The Running Man

Now that I finished The Satanic Verses, I have TONS of time to read other books!  Plus, I'm currently on vacation, so I hope to get heaps of extra reading done.  If I'm going to spend money for the books, I might as well read them, right?!

The Running Man is a novel by Stephen King, written during his Richard Bachman phase.  Made into a movie in the late 1980's, it is loosely based on the novel.  By loosely, I mean that it involves running from people trying to kill Ben Richards.  And that's it.

In this dystopian novel, set into the not-so distant future (2025!), the social gap has been split even further.  The rich are still living the high life, but the less fortunate are so poor that in order to make money they vie to be contestants in game shows that may cause injury or even death.  Ben Richards, the novel's hero, is a 28 year old man who is desperate to keep his wife from making money "on her back" to pay for the medicine that their 18 month old daughter needs to treat her influenza.  In a last ditch effort to provide for his family, Ben goes through the extensive physical and mental testing required by the game show corporation and ends up on the highly acclaimed, and highly paying, Running Man show.

In this game, the contestant runs for his life: for every hour he survives, he earns $100 and for every hunter he kills, he gets $100.  On the flip side, the public is encouraged to help the hunters find the contestant: for a reported sighting, the person gets $100 and for a sighting ending in a kill, the person gets $500 and if the contestant makes it 30 days, he'll receive $1,000,000.  However, the longest record for survival is only 8 days.

Ben's plan of attack is to stay low; using his first 12 hour head start, he attains a fake ID to fly to New York.  Convinced that his mandatory twice daily tapes to the studio are being traced, he buses to Boston and stays in a run-down hostel.  Bored and watching cars, he realizes that the men outside the window are hitmen; to solve this problem, Ben sneaks in to the basement and blows up the hostel on top of him.  On the other end of the sewer, he meets a kid by the name of Stacey and his older brother, Bradley. 

Turns out, Bradley is an educated gang member who enlightens Ben on the issues of the poor air quality.  In his videos, Ben attempts to address this problem, but the games corporation does its own form of censorship: voice overs to increase hostility towards Ben.  Bradley helps Ben by smuggling him through road blocks and sending him to meet his contact: Elton.  Unfortunately, Elton's mother tips off the hunters, resulting in a car chase. 

Separating, Ben ends up in a small town and he hijacks a car driven by an upper class woman named Amelia.  Bluffing his way through a few road blocks, he demands a jet and for the head hunter, McCone, to join him onboard.  While on board, Ben is offered the job of head hunter by the head of the games corporation, Killian.  When Ben refuses, he learns that his wife and daughter were murdered at the start of the show.  In a fit of madness (or perhaps clarity) Ben kills everyone on board and crashes the jet in to the building of the games corporation.

I really liked the concept of this book: running for your life and money.  I honestly believe that reality tv will end up this way in a few years (hopefully decades).  I mean, look at UFC!  Sure, that isn't to the death, but it could end up that way eventually.  For example, Roman gladiators and hangings of the past were for the entertainment of the public.  However, I didn't really care for the personality of Ben Richards - who was too cynical and too quick to flip off everyone. 

Having read books by Stephen King in the past, I figured that there was a 50/50 chance of Ben surviving this show.  However, I didn't like the ending: sure, the building was destroyed, but who did that benefit?  Definitely not Ben or his family; and he sure didn't help out the poor by breaking the news of the poor air pollution and nose filters.  Essentially, he destroyed the building out of spite.

So, honestly?  If you like dystopia, you might like this book.  If you've watched the movie, you may get a kick out of the book to see the differences.  Otherwise, I don't know if you'd like it.  The language is racist and coarse, the hero really isn't a hero and some scenes are unnecessarily graphic (which is typical of Stephen King).