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My Journey with The Long Walk
I had a long 3-hour round-trip commute in 2018. I got tired of listening to music and podcasts, so I decided to try an audio book.
I remembered that I used to enjoy reading Stephen King books in the 80s when I was a teenager starting with The Shining,
after I saw the movie in theaters in 1980. I would see Stephen King movies, then read the book. I did this with
Christine, Cujo, The Dead Zone, Firestarter, and Carrie.
So, I went to StephenKing.com and browsed the works. I figured he had written a lot of new books that I didn't know about unless there was a movie.
I saw a link on The Long Walk. It sounded boring, but I clicked on the link to read about it, then I was scared to read it because it sounded too intense.
I wasn't sure I could handle it, but of all the books King had written, this one intrigued me the most.
I know from the past that my mind wanders while listening to audiobooks, so I frequently lose the plot, then lose interest in the book. So, I decided to rewind to the last point I remembered, every time my mind wandered. I probably rewound a few hundred times on that first pass.
By the time I got through it, I had fully understood every sentence and did not lose the plot. I held off watching reviews of the novel on YouTube until I was done listening to it. The 10-hour Audible audiobook took me 3 days, then I watched 3 book reviews each night for the next 3 nights and they all said things that differed from understanding.
I thought 9 reviewers couldn't be wrong. I must be wrong. So, I wrote down the things these reviewers said that differed from my understanding, then I listened to the book again, taking notes, and paying close attention to these differences.
After finishing my second pass, I went back and rewatched all 9 reviews, and documented with timestamps, all the things I thought each one got wrong. I set out to find a review of The Long Walk that had no mistakes.
Since then, I've watched over 1000 book reviews of The Long Walk, and the only ones that have no mistakes are short and vague.
I kept re-listening to The Long Walk and taking more notes because half-way through, I'd start tracking something new, like all the character names, all the warning, all the tickets, all mentions of distance, days, time, and landmarks (for my timeline), mistakes in the book, things that didn't make sense to me, all pop culture references, and so on.
After the 10th listen, I moved onto other Stephen King books and set out to listen to them all, which I did. I'm now on my 8th read, and my 19th listen of The Long Walk.
Each time through, I have new realizations, and I still take lots of notes.