kiss. His arms around her waist. Her anus around his neck, locked there, her eyes closed (he had peeked),
the soft feel of her breasts-muffled up in her coat, of course-against him.
- Carrion is the decaying flesh of dead animals. It takes time to decay. Unless the walkers are piling up in body-bags in the back of the half-track,
- then there's not enough time for them to decay to the point you can smell them. If they did store the bodies in the halftracks, they'd have it refrigerated to slow decay.
the stink of carrion that had settled into his nostrils.
- The "I" should be a "1", the way they wrote out "It was Abraham, 2." and "Scramm, 85"
Aaronson, I, cramped up in both feet
- Time went backwards. It should have been about midnight 12:15 AM when Garraty glanced at his watch and sees it's 11:45 PM. 45 minutes seems to have vanished!
p106 DAY 1: 11:10 PM - They hit sixty miles at about ten past eleven,
- About 20 minutes pass, then the book says another 30 minutes pass, so it should be about midnight at this point
p108 DAY 2: 12:00 AM About half an hour later, McVries came up beside Garraty and walked with him in silence for a little while.
- then about 15 minutes more pass, so it should be about 12:15 AM when Garraty glances at his watch
p110 DAY 1: 12:15 AM Garraty glanced at his watch and saw it was 11:30
- p211 Start of Chapter 9: At one o'clock, Garraty took inventory again.
Three paragraphs later: Then, around noon, as the day's heat mounted toward its zenith, the guns began to make themselves heard again
- Olson whispers to the boy "What's the matter with you?", then Olson asks "What's your name?" but then McVries says "Ray, Don't bother him". How did it switch from Olson to Ray?
Olson whispered, "What's the matter with you?" but the boy seemed not to hear.
They got that way, Garraty had noticed. Complete withdrawal from everything and everyone around them.
Everything but the road. They stared at the road with a kind of horrid fascination, as if it were a tightrope they had to walk over an endless, bottomless chasm.
"What's your name?" he asked the boy, but there was no answer. And he found himself suddenly spitting the question at the boy over and over,
like an idiot litany that would save him from whatever fate was coming for him out of the darkness like a black express freight.
"What's your name, huh? What's your name, what's your name, what's-"
"Ray." McVries was tugging at his sleeve.
"He won't tell me, Pete, make him tell me, make him say his name-"
"Don't bother him," McVries said. "He's dying, don't bother him."
- At the start it says Garraty had never seen the Major in person, then soon after Garraty remembers seeing the Major in person giving a speech in Freeport.
But he had never seen the Major in person.
Later we read ...
Garraty thought about the only Long Walk his father had ever let him go to.
They went to Freeport and watched them walk through.
The Major had made a speech to the crowd while the boys were still five miles out of town.
- Garraty is 16 and said his father was taken away 11 years ago (when he was 5)
so is Garraty lying when he says his father took him to see the Long Walk at age 10?
Although he was only sixteen, Ray Garraty knew something about guilt.
Garraty's father, before the Squads took him away,
Garraty had never seen his father since. It had been eleven years.
Garraty had been ten and overwhelmed by everything. (seeing the Long Walk in person)
- What does Garraty mean by "inflict a boy's last minutes with such a horror"? What boy is he talking about?
- The boy who died was Quincy or Quinten, and that boy wasn't listening to Stebbins horrific story.
Garraty didn't go crazy. He turned around to say angry words at Stebbins-to ask him, perhaps,
how it felt to inflict a boy's last minutes with such a horror-but Stebbins had dropped back to his usual position and Garraty was alone again.
- Is it foodbelt, food belt, concentration belt or just belt?
Garraty looked back and saw Olson's food belt lying across the broken white passing line.
Garraty fumbled in his new foodbelt
Greedy glances were shot at his foodbelt
His concentrate belt was nearly full
He deliberately selected a bar of chocolate from his belt
- If Olson was a true Christian, he wouldn't have committed suicide. He also wouldn't have told McVries that God will strike you down, for saving Garraty.
