The Shining
I've been thinking again about plot and energy in hypertext narrative, and grabbed this along with the Elmore Leonard.
Jack Torrance is an alcoholic. So is Stephen King, but while King now writes casually and humorously about the time when he simple couldn't sleep, knowing that there was a bottle of beer still not drunk somewhere downstairs, Jack Torrance is grimly on the wagon, without humor and unable to laugh at, or forgive, himself. Jack, in other words, is awfully tough on himself, and King sure is hard on Jack. Inserted into a horror novel, this guy never has a chance.