The plan is to reread all of Stephen King’s works in the order that they were published. Richard Chizmar of Cemetery Dance had the vision. I’m doing it because I am a writer and I want to improve my fiction. And I love Stephen King’s stories. I think there is something to be learned through this process.

You can also go back to the beginning and read Before Carrie or any of my other posts up through this one and beyond by checking out this link to the Master List of all my #StephenKingRevisited posts.

This story in Charlie the Choo Choo comes off just as subtly creepy as its description in The Dark Tower series.

The recreation of this imaginary book has a good cover and interior art. There are high quality end pages. The copyright is listed as 1942 and by Beryl Evans like in The Dark Tower. It is even listed as the fourth edition as if this book has a real history.

It didn’t include the “missed sections.” In the novel, there was a place where we drift off from the story and come back to it. In this version of the book, there was no new material created for those missed pages in the description of the novel.

The talking train runs for the Midworld Railway Company from St. Louis to Topeka. Topeka from a Captain Trips plague world makes a slip into The Dark Tower world and becomes part of the rail line in that story with a much more sinister train. The daughter in the book is Sussanah, after one of the companions of the gunslinger. The train flies past cars on route 41 like they are standing still.

The train in the illustrations is dark and toothy in an intentionally unintentional way.

The engineer’s wife died in New York. A heavy detail for a children’s book.

“Still full of zip and zowie” we’re told of our beloved train.

“Look at the old fool,” one of the other engineers yells. “He cannot understand the world has moved on.” An important concept in the Dark Tower universe

We have an illustration of his wheels coming off the track like he’s derailing. Charlie is feeding himself on this last run. Susannah yanked “the hell” out of whistle, we are told in this strange children’s book. In the end, Charlie doesn’t talk as much as he used to.

In the last illustration, we have Charlie and his beloved engineer going in circles for the joy of the children. But as described in the Dark Tower encounter with this book, the children onboard look afraid.

My next post in this series will be Before Gwendy’s Button Box which will be linked on the Master List of all my Stephen King Revisited posts.

Jay Wilburn

Jay Wilburn has a Masters Degree in Education that goes mostly unused since he quit teaching to write about zombies. Jay writes horror because he tends to find the light by facing down the darkness. His is doing well following a life saving kidney transplant. Jay is the author of Maidens of Zombie Kingdom a young adult fantasy trilogy, Lake Scatter Wood Tales adventure books for elementary and middle school readers, Vampire Christ a trilogy of political and religious satire, and The Dead Song Legend. He cowrote The Enemy Held Near, Yard Full of Bones, and The Hidden Truth with Armand Rosamilia. You can also find Jay's work in Best Horror of the Year volume 5. He is a staff writer with Dark Moon Digest, LitReactor, and the Still Water Bay series with Crystal Lake Publishing.

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