- Garraty didn't have a packsack. Where did he take his cookies out of?
Garraty took out his cookies, and for a moment turned the foil package over in his hands.
- bloody bastards? Is McVries British?
"You bastards!" McVries sobbed. "You bloody bastards!"
- They had just left Limestone.
By one o'clock, Limestone was a memory.
McVries: What's the next big town, Garraty?
Garraty: Caribou, I guess.
McVries: How far's that?
Garraty: Maybe thirty miles from here. WRONG! It was more like 11 miles.
The most direct route from Limestone from Route 1A is Route 89 to Route 1.
Limestone and Caribou border each other.
When they say "Limestone was a memory", they're talking about the main town area,
but they are still in Limestone. They reach the border of Caribou long before
they reach the main city area for Caribou. From the main city area of Limestone to
the main city area of Caribou is about 13 miles via route 89.
They leave Route 1A but then get onto Route 1 in Caribou.
Perhaps this can be explained by saying this is an alternate reality where
the distance from Limestone to Caribou is 30 miles.
- If you have a subconscious thought, that means you don't know about it.
I have no subconscious urge to kill myself
- How can his thigh be in excruciating agony when he barely felt it?
His thigh was excruciating agony, but in his concentration he barely felt it.
- If you don't notice it, then they're not aching
His fingers began to ache and he did not notice that much either.
- If he's not aware of pain and stiffness, then there is none.
He was not even aware of the steady dull pain in his feet and the frozen stiffness of the hamstring muscles behind his knees.
- McVries mentions "The original Three Musketeers", meaning him, Garraty and Baker, but he leaves out Olson. He should have mentioned the four musketeers.
This is about 50 pages after Olson got his ticket, so perhaps that's why he doesn't mention Olson.
"Let's start dropping back," McVries said. "We'll do it slow. Get together with Baker. We'll walk into Augusta together. The original Three Musketeers. What do you say, Garraty?"
- At the start, Garrty meets McVries and then they meet Olson and Baker.
"I'm Art Baker," the other said quietly. He spoke with a very slight Southern accent. The four of them shook hands all around.
- Barkovitch points out that "poking" is against the rules
"Move away," Baker said evenly, "or I'll poke you."
"It's against the rules," Barkovitch said with a smirk.
- And yet McVries didn't get a warning when he poked Garraty
An elbow poked him rudely in the ribs. "That's you, boy. Rise and shine." McVries was grinning at him.
- The rules say you can have bodily contact
I know what the rules say. Bodily contact with anyone I wish, as long as I don't leave the road.
- McVries points out Rule 8
"Next time he comes around I think I'll trip him," Olson said. His voice sounded dull and drained.
"Tut-tut," McVries said. "Rule 8, no interference with your fellow Walkers."
- Garraty gives McVries a hard flat shove, and doesn't get warned
Garraty put out his hands and gave McVries a hard, flat shove.
- The word automation should be automaton which means "a moving mechanical device made in imitation of a human being."
Why, he's nothing but a robot, nothing but an automation, really.
Credit: Carbon_Blob on Reddit
- about-face is used wrong twice.
Definition: About-face is an order given to soldiers to tell them to turn around and face the other way.
It's a change in the opposite direction, turning 180 degrees.
- A moment later Mike and Scramm did an abrupt about-face and began to walk toward the crowd
- The two boys were warned, and as they reached the guardrails that bordered the road, they about-faced smartly and faced the oncoming halftrack.
In both cases, they turned 90 degrees. King should have written left-faced or right-faced.
Credit: Carbon_Blob on Reddit
- Oversimplified and misleading: You can fall below 4 mph with 3 warnings. All that happens is your timer counts down. You were out of the walk when your timer reached 0.
They gave you three warnings. The fourth time you fell below four miles an hour you were ... well, you were out of the Walk.
