I was about 12 years old when this came out. My friend's mother at the time was our personal expert consultant on all things Stephen King. Her opinion of this book was something like "meh." That isn't verbatim but it's pretty close. After that, I read some mediocre or even less flattering reviews in whatever rags I was reading back then - TIME, NEWSWEEK, THE BERGEN RECORD, shit like that. This book went on my permanent not-to-be-read-list. I even skipped the mini-series on TV because the almighty THEY said that it basically sucked. I was 12. Cut me some slack, Jack. 
 I liked it. Maybe because the worst of 80's King is still pretty damn good. Maybe because I read it in the context of what we know about King at the time, including his BAC. A respected reviewer who goes by the name Edward Lorn (Don't trust this guy; He's presumed to be dangerous) recently reviewed this with a 3 star rating and a pretty damn brilliant review. I admire his quest to reconsider every King novel in the context of the Dark Tower. He convinced me. That tower is fucking everywhere. I won't get into that since he already did but his review made me realize that I made a mistake when I passed this up. 
 There were echoes of everything from 'Salem's Lot to Under the Dome. In all of its imperfections, I'm glad I read it. Better to read it now rather than when it was released... that would have tainted my rating back then or would have if there were such a thing as Goodreads or the Internet or whatever... but I'm glad I finally read it. 
 If you are anywhere near a King completist, don't skip this one.