Cujo: A Novel

Cujo is a very lrge, very sick dog. Cujo has rabies, Cujo is a monster. Cujo has a lady and her daughter has a lady and her daughter trapped inside a car that won't run."Cujo is a great read. The novel presents a depiction of terror in a very realistic setting. Of all of Kings novels, I think Cujo presents the most immediate sense of terror in a realistic setting.

When you read this great little novel you will come to fear "Cujo" as much as the woman and her daughter trapped in their car. highly recommend.

The book had my interest from the start and from the end.It really grabbed my attention in the first part where a high action took place.I was hooked from that point on.When the high action takes place is when, Cujo, the dog who has rabbies which makes him crazy is getting closer and closer to Tad Trenton's bed each night. Tad, the young boy, cries every night and tryes to tell his parents but they dont believe him.You, as the reader, will be surprised how fast you will be involed with the book in the beginning and will be hooked from that point with the rest of the book.The theme is not to belive everything you hear like there is no "monster" in your closet.In conclusion, I would recomened this book to everyone, especially those who enjoy lots of action.

If you’re a die-hard Stephen King fan, you’ll probably love this book. But, if you’re a fresh reader of King, I’d recommend starting with something else. I would characterize this book as more of a soap opera with horror thrown in. You have to remember, when King wrote “Cujo” he was dealing with substance abuse issues, and has claimed that he barely remembers writing it.

The ending was surprising and was what made the book worth it to me. Worth a read.

When I first picked up this book, I envisioned the standard possessed monster traveling around, leaving bodies in its wake. To my surprise, this book isn't like that at all!! King is much more creative and realistic than that!
This book is actually far more psychological than action oriented. Even though it is relatively short, there are numerous intriguing subplots in addition to the main plot.
As with all King books, the characters are very well developed. We really feel for the main characters. Even Cujo, the dog, is well developed and in the end King finds a way to make us feel sorry for him. As for Kemp, *shivers*, King really knows how to make us hate a character.
This book is scary to begin with, but what makes it even more frightening is the fact that this situation could actually happen to any one of us.
An excellent book.

Cujo- A pet to never forget

Cujo is a tedious read for those used to the more exciting and action packed Stephen King usually writes. Cujo written by the famous author Stephen King.

The book Cujo is about the real life monsters that don't have to live in the dark recesses of your closet or dreams to thrive in. There is no main character like in many of King's books the perspective alters constantly to show everything that's going on. Though in the broad prospect of things there are two main families the story follows.

The Trenton family is in the upper middle class with Vic a commercial director and his wife Donna a stay at home house wife. There pride and joy Tad or to his dad tadder has a monster in his closet which is a foreshadowing of the monster he faces latter on.

The other family is the chamber family. A poor hillbilly get'r done husband abuses his wife Charity. She stays around only for her son who his very intelligent but she worries that he will follow his father's footsteps to nowhere.

The Trenton's car is in need of repair and so they take it to Joe who repairs cars and meet the Chamber's dog Cujo. Cujo is a lovable easy going 200 lbs dog.

Of course in typical King fashion he turns Cujo into a poor retched monster. Maybe not the type your thinking of Cujo gets bitten by bats and get the nervous system attacking brain deteriorating incurable disease rabies. Well while this is happening Vic finds out that Donna is cheating on him so he leaves town.

While Donna is trying to keep her marriage together which takes up a large potion of the book dulling it so much that even when you get to the parts where Cujo is killing people it can hardly raise your attention.

Well Donna takes tad with her to get the car checked out again. Cujo has fallen to the last stages of madness and attacks. With a cruel twist of fate the car battery dies trapping Donna and her 6 yr old son to an indefinite siege in the car. After day of being trapped and with tad on the brink of death Donna faces off with Cujo armed only with a broken bat.

I would recommend that if you want to read this book that you be very persistent with your reading. The extra details can grow tedious and boring so if you're not a good reader find something else.

I read 'Cujo' several years ago and just re-read it a few
weeks back. The portions of the book that dealt with
what was going thru Cujo's mind were innovative and well
done. I often wonder about the thought processes of my
pets(or animals in general). Cujo was a simple being with
simple needs that, while responding to his normal animal
insticts, ended up with an unfortunate physical condition
that converted him into a monster. Maybe Mr. King should
have considered a different breed of dog to play Cujo; a St.
Bernard is generally a very docile, amiable creature.