- There are 2 problems with getting a warning every time you fell below 4 mph.
1. You'd never get a warning if you stayed below 4 mph (assuming no
timer)
2. If you walked on the edge of 4 mph, you could go over/under four times in 5 seconds, giving you 3 warnings and a ticket before the soldier could even lift the loudhailer.
You'd think you had no warnings, and suddenly you'd be dead. The 3 verbal warnings are so you can react and adjust, and have a fair amount of time to pick up the pace.
- Oversimplified and misleading: Barkovitch could fall below speed in the next hour and would not get his ticket, as long as his timer didn't reach zero.
He hadn't expected anyone-not even Stebbins-to get a ticket until late afternoon at least.
He thought of Barkovitch. All he had to do was fall below speed once in the next hour.
- Wording for third warning is inconsistent
"Third warning, 11 Final warning."
"Warning! Warning 11! Third warning, 11!"
"Warning! Warning 11! This is your third warning, 11!"
"Warning! Warning 11! Your third warning, 11!"
"Warning! Third Warning, 11, final warning."
"Warning! Warning 11! Third warning, 11!"
- Tubbins number is not mentioned, but can be assumed to be #93 since Tubbins falls between Tressler #92 and Wayne #94.
Garraty meets 93 and says Hi.
Number 93 - Garraty didn't know his name - walked past him on Garraty's right. He was staring down at his feet and his lips moved soundlessly as he counted his paces.
He was weaving slightly.
"Hi," Garraty said.
93 cringed. There was a blankness in his eyes, the same blankness that had been in Curley's eyes while he was losing his fight with the charley horse.
He's tired, Garraty thought. He knows it, and he's scared.
- Later Tubbins goes insane and gets ticket #80
Tubbins had gone insane.
- and gets a description
Tubbins was a short boy with glasses and a faceful of freckles. He wore hip-hanging bluejeans that he had been constantly hitching up.
He hadn't said much, but he had been a nice enough sort before he went insane.
- I'm wondering how they finally learned his name. It seems to me that King meant for these to be two different boys,
- but they have to be the same boy because they are numbered by last name ascending alphabetically,
- and there is only one slot between tressler #92 and Wayne #94.
- "We go down Route 196, then along 126 to Freeport"
It's actually route 125 that intersects 196 and goes to Freeport. When they turn off 196 onto 125, they cross a bridge over the Androscoggin river which is indicated in this excerpt.
"The road curved again. For a moment the crowd was gone as they crossed the bridge spanning the Androscoggin."
The bridge is narrow so it makes sense that there would be no crowd in order to protect the walkers.
https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9934573,-70.0583331,3a,75y,180.24h,75.11t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sJD-RmHCzRZR1L6MFf9dIHQ!2e0!7i13312!8i6656
- The book spells Old Town as one word, Oldtown. This could be a mistake, or an alternate reality spelling, or maybe it changed since
Stephen King wrote it in 1966/1967, or since he updated in 1978/1979 before published in 1979.
- It says Garraty asked, but he didn't ask anything.
"Did you go out for track or anything? In school?"
"No."
"Me either. But I guess it don't matter, does it? Not now."
"No, not now," Garraty asked. <-- Garraty didn't ask. There's no question-mark. It ends with a comma, like he's going to continue, but he doesn't.
- why was it so hard for Olson to go back and pick up his food belt? Even if he got an instant violation-warning, it would be his first.
I'm not aware that he had other warnings. The only way he wouldn't be allowed to walk in the opposite direction to get his food-belt is if he had 3 warnings.
In that case, it would be an instant ticket to get a violation-warning.
"his foot came down on a discarded belt of food concentrates. Surprised, he looked up. It had been Olson's. His hands were twitching at his waist. There was a look of frowning surprise on his face.
"I dropped it," he said. "I wanted something to eat and I dropped it." He laughed, as if to show what a silly thing that had been. The laugh stopped abruptly. "I'm hungry," he said.
