Mile 81

Stephen King

Sep 2011 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

Mile 81 is Stand by Me meets Christine—the story of an insatiable car and a heroic kid.

At Mile 81 on the Maine turnpike is a boarded up rest stop, a place where high school kids drink and get into the kind of trouble high school kids have always gotten into. It’s the place where Pete Simmons goes when his older brother, who’s supposed to be looking out for him, heads off to the gravel pit to play “paratroopers over the side.” Pete, armed only with the magnifying glass he got for his tenth birthday, finds a discarded bottle of vodka in the boarded up burger shack and drinks enough to pass out.

Not much later, a mud-covered station wagon (which is strange because there hadn’t been any rain in New England for over a week) veers into the Mile 81 rest area, ignoring the sign that says “closed, no services.” The driver’s door opens but nobody gets out.

Doug Clayton, an insurance man from Bangor, is driving his Prius to a conference in Portland. On the backseat are his briefcase and suitcase and in the passenger bucket is a King James Bible, what Doug calls “the ultimate insurance manual,” but it isn’t going to save Doug when he decides to be the Good Samaritan and help the guy in the broken down wagon. He pulls up behind it, puts on his four-ways, and then notices that the wagon has no plates.

Ten minutes later, Julianne Vernon, pulling a horse trailer, spots the Prius and the wagon, and pulls over. Julianne finds Doug Clayton’s cracked cell phone near the wagon door – and gets too close herself. By the time Pete Simmons wakes up from his vodka nap, there are a half a dozen cars at the Mile 81 rest stop. Two kids – Rachel and Blake Lussier – and one horse named Deedee are the only living left. Unless you maybe count the wagon.

Ratings and reviews

I thought that the story was pretty good. But it did end very quick,I read the story in about a day. I thought it was a but short. Some things I didn't like too much was that the main character Pete was passed out during all the action, and when he wakes up, he is only up for like one scene before the story ends. But I liked the story and I'm looking forward to reading more Stephen King books.

The monster is very interesting. I was wondering how people gonna deal with it? what will happen?... But I disappointed at the end. It's stupid! Obviously the writer didn't know the answers either! Another thing disturbed me was the writer tried to write the dialogues like young people, but he couldn't make it. I gave 3 star because the story was really really interesting and exciting. I couldn't even stop reading it, but the ending was terrible.

I've been a King reader for many years now, and his short stories have always been some of my favorite work. Of course, by their very nature these types of stories can be hit or miss... And for me, unfortunately, this was mostly a swing and a miss. It combines some familiar elements from other King stories. You have the vehicle with malicious intelligence, a-la Christine. You have the young kid who ends up seeing and dealing with very horrific situations. For me, this one just doesn't tie together very well. I can't explain it very well, but the themes were all just a little too familiar for a SK reader; I've seen it all before. Typically when I read this particular author, I find myself able to suspend reality just enough to deal with the subject matter at hand. I usually delight in it, in fact. Not this time; I just found myself critiquing the plot line and feeling very unconvinced. I just didn't enjoy this one... But Mr. King has earned a mulligan or fifty, and I'll definitely keep on reading his work.

About the author

Stephen King is the author of more than sixty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes the short story collection You Like It Darker, Holly, Fairy Tale, Billy Summers, If It Bleeds, The Institute, Elevation, The Outsider, Sleeping Beauties (cowritten with his son Owen King), and the Bill Hodges trilogy: End of Watch, Finders Keepers, and Mr. Mercedes (an Edgar Award winner for Best Novel and a television series streaming on Peacock). His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller. His epic works The Dark Tower, It, Pet Sematary, Doctor Sleep, and Firestarter are the basis for major motion pictures, with It now the highest-grossing horror film of all time. He is the recipient of the 2020 Audio Publishers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the 2018 PEN America Literary Service Award, the 2014 National Medal of Arts, and the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.