Usually, I'm struggling with trying to review my favorite books, because apart from expressions like 'awesome', 'mind-blowing' or 'must-read', not too much can be said about stories like these. Perhaps this is one of the reasons why I tend to enjoy writing snarky reviews of books I disliked way more than trying to compose a decent review on a story I loved and want everyone else to read as well. 
 "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" is one of them. I have to admit, I am a huge fan of prison stories and the way they are able to explore what imprisonment and isolation from society can do to a human's mind. Stephen King managed to explore this in such a perfect way, allowing hope and despair to flow into his words simultaneously. I've read many other reviews emphasizing it, and I can only sign what they are writing: this is not only a story about life in prison (which, by the way, is depicted in a very realistic way - not that I would be able to judge how life in prison really feels like, but at least King managed to convince me this is how it would feel like to be imprisoned for more than thirty years), but also a story about hope. And it is perfectly done. Not many stories before have been able to nearly reduce me to tears at the ending, but "Shawshank Redemption" is one of them. 
 It's no long story and, thus, will not take much time to read, so I can highly recommend giving it a try. Now, watching the movie version with Morgan Freeman and Tim Robbins will gain a high place on my to-do-list (right beneath reading more Stephen King novels), as nearly everybody seems to have watched this movie - and loved it - except for me.