No one answered. By that time everyone had gone by and there was no chance to pick it up. Garraty looked back and saw Olson's food belt lying across the broken white passing line.
- The Major congratulated Garraty before Stebbins got his ticket
But Stebbins was dead.
The Major stood in the jeep. He held a stiff salute. Ready to grant first wish, every wish, any wish, death wish. The Prize.
Behind him, they finished by shooting the already-dead Stebbins
- Thelonius Monk <-- typo, should be Thelonious Monk (or alternative reality?)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thelonious_Monk
- Cannonball Adderly <-- typo, should be Cannonball Adderley (or alternative reality?)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannonball_Adderley
- Garraty is checking his watch right before he sees Jan.
It was eight-fifteen now.
Eight-thirty.
Eighty forty-five. <-- typo: should be Eight forty-five.
- Time of day is written inconsistently. At the start, he's just listing the time like 8:40.
p11 DAY 1: 8:15 AM "Garraty looked at his watch again. It said 8:16, and he decided it was a minute fast."
p13 DAY 1: 8:40 AM "It went on until 8:40"
p14 DAY 1: 8:56 AM "Garraty's wristwatch said 8:56"
p15 DAY 1: 8:59 AM "His wristwatch said 8:59"
p15 DAY 1: 9:00 AM "Garraty's watch said 9:00"
- But then changes to spelling it out with o'clock to the end, for example ...
p22 DAY 1: 10:00 AM A little after ten o'clock, they passed a sign that said LIMESTONE 10 MI.
p135 DAY 2: 5:05 AM At a little past five o'clock they passed their first clump of bona fide spectators,
p326 DAY 3: 9:55 PM Do you realize it's almost ten o'clock?"
- But he also changed to expressing time written out like this
p54 DAY 1: 3:45 PM By quarter of four the sky had cleared and there was a rainbow in the west
p253 DAY 2: 8:45 PM "It's quarter of nine."
p277 DAY 3: 9:00 AM Somehow it had got around to nine in the morning again.
p363 DAY 5: 1:15 AM At quarter past the hour
- Pearson mentions something about psycho-history, but there's no mention of it. I think Pearson is referring to something that was cut out.
"I don't know about all that fucking psycho-history," Pearson said finally.
- Sluff is an alternate spelling of sloughed, but he's inconsistent using both spelling
His form had seemed to elongate as the weight
sloughed off him.
Garraty
sluffed one of his two warnings.
- Are canteens strapped, clipped or both?
More soldiers came around with canteens. They buckled on the belts and slung the canteens.
He laughed and unstrapped his canteen.
Garraty unclipped his canteen and had a quick swallow of water.
He passed trembling skeletal fingers across his lips, dropped them to his belt, and spent thirty seconds making them undo the clip that held his canteen to his belt.
It took Garraty what seemed like hours to make his hands go through the complicated ritual of snapping the belt closed around his waist
- Seems like he had it strapped on here
Garraty tipped his canteen up, swigged deep, recapped it, and began to doze again.
- Garraty had heard Stebbins voice before. See page numbers below.
p64 Garraty looked around, sure it was Stebbins even though he had never heard Stebbins's voice. But Stebbins gave no sign. He was looking down at the road.
- But ...
p39 From somewhere behind Garraty a voice said softly but clearly: "Diddly shit."
- Age range is 13-18
The following is a true statement, but it is misleading, because it implies only kids take the test.
most of the kids in the country over twelve take the tests
- and yet they allow up to age 18
Why don't you just get up off your fat ass and go to it with us? But the milkman was past eighteen.
- Garraty gets his acceptance letter and thinks
I was one in a million.
- Wrong: If most Males from age 13 to 18 applied then that's about 20,000,000. 1-in-50 get accepted, so that's 40,000. He's 1-in-40,000.