At any rate, the book was a winner, as are most all of
Stephen King's works.

Read this book in paperback before I saw the movie, and at first was kind of put off that a horror story was based on rabies. Then I got into the book and loved it. Cujo is a Saint Bernard and a good dog, until he gets rabies, after which he changes into a rabid killer. A woman and her child are trapped in their Pinto when it won't start (kind of creepy when I was reading the book since I also had a Pinto). Cujo is a masterful story of man's best friend turning into his worst nightmare, killing his owner and terrorizing some visitors. I think it was one of King's best.

This is one of my favorite novels from King. The plot is pure genius...a gentle, loving family dog that gets rabies from some bats...then unwillingly turns into a savage monster. I myself am a dog-lover, throughout the book -- I had alot of compassion for Cujo...he was a victim of a terrible disease -- not a cold blooded killer. It's weird to have compassion for the humans and the dog --- this is not a novel with a clear-cut good guy vs. bad guy. I guess it is just part of King's genius. This book is fairly fast-paced....the only part of the novel that bored me a little was the whole "Vic/Roger -- Rasberry Zingers/Advertising job troubles" subplot. The last 100 pages are some of the most intense pages I have ever read. I want a St. Bernard :(

This is one of King's most poetic, beautifully written works, and simultaneously one of his most horrifying. It's hard to put into words how amazingly well crafted it is, how the words flow, how the characters live. I wish someone would ask King what he means about not being able to remember writing large sections of it ... was it because of inebriation at the time, or alcohol and drug abuse later that damaged his memory of writing it? Because the novel itself is one of the best, most lucid things he's ever written, and King is utterly and sincerely committed to it's reality, something that seems to have disappeared from his more recent works. Can it be that at one time alcohol helped him actually face the horror of what he was writing?

The novel is almost unique among his longer works in that the supernatural element is suggested to be underlying everyday reality, not forcefully poking it's head into it to prove its presence. Every element can be explained psychologically or naturally, leaving the sense of spiritual malevolence as a suggestion, not actually manifest in some intruding non-natural form, and even the never explained mystery of the rearranging closet contents could be explained by sleepwalking. This actually allows the spiritual to be felt by the reader with way more force, supported by the natural elements the reader encounters every day. Much has been made of King's use of the everday in his fiction, but so many fail to point to this novel as illustrating his most powerful and masterful use of it.

I can only think of one element that some might find distasteful, and that is the way the story punishes one character excessively for the crime of being a coward, as this might indicate a bit of insecurity on the author's part, directed towards the character for the way this fear brings about tragedy. But King's genuine effort to understand this character and the fear that is suffered by the character shows that he was trying with all honesty to see things from that character's point of view. A second subplot, involving a counterpart to this character, seems also to point to this insecurity (both are women and the sub-plots are about their choices regarding their relationships with their husbands).

And the characters, oh the characters! Old deaf Evie, with her cigarettes and foul mouthed forecasts is one that I dearly love and remember, and King obviously dearly loved and crafted. The most hopeless and lost of his poor rural-Maine characters are seen with sympathy and affection, and not as a cheap trick to make the horror more effective, but because the author's feelings about them seem genuine.

As a kid, I was twice attacked by dogs, resulting in my long-time phobia of them. "Cujo" first appeared during my freshman year of high school, and I was always intrigued and also frightened by its premise. If I read it, would it cause me to lose sleep for years to come? Would I be able to handle the flashbacks of my own terror? Finally, for a number of reasons, I took the plunge this week.

To my surprise, "Cujo" is less of a horror novel--it has only a few disturbing moments--and more an exploration of families in a small town, teetering between the nostalgia of the past and the nightmarish realities of the present. Vic and Donna are dealing with marital problems and with a child who believes he has monsters in his closet. The Cambers are hiding abusive relationships, while unaware that their peaceful St. Bernard is about to become two hundred pounds of rabid fury. King's depiction of Cujo's changing frame of mind is masterful.

