The Green Mile Paperback – 1 Dec 2008

I read this one whilst reveling on some long train trips. It was a perfect choice. It is a relatively easy read - episodic and filled with memorable characters. It helpful but not essential to have seen the film. The novel has more of the narrator's life in a old age home than does the film.

The book is great and I'm glad to find out what happened to the characters in this first rate Mr King

Thought provoking book. Deeply moving in parts. I am not, generally speaking, a Stephen King fan but I loved this book. I will be reading it again.

One of my all time favourite book & movie. Very pleased with how the movie represented the book.

I have read the green mile many times each time i read it i remember why i love the books so much awesome reading

Paul Edgecombe is the "bull-goose screw" in charge of the Green Mile, Cold Mountain Penitentiary's death row. He and his fellow guards have learned to keep things calm on their cell block. They make it clear that misbehavior will not be tolerated, but within reason they grant the condemned prisoners' requests. Things run smoothly.

In the fall of 1932 some new personalities join the mix and things change. Percy Wetmore is a new guard who doesn't want things to run smoothly--he wants to bully and humiliate the prisoners. Eduard Delacroix is a newly condemned prisoner who just wants to teach tricks to Mr. Jingles, a mouse who has found its way into the cell block. "Wild Bill" Wharton is dangerous to anyone who comes near his cell because "he just doesn't care about anything." And John Coffey is a gentle giant, convicted of the brutal rape-murder of two young girls but as quiet and well-behaved a prisoner as the guards have ever seen. As events unfold, it becomes clear that John Coffey has some unusual abilities.

I was a fan of The Green Mile movie, but for some reason put off reading the book. Reading it was a pleasant experience, indeed. First, the movie seems to follow the book closely--most of what I liked about it was in the book to begin with. The book also offered some additional enjoyment. It is structured as two parallel stories, one in 1932 in Cold Mountain Penitentiary and the other in a 1990's retirement home where Paul Edgecombe shares his story with a fellow resident. The interweaving of these two stories and the disclosure of information as they both proceed is skillfully done. In fact, King's foreshadowing in both stories adds to the telling, reliably pointing the way ahead while allowing the reader to guess correctly or incorrectly about what will occur. These aspects do not fully make the transition to the movie, good as it is.

I recommend this book highly for Stephen King fans and for readers who appreciate well-crafted writing.

The prisoners who are sent to E Block at Cold Mountain Penitentiary come and then they... go. One man, however is destined to make a lasting impression.

Set on the penitentiary's death row and told from the point of view of the head warder on the block, The Green Mile is a curious story in many ways but it is, from my perspective one of King's finest stories. It was also made into a rather good film.

The setting is certainly an absorbing one, giving the reader an up close and personal view of life and death in an American prison's execution block. There are some fascinating character studies of the staff and inmates and a graphic account of an execution by electric chair. Surprisingly enough, this is a feel-good story where the warders are, for the most part, decent, likeable and sensitive people and even the condemned inmates turn out to be "just human" (again, for the most part). Is this a rose-tinted view of the death penalty, it's victims and executors? I don't think so, but not having any direct experience (thank god!) I can't say for sure. It is certainly a /different/ view and that makes for a good read and, if the reader finishes the story feeling a little warmer, then who can complain?

The story deals with the sort of themes that you would expect from King; spirituality, good and evil, redemption and a strong christian religious undercurrent, with a Christ-figure, supernatural healing and martyrdom. No supernatural /horror/ though, if that's what you're looking for. The horror comes solely from what one man, if so-minded, can do to another.

As I mentioned, there are several execution scenes; one botched electrocution is rather more gruesome than the others and King, as one would expect, pulls no punches here, so beware. But then you weren't expecting pixies collecting magic powder in the enchanted forest, were you? As an interesting aside, according to Wikipedia, the word "electrocution" which we use now to describe any electric shock (accidental or otherwise) is actually a portmanteau of "electrical" and "execution" and was coined to describe the method of dispatch. Now you know.

It was originally released in six installments during 1996 and this does result in a somewhat episodic structure. This isn't overly disruptive but there are some rather annoying repetitive "pick-ups" at the beginning of each section. The story also jumps back and forth in time between the contemporary period (set in during the Great Depression in the 1930's) and the narrator's "twilight years" in an old folks home. On the whole, this format is a little jagged and it is, I think, the only cause for complaint about the novel (and a small one at that). Actually not the only one. The ending is a little flat, a bit of an anti-climax, but you can't have everything.

Very highly recommended

I read this in 10 tiny little books back in the day in my early teens. I really enjoyed it and was also impressed with how close the movie is to the book