- Stebbins last warning is actually his third, but it says second. Here are his 3 warnings
p16 Warning! Warning 88! Olson: Smart. The guy takes a warning while he's still fresh and gets an idea of where the limit is.
p256 Stebbins dropped back quickly. Soldier: Warning! Warning 88!
p373 He staggered, and for only the second time since the Walk began, he was warned.
- Four mistakes:
Garraty's ID card says he lives in Pownal, Maine in Adroscoggin County
1. Pownal Maine is in Cumberland County just south of Adroscoggin County
2. Later he says he lives in Porterville which is fictional
3. Garraty says they won't be going through his city of Porterville, then they do.
4. The city of Porterville moves from west of Freeport to North of Freeport
- When Garraty arrives and hands the guard is blue plastic ID card, the terminal reads his address as RD 1 POWNAL MAINE ANDROSCOGGIN COUNTY
Notice there is no house address. There is also no Rd 1 in Maine. There is a Rt 1.
Pownal Maine is a real city, but it's just South of Androscoggin County, in Cumberland County.
But then he says he lives in Porterville, just west of Freeport. Pownal is just west of Freeport.
Porterville is a fictional city.
Garraty says Porterville has a population of 970. Pownal has a population of 1,474 in 2018, when I researched this.
It appears that Stephen King was using Pownal as Porterville, which may have had a population of 970 when he wrote it in 1966/1967.
He had lived in Maine all his life, in a little town called Porterville, just west of Freeport. Population 970
p17 "Does the road go anywhere near your hometown?" McVries asked.
"About seven miles to one side.
p244 "But we go through your hometown, don't we?"
"No, but close by it."
p331 they were now only thirteen miles out of Freeport. They were in Porterville now
- 13 miles North of Freeport on Rt 1 is in New Brunswick. Garraty's father made a living driving Government trucks out of Brunswick.
I'm not sure if he meant New Brunswick ME or Brunswick in Ontario Canada.
- This is confusing because it gives you the impression that you learn if you're a Prime Walker or a Backup when the names are pulled.
- You don't learn if you're a Prime Walker until the last backout date April 31.
- The names are pulled out of the drum before the first backout date of April 15, maybe sometime in the month before.
Abraham: "Then one morning I woke up and I was in. I was a Prime Walker, sixteenth out of the drum, as a matter of fact."
McVries: "Sure, they draw the names out of that cocksucking drum. Big TV spectacular." McVries's voice cracked a little.
"Yeah. The Major draws the two hundred names, but the names're all they announce. You don't know if you're a Walker or just a backup."
"And no notification of which you are until the final backout date itself,"
- Is this a mistake or is Stephen King showing how Garraty's memory of the past is changing, or he's becoming more honest with himself.
- Did he hit Jimmy in the mouth with the air rifle or not?
He hadn't meant to hit Jimmy in the mouth. It had been an accident. Of that he was quite sure
He thought of Jimmy Owens, he had hit Jimmy with the barrel of his air rifle, and yes he had meant to
- When there are 200 picked in lottery, a lottery picks chance of survival is 200-to-1.
- If you are a Prime Walker at the start of the walk, then your chance of survival is 100-to-1.
- If more than 100 backout for example if there are only 10 walkers at the start, your chance of survival is 10-to-1.
- As walkers get their ticket, and the number of walkers drops, your chance of survival improves. If 3 walkers remain, then your chance of survival is 3-to-1.
- So why did Dr. Patterson say Garraty's chance of survival was 50-to-1?
Figuring in the Prime group and the backups, your chance of survival is fifty-to-one.
- Click
here to see more factors that affect chance of survival.
- Stebbins did most of the walk in his tennis shoes, but his feet were fine unlike Ewing, who died from blisters because he was wearing P.F. Flyers sneakers.
Hint 3: Do not, repeat, do not wear sneakers. Nothing will give you blisters faster than sneakers on a Long Walk.
"They all listened silently. Garraty thought of Stebbins again. Stebbins was wearing tennis shoes. Maybe Stebbins was fighting blisters right now."