Ultimately, the threads of these lives will interwine and unravel on a number of levels. The very adult story is also an ode to the survival skills of Donna, and the determination of Donna and Vic to make their marriage work. The ending has some ironic tragedy, but it left me with some details unexplained. It also--thankfully--failed to rob me of any sleep later on. Overall, this is a well-told tale by a deft storyteller who seems as interested by the troubles behind America's picture windows as he is by the horrors of inexplicable evil.

Despite reading like a pre-made screenplay, this is an effective and very involving pulp novel that doesn't pull any punches or end with any cop outs. It's quite realistically scary, too, in that King makes simple every day things, like breakfast cereal and a child's toy closet, seem menacing. Probably his best characters for sheer immediate indentification, since they're well drawn and fragile enough to be totally believable. A heartbreaking and very blunt ride thru the suburbs, where, alas, not even the family dog (or the family car for that matter) is safe. Note the clever references to King's other work, the Dead Zone, that sort of tap into the kid's childhood nightmares.

Stephen King may have been coked out of his gourd when he wrote Cujo (by his own admission), but it still holds up better than his more recent books. Or his so-called more ambitious work, such as the ridiculous, bloated novel, IT, which, even at 1000 pages, never convinced me that evil in the form of a clown (!) dwelled in a sewer system.

Cujo, on the other hand, is tight, solid, suspense fiction, typical of his early work. I still think The Shining is King's best and most deeply unsettling book (the *All Work And No Play* revelation still creeps me out to the point where I have to double-check my locks).

But like other early novels such as Carrie and The Dead Zone, Cujo showcases SK when he was still testing his talent, trying to push it. Here, his challenge was clearly: Can I break out of the supernatural niche and still write a damn good book? And he does, though he succumbs to the temptation to hedge his bets with a (never resolved or fully explored) hint at the occult.

In short. Read it. Instead of IT.

I have two veiws on this book. I really like the over all book but in the begining it was very slow. Cujo is not a book for younger children. There are very strong words and very good descriptive adjectives in this book. That is one of it's best qualities though. I would recomend this book for anyone that likes horror books and suspence books. The way Stephen King wrote this is a way to keep you interested. He accually explained how the dog was thinking, he got into it's mind. In my opinion that takes a real writer to do that. Once I started I just could not put the book down. Over all this book was one of the better books of Stephen King.

Like many other people, Cujo is the first Stephen King book I ever read. It's shorter than most of King's other work, but it's a great story.

Before reading it, people obviously have an idea what it will be about. When reading it, you know how it's going to turn out later on in the story, it's just a matter of when it will happen. Stephen King really builds up the suspense based on the readers knowing something bad will happen later on.

From my memory, the first 30 pages are good. We are introduced to the characters. The story becomes less scary about 30 pages in, but the suspense is built upon the readers knowing Cujo is about to go on his rampage at some point, we just don't know when. The story becomes a little bit slow in the first half, but the character development is great none the less. The first part of the story focuses on marital problems in two different families.

The part with Cujo's rampage and the situation two characters get into is loosely related to these problems. How is it related you might ask? The best answer is to read the story and see how.

While it might seem slow at first, Cujo becomes a gut wrenching story at the half point, and it ends with a tragic, heart breaking ending.

I won't give away the ending, but I will say that the movie ends differently, which really disapointed me when I watched it.

Cujo is great for those who are new to Stephen King. It's pretty well paced, even during the slower parts. It's a great story too, and is much deeper than it looks on the surface. It also hits home to certain people, since the story is realistic and doesn't involve anything supernatural.

I can't think of any words to describe to you, the reader, how this book made me feel, but here goes anyway, because I like to be helpful.
To lump King into the limiting paradigm of "horror writer" is like blasphemy, and if you're going to read Cujo, you might as well toss it if you're going to think of it that way. King is not a horror writer, any more than Fitzgerald is a cheap, 10-cent paperback romance writer.
What King writes about is life--in all its bloody and dank, beautiful and mysterious glory. When I read Cujo I was terrified, and my hands even shook as I put the book down, finally finished at the end of the long night. But what terrified me the most is not the actual carnage, but the fact that this story is so real that the location might as well be Anytown, USA, and You, the Anonymous Reader Reading This Review, as the lead character.
King said himself that, like in Ripley's Believe it or Not, reality and the bizzare (read:horror) coexist at all times, and that the juxtaposition of the two is where terror originates. REAL horror is here in the real world, not in Nasfaratu, not in Freddy Kreuger or Jason, but in your own home, or worse--in your own mind. The story on its own is almost boring: a lovable 200-pound St. Bernard catches rabies. So why was I shaking, and why did I burst into tears after reading the ending? Better yet, why was I so moved that I took the time to write this review to convince you to read it for yourself?
Trust me. Read the book. I don't care if you've never met me. From one terrified reader with her head detached after reading Cujo to another reader contemplating buying it (that's why you're here, isn't it?), take my advice and get it. You won't regret it.

