Book Review: 11/22/63 by Stephen King

Reading a fiction on the assassination of JFK and one that doesn't indulge in any conspiracy theory would certainly have to rely on something powerful... which is, in this case an unparalleled amalgam of solid research and character development. Writing a convincing period fiction is a challenge. Not only this fiction does it masterfully and with vivid detailing, the book was able to deliver almost a meta-sensory experience via the narrative from the perspective of a man travelling from present era. The rich narrative not only details out the timescape, but explores the multitude of dimensionality of different characters, economic conditions, social trajectory under the larger context of historicity. The social, cultural and linguistic dissonance felt by the protagonist are curved out through his experience and first person narrative... this book has textures.

The narrator is at the same time accounting his personal feelings while never offsetting the larger trans-generational perspective of social and cultural evolution. I bet I would have never read this book had it not been written with such a personal narrative style. The narrative of Jake Epping has an eerie resemblance with Holden Caufield of the Catcher In The Rye... where the readers can easily find a friend in the protagonist, privileged to be the witness of the protagonist's innermost feelings.

A rather long but an ornately beautiful insight into human condition and the fictional example of butterfly effect.