- Hint 6 changes slightly
Hint 6: Slow and easy does it.
Hint 6: Conserve Wind
- Misleading because Barkovitch would not get a ticket for stumbling as long as his timer stayed above 0.
Olson couldn't resist a parting shot. "Just don't stumble, buddy. They don't warn you again. They just ..."
- Misleading because Barkovitch could fall below speed and not get a ticket as long as his timer stayed above 0.
He thought of Barkovitch. All he had to do was fall below speed once in the next hour.
- One sign read GRADE, another HILL
STEEP GRADE TRUCKS USE LOW GEAR
STEEP HILL TRUCKS USE LOW GEAR
- Garraty was shocked when McVries said "Would you let me jerk you off?", then later he thought he wanted to touched, queer, not queer, but then follows with "not by McVries, not that way."
- It feels like he's contradicting himself.
The thing was, he wanted to be touched. Queer, not queer, that didn't seem to matter now that they were all busy dying. All that mattered was McVries. He didn't want McVries to touch him, not that way.
taking off their clothes and touching each other had been Jimmy's idea
- Then he yells at McVries "what ever you want!"
Garraty: "Do what you want, But quit playing games."
McVries: "Does that mean yes?"
Garraty: "Whatever you want! Whatever you goddam want!" Garraty yelled.
- He doesn't want McVries to touch him sexually, but he's telling McVries he can. Either Garraty is confused or King's writing is confused.
- Related: Speaking of touching, what is Garraty referring to? Maybe Stephen King edited down the book and removed the scene that Garraty is referring.
"We'll all spit in your brains," Garraty said crazily. "Do you want to touch me too?"
- Garraty is described as ...
well-built boy
Garraty flapped his thin arms
- Would a well-built boy have thin arms?
- The backout date is called the blackout date at one point.
"I let the April 15th backout date go by"
"No one tried to talk you into using the April 31st blackout?" <--- typo? Should have been backout
"Jan said she'd go all the way with me, any time, any way, as often as I wanted if I'd take the April 31st backout."
- The ending of The Long Walk is televised each year for as long as they've lived. They must have seen the end of the walk on TV many times.
- This excerpt makes no sense, unless The Long Walk is pay-per-view. Since these boys are all poor, they wouldn't be able to afford to watch it.
"You ever see the end of a Long Walk?"
"No, you?"
"Hell, no. I just thought, you being close to it and all-"
Stebbins says "I saw." then proceeds to tell them the horrors of the ending.
- Punctuation: Missing a close double-quote in the text below
One hand was frozen in the middle of a wide, sweeping gesture, as if he was about to deliver an angry philippic.
"God. <-- missing close double quote
"Damn," Parker said.
- it's actually early May
"He broke off for a moment, thinking, smelling early April."
- If your throat gets torn out, can you still scream? Wouldn't your vocal cords be gone?
Barkovitch ripped out his own throat.
Barkovitch went on screaming
- McVries tells Garraty "I got the call just past 11 PM four days ago. When the call came, I had just ten hours."
- He's telling Garraty this on Day 3 so he got the call May 31st at about 11:05 PM.
- 10 hours would be 9:05 AM. He'd be late. He needs to arrive by 8 AM to meet the Major to get his number,
- food-belt, and water cantene, then line-up for the start at 9:00 AM. He had less than 9 hours to get there.
- Confusing: Garraty talks about getting the acceptance letter, then mentions he let the April 15 backout date go by.
The letter was in the mailbox and it had a Wilmington, Delaware, postmark, so I knew that had to be it.
I let the April 15th backout date go by and the day after that they had a big testimonial dinner for me at the town hall
- Then McVries mentions the 200 names pulled from the drum.
"Sure, they draw the names out of that cock-sucking drum. Big TV spectacular."
- It's discussed out of order so it's confusing: The actual order is.