I'll admit that I didn't quite get this book at first. I found myself wondering aloud "HOW EFFING LONG DOES IT TAKE FOR ONE DOG TO RABID?!"

But if you stick it out, you see what King is doing pretty quickly. Every single bit of drama, seemingly pointless tangent, overly drawn out scene about characters who have nothing to with the story - it's all setting up a terrifyingly intractable situation. At any point in this novel, if things played out even slightly different, the whole plot would have fallen apart, and the damn dog would have been shot like, 100 pages in. But instead, a series of exceptionally mundane coincidences add up to create one down right absurd, yet horrifying, situation; yet, in such a way that I bought every freaking second of it.

Readers who go into "Cujo" expecting a story about a rabid dog terrorizing unsuspecting humans will be a bit disappointed. Although that element is present, it really doesn't take up much of the novel. Most of the book is about issues that the two main families have to deal with. King himself was going through some difficult times in his own family when he wrote this, which probably explains why that particular part of the story takes up so much space. King has actually said that he was abusing alcohol so heavily at the time he wrote "Cujo" that he doesn't even remember authoring it. It's quite evident, too, as there are several sarcastic passages in the story and some of it is actually pretty funny. If you keep in mind the author's struggles during this period in his life, then it will be much more clear to you why he wrote the story the way he did. Horror purists probably won't care for it, but those who desire real character development in their novels will appreciate King's approach.

Cujo kept me on the edge of my seat. It was very suspenseful, especially at one point when the heroine arrives at her mechanic's house. She is then stalked by the dog, then it charges at her. I recomend this book because it eas so realistic, and all the characters were so life-like because Stephen King allows you to enter their minds. Therefore you feel fore them. What makes it so realistic is that this could really happen. It doesn't deal with monsters or any thing like that. It deals wirh two very realistic characters, trapped in a Pinto, for two swelteringly hot days, by a very rabid dog. The ending was a bit of a shock to me, though. I don't wasn to give it away, but it has to do with the son. Once again, Stepohen King has surprised me.

... was a bit like watching one of those special-effects extravaganza disaster movies -- the focus of the book, it's sole redeeming feature, was the disaster itself, in this case Cujo. The simplistic attempts at psychology were relatively weak, shallow, and somewhat cliche-driven, or so it seemed to me. However, I read this book with the same guilty-pleasure mindset one gets from watching such a disaster movie as I've previously mentioned, and to this end, the shallowness of the characters only added to my enjoyment. This was because the book's focal point, for me, was "wouldn't it be cool if a very large, powerful dog got rabies and went on a rampage?" If the characters had enough depth to actually make me care about whether or not they got eaten by a rabid dog, then the book would have ceased to draw from me that morbid, voyeuristic fascination which it did.
I've only read to other books by Stephen King so far, "Needful Things," and "Gerald'! s Game," both of which, I thought were of much higher quality than this -- Both were very well, and intelligently written, and the focus seemed not so much to scare the reader, or to indulge their morbid curiousity, but to reveal and explore the external and internal landscapes of the various characters involved. Overall, this book was a dissapointment, especially after reading all the good reviews found here. Nevertheless, the few hours I spent reading this book were anything but boring.

One of Stephen King's most outstanding novels, "Cujo" came out in 1981 and later was made into a theatrical film.

The story tales plave in Castle Rock, Maine and revolves around two families intertwined because of a demented serial killer on the loose. Frank Dodd, a killer in King's "The Dead Zone", is reprised in "Cujo" and is somehwat of a boogeyman that terrorizes the resiedents of this particular small town.

What many do not know id that when King write "Cujo" he was suffering from an excessive use of alcohol and does not remember much about writing it. I later interviews he does admit he likes the novel but wishes he could recall putting the story on paper.

The original hardcover edition of "Cujo" is one of the most-sought after Stephen King books out there and is sought after by die-hard fans!

I am reading my way backward (more or less) through Stephen King's novels and I was not looking forward to this one. The title and cover, perhaps, were a turnoff. However, with its strong characterizations, consistent style, and very well-thought out plot, Cujo is very good indeed. The supernatural elements (which really contribute nothing positive to the novel, but almost always creep into King's works) are kept to a minimum. There are some unpleasant, very graphic scenes in the book, no doubt, but what should a reader expect from a King novel about a rabid dog?

The Golden Age of Stephen King (from Salem's Lot to approximately Christine) was a glorious time for horror fans and Cujo fits nicely into this period. The story is basic with no supernatural add-ons. It is about a crazed dog and a mother and son trapped in a car and, in the hands of the master, this makes for nail-biting suspense. It never has the feel of an elongated and needlessly stuffed short story (such as Pet Semetary or The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon) but is a meaty read all on its own. My only regret is that a friend decided to tell me the ending. He won't bother us anymore. An exciting, well-crafted book.

The last half of "Cujo," when the mother and son are trapped in the car by the rabid title beast, goes from being frightening to being tedious. "The monster is out of my closet," little Tad tells his mommy. Unfortunately, the monster does not do much of anything for a couple of hundred pages after that except keep Tad and his mother trapped for no real good reason. Too bad, because "Cujo" starts off very well, slowly weaving its fabric of terror. After the disease apocalypse and town destroying vampire hordes of some of King's previous works, this one just doesn't measure up.

Stephen King's penchant for fleshing out his characters (even the ones that make a grisly exit mere pages later) really takes a new twist in Cujo, when he writes, at times, from the actual point of view of a mentally deteriorating St. Bernard. While not as terrifying as typical King fodder, this gripping (and strangely endearing) read is more than worth the (nowadays reduced) cover price.
The novel's theme is one of circumstance, and the chances every existing entity takes with fate. While some supernatual ties are (rather vaguely) referred to, the plot of the novel is essentially fate intertwining the personnal crisis' of several families with that of a dog who suffers an untimely bout of Rabies.
Other commentators haves speculated deeper ties and metaphors in the novel's sub-plots, and the reader may assume these as he or she pleases.
The resulting conflicts in the novel have the great effect of being mindbendingly outlandish and yet fathomable, and entirely gripping.
A more than justifiable King classic, once again defying critic's claims that King's writing is "fast food" literature.

So if you need more proof that Stephen King doesn't just write about haunted hotels or boogeymen, pick up Cujo. He manages to write a great book (and it's short too, just over 300 pages)where the "monster" is a rabid Saint Bernard named Cujo. What's also great about the book is King continuing to write rich characters, with backgrounds and personalities. I read a lot and I still find that he is one of the best writers when it comes to creating memorable characters. This book is quick, to the point and still pretty scary. I guess the scariest part is the fact that the story is so plausible. Read it. But only if you don't have a Saint Bernard, because I don't think you'll look at him the same way again!

Cujo has got to be the source of most fears of dogs... And for good reason. After you're done reading this book, never again will you want to go near a Saint Bernard (or any other wrongly termed dog) again! Or at least for a long time. The biggest plus to the book besides the movie is not having to hear the kid screaming and crying all the time (I think). That just got way too irritating for me. As with all books, Cujo went into more details than the movie, you learn more about the characters and what thoughts are running through their heads. To run or not to run... etc.
~Natalie Kilpatrick

Overall Cujo was an extremly wellwritten novel.Using an amazing mixture of hope, suspense, and fear, the author(Stephen King) creates an exterordinary tale of a dog that terrorizes a town.The dog (Cujo) obtains rabies from a bat and immedietly shows signs of being rabid. The author portrays what is happening while he is going through the changes that any rabid animal would go through, making the story easier for young people to take in.I do not recommend this book to anyone who is below the age of 12 or has a soft spot for dogs. Cujo is a book that anyone from ages 12 to 100 will enjoy.