1. Apply (In 2018, about 20,000,000 would apply) maybe in February
2. Get accept/reject letter probably mid-March. 1 in 50 gets accepted so 400,000
3. 200 names are pulled from those 400,000 accepted, probably April 1 (April-Fools day!)
Related: McVries: (I thought when the first walker got his ticket) the Major would say April Fool and we'd all go home.
4. April 15 First back-out date (taxes due)
5. April 16 I let the April 15th backout date go by and the day after that they had a big testimonial dinner for me at the town hall
6. April 30 And the Ladies' Aid. They would be there. The Ladies' Aid had given him a tea two nights before the Walk started.
7. April 31 Final backout date
8. May 1 The Long Walk begins
- Jan's hair is initially dark, then later it's described as blond.
her dark hair that streamed nearly to her waist.
her long blond hair and her flat shoes.
Her long blond hair.
- Missing a closed double-quote at the end of this paragraph.
"I'm the rabbit," Stebbins repeated. "You've seen them, Garraty. The little gray mechanical rabbits that the greyhounds chase at the dog races.
No matter how fast the dogs run, they can never quite catch the rabbit. Because the rabbit isn't flesh and blood and they are.
The rabbit, he's just a cutout on a stick attached to a bunch of cogs and wheels.
In the old days, in England, they used to use a real rabbit, but sometimes the dogs caught it. More reliable the new way.
- After Ticket 29, Garraty says to McVries "a quarter of the way home, Pete.", but Ticket 25 would have been a quarter of 100.
- it mentions Garraty taking off his jacket, but it never mentions him putting it back on.
Garraty took off his jacket and slung it over his shoulder.
Garraty was tempted to take his jacket off again.
Garraty unzipped his fatigue jacket. He slung it over his shoulder.
Garraty took off his own jacket, rolled it, and tied it securely about his waist.
He retied his jacket about his waist and then went on walking as before
- Garraty says that Barkovitch was the only guy who thinks he's going to win, but that's not true.
"Can't." Garraty began angling toward the small, slumped figure of Barkovitch. "He's the only guy that still thinks he's going to win."
- Garraty already had this conversation with Stebbins, so he knew Stebbins thought it too.
"You think you'll win, don't you?"
"Yes," Stebbins said calmly. "I'm quite sure of it."
- The entrance ramp actually descends onto the turnpike because they cross a bridge over the turnpike.
entrance ramp split off and climbed
- It mentions confetti coming from 2nd and 3rd story windows in Oldtown but if you check
Leg 4 of the route,
then look at street view, you'll see that the buildings are sparse with some two story houses, and almost no 3 story buildings.
Confetti, newspaper, shredded pieces of telephone book, and long streamers of toilet paper floated and soared from second
and third-story windows. It was a New York tickertape parade in Bush League U.S.A.
- The book has the text "Aaronson, I, cramped up in both feet"
The upper-case I should be a 1. That's Aaronson's number.
For example "It was Abraham, 2."
- The Curley's Second Warning isn't correct.
Curley had a charley horse and had already picked up his first warning.
Then later Curley gets his second warning and he hears "Warning! Warning 7!"
What he should have heard was ""Warning! Second Warning 7!"
If the Soldier's just say "Warning! Warning 55!", then it's 55's first warning.
For the second and third warning, their supposed to say
"Warning! Second Warning 55!"
"Warning! Third Warning 55!"
- There was a business section and three used-car lots and a McDonalds and a Burger King and a Pizza Hut and an industrial park and that was Limestone.
Mistake: McDonalds should be spelled McDonald's
- They passed beneath a turnpike overpass. Not long after that, they walked into downtown Caribou.
But the Turnpike is about 60 miles South of Caribou.
They couldn't pass beneath a turnpike overpass right before entering Caribou.
- McVries says to Garraty
I christen thee Raymond Davis Garraty, pax vobiscum.
That is the only time Garraty's middle name is used.
How did McVries know Garraty's middle name?