Book Review: Cujo

By Jacob Bolthouse

This story is about a boy and his dog. A dog that murders 4 people. Once a sappy happy St. Bernard Cujo is bitten by a bat that gives him rabies. Within a few days he kills his owner, a neighbor, a police officer, and a little boy named Tad. The main story revolves around this boy and his mother when they are trapped by Cujo in their little ford pinto. In the end the mother Donna has a showdown with the dog serial killer. I will not tell you the ending since my teacher told me that pisses him off so I'll end it here. May I say though that Steven King does a good job on the storyline and puts profanity in every sentence which I think makes the story more real. End

There are two SK novels that have truly disapointed me. This is one of them. The movie makes this an imediate hit to most new SK readers (until ofcourse, they actually read it). The plot was not bad at all. A 200 pound St. Bernard going rabid is not a terrible plot. However, King doesn't do a good job of setting a main theme. The book is not gory enough to make it a scary book due to the amount of gore. It is not very suspensful. Any observant reader can usually tell what the next step in the sory will be. However, this is an excellent example of King's "oldstyle" of writing and should definitely be read.

I like this book, though I'd rate it below average compared to King's other books. Cujo is one cool cat of a bad guy, and I think choosing a St. Bernard as the breed was an interesting and paradoxical choice by King, mainly because St. Bernard's are usually such nice dogs. I only give this book four stars because I think it's a little lean both on plot and character development; I just think the story was a bit slow at times and none of the characters were too memorable for me. Nonetheless, I think it's still a pretty good book. Avery Z. Conner, author of "Fevers of the Mind".

Cujo was the first novel I ever read by Stephen King, and it continues to be probably the best novel that he has written that I have read. Other than IT and Carrie, nothing comes cloase to Cujo, the horror story of the rabid dog in Castle Rock who goes on a rampage killing 4 people. The novel really is something special, with its excellent storytelling, and likeable villian, who doesn't like a rabid dog, it just all works. The novel doesn't hang around to long, gets to the point, and then delievers. This is Stephen King at his best, and I would reccomend Cujo to anyone. What a great novel.

I have always been fascinated by the concept of the disease Rabies. Ever since I saw the film Cujo as a kid I have wanted to learn more about it. The subject is not touched on as much as it should be; King captured it brilliantly with this horrid situation that really could have happened.

The atmosphere was claustrophic and powerful. The characters rang true, even the dog. The ending was hauntingly depressing - the dog attacks were vicious and exciting - the narration at the beginning and end of the book before and after the characters are 'dealt' with -- King's ability really shows within these paper walls.

Cujo deserves a place in your library.

I guess I was expecting more having just read Salem's Lot, but I was not happy with this book. In my opinion it is not one of King's stronger works. It seemed to drag on and there were lots of events that seemed pointless to the story. It seemed a lot of this book was written just to fill space. I am glad I have read it and can move on but really don't have much to say about this book other than I was not happy with it. It was however, better than Lisey's Story.

Cujo is a short read compared to King's epic novels like It and The Stand; but it is one of the scariest because its realistic. It would be a hard task for anyone else to center an entire novel around a rabid dog, but since this is Stephen King, he pulls it off beautifully. Its fast paced, terrifying, and tells a spooky tale about childhood fear and domestic conflict. King succeeds in capturing the small town essence of so many of his novels with his powerful ability to chill his readers....and perhaps arouse their own fears..in this case, a saint bernard on the rampage. Well Worth it!

Although not King's best Cujo is still a great read! It is about a dog named Cujo that becomes rabid and attacks the town of Castle Rock. He traps a mother and son in the mother's Pinto for days. With a great plot and storyline this book is really great and any King fan would love it. The only thing about the book that I did not like is the characters. What was really cool about this book is that you actually get to read Cujo's point of view on everything. In conclusin, read this book for a great read but don't except a whole lot of horror in this little book. Happy Reading!

I have to say that this isn't a good or bad book. It depends totally on what you like to read. After Peter Benchely got away with half of Jaws being sprawling subplots (Which I really liked anyway) I guess King decided to have his go at what happens when you combine terrorizingly real animals (sharks and rabid dogs are real, and that's what's so creepy) and unfaithful spouses. Unfortunatly the beginning of the book doesn't read that well or fast, but at the last half, its gets very intense.Its well worth it, if your patient enough. So if you think your in for a rampaging beast gore fest think again. I would have enjoyed it if it killed brett, the mailman, kemp, and charity. That would have made it better, because thats what killer dogs are all about.

This book came out just as Stephen King novels were becomming a hot property in Hollywood. I think all of that went to King's head, because unlike "the Shining" and "Salem's Lot", which were outstanding horror novels, "Cujo" is simple-minded and plodding. Novels have to be condensed and "dumbed-down" before they can be adapted for the screen. With Cujo King did the dumbing down beforehand. He started to write for Hollywood and forgot his older fans. Recommendation: Read King's four good novels (The Stand, The Shining, Salem's Lot, and Carrie) and forget everything else--unless you really really need something lightweight to read while sitting on the can--something you won't mind tearing out the pages of when you run out of TP.

He hooks your interest in the beginning and drags you to the end! As all of his other books, Cujo is full of detail, sometimes to me too boring, but I love the way he does the omniscient point of view... the way one person's time and place leads into another person's critical situation. He weaves an interesting plot, and I love how he did Cujo's point of view. Neat. BUT, the only thing I did not like about the book is that Tadder died. I read such a description that I ended up liking Tad's innocence and wishing totally that he'd be ok, but he ended up dead! Ah well, at least Kemp got caught...

Although I've read a lot of Stephen King, it's taken me a while to get around to reading Cujo, in part because I had worried that it might be a little one-dimensional: just a simple story of a possessed dog that wrecks havoc. After getting into it, I was pleasantly surprised to find I was completely wrong.

I think the the store.com Review of the book (under Editorial Reviews) is spot on. It points to two things that surprised me most about the book. First, there's a lot more going on than just the dog threatening the people trapped in the car. Instead, it's a nuanced story about two families and the daily domestic struggles and conflicts they have to deal with. Second, although on first appearance Cujo is the "monster" of the book, in actuality, you really feel sorry for him, due to the well written point of view sections from his perspective.

If you want to read the Stephen King's Castle Rock novels in chronological order, I believe they are: The Dead Zone, Cujo, The Dark Half, Needful Things.

Cujo was a book I read... or went through... quick quickly. Even Stephen King says that he can forgive you for not reading every word because he does not remember writing much with it, because according to his current autobiography "On Writing" he says this was the one that was mostly a part of his cocaine addiction.

It is, for all essential purposes, a nice dog turned crazy running around a woman locked in her car. It is quite well described although you would have to imagine why some of his better short stories did not make it to this length.

Generally I find Kings books to be ok as far as casual entertainment but they tend to be dumbed down for mass consumption. Being that I tend to be a sucker for any book involving dogs I thought Cujo might transcend beyond the level of mildly entertaining light reading. It turned out to be a disappointment. The story in a nutshell is about a rabid Saint Bernard and the havoc he wreaks. Like I said its ok as far as casual entertainment but if your looking for a great or even very good book don't bother.

This is my first Stephen King novel, and it succeeded in making me want to continue to read some more of his books. I'm not usually much of a horror fan, but I picked this book up for some reason, and I am glad I did! The book kept me up through the night in the last half of it because I simply didn't want to put it down. I actually found the scenes of Donna and Tad trapped in the Pinto to be the most intriguing and interesting. The plot with Holly/Joe/Brett was hard for me to read because it was so very boring and uninteresting, and I would sigh when it came back to that part in the book. The subplot with Vic and Roger was interesting, I thought, but not as good as the car scenes. I did not dislike Donna nearly as much as I think some people did. I saw her as a human being with flaws. A person who made a big mistake, and don't think she deserves to be villified. Her utter helplessness of watching her son slowly drift away from her was just awful, and very sad. Some people don't like how the book ends, because it is not a happy ending. But I feel the exact opposite. Don't you ever get sick of "And they all lived happily ever after." Although it is tragic, it is somewhat refreshing to see that for once, things don't just gel at the end and get wrapped up in a bow. In real life, it's not always a happy ending, and I give King props for not going the easy route. Donna's utter rage at the end, when she is pounding the dead and mangled dog over and over again with half of a splintered baseball bat, was powerful. Her fury was palpable. The scene where she sees as a sheet is placed over her son's dead body, and manages to escape 4 men holding her back, is menacing. I would definitely recommend this to anyone.

This is one terrifying ride. King masterfully allows you into the twisted brain of the sick dog as well as the characters. After hours of endge of your seat horror, the ending rips your heart out and stomps on it a bit. One heck of a ride!

When I first picked up Cujo, I was only reading it to get in A on a assignment at school. But as I read I started to want to read it more and more. This has to be my favorite book from Stephen King. It not only has a exciting plot but it also has a few sub plots. In this book Stephen King is really able to grip the reader by making the reader fond of the characters and then placing them in grave danger. If you are a true Stephen King fan or if you just like a good book full of suspense and gore I would definetly recomend that you read this book.

I had the same reaction upon reaching the end of this novel as I did with a later work of his - Gerald's Game. Namely, huh??? Or to be more precise, that's it?? Cujo reads like a premise for a short story that King, with his usual expansive style, manages to expand into a novel. Too much seemed contrived - like the monster in the closet in the opening chapters - and the Castle Rock stuff felt like it got tacked on to add another fifty pages. In reading Cujo you're slogging to the conclusion, rather than accelerating. Not recommended

I have read "Cujo," "The Green Mile," "Christine," "The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon," and "The Gunslinger." This is a pretty intriguing story (kind of boring at times, but usually pretty interesting), but it focuses way too much on the back story. If you are looking to read this book for big action with the dog, you'll be disappointed. This book takes the family's problems and watches them escalate up until the climax, where when everything is getting to its worst, the dog attacks. King seems to forget what the book is about and forget to check on the dog for 70-90 pages. He was having a drinking problem when he wrote this book, which might explain why the book is sort of brutal and messy. If you're a King fan read this book, if you're a King beginner, read some of his better books first.

Sandwiched in between Firestarter and Christine was a little nugget of the macabre called Cujo. Now most people hear the name and think of a rabid St. Bernard trying to eat Dee Wallace from the hood of her Pinto runabout. Well...that was the movie, and that was the movie. Not one of my personal favorites. When you first read Cujo, your next inclination is to not read it again. Dog gets rabies, kills crazy neighbor, kills owner, tries to kill lady in a pinto, her son dies at the end of shock. Hmmmmm. Of course, I'm breaking it down rather quickly. This is, after all, one of Steve-O's better books. Still, you aren't going to put Cujo on your favorite booklist right away. It takes time and a second read. Then maybe another before you fully understand and appreciate King's powerful story-telling. This book is and it isn't about a great big rabid St. Bernard named Cujo. It's about many things from the advertising business to crumbling relationships to childhood fears and so much more. So read Cujo, and then read it again. One of Stephen King's classics.

Dig it!

Cujo was a very good book, which kept me on the edge of my seat at all times. The novel Cujo is a very interesting piece of work; it makes the reader imagine what else could possibly happen in life, not just the nice things. It is about a mechanics' dog that ventures into a bat hole in the ground and contracts rabies after being bitten by one. Its very descriptive detail shows how a two-hundred pound, Saint Bernard dog tears each of his victims apart one by one. Many people fall prey to this rabid beast. It was very suspenseful, especially at one point when the heroine arrives at her mechanic's house. The dog follows her around, then it charges at her. She makes it away, but that isn't the last encounter that she has with the dog. I recommend this book because it is so realistic, and all the characters were so life-like because Stephen King allows you be a part of the book. Therefore you feel for them in a way. What makes it so realistic is that this could really happen. It's not about monsters or any thing like that. It deals with two very realistic characters, trapped in a Pinto, for two swelteringly hot days, by a very rabid dog. I don't want to give away the ending or anything, but I have to say that it came as some what of a shock. On a star-scale of 1-5, 5 being the highest I would give this book 4 stars. I would give it a 4 for a few reasons. It didn't quite live up to my expectations that I have for Stephen King books. Another reason that I did not give it a five was because some parts were very dull in contrast with the very suspenseful parts. The most important reason for me choosing my rating was just because towards the end of the book I just couldn't wait until it was over.

The book is quite ok as far as readabilty is concerned. Plot too is original and interesting. But as this is classified as a horror story I have to ask what on earth is so scary in this book. A Saint Bernard dog gets rabies and it bites and kills a few people. A mother and child are trapped inside a car with the rabid dog prowling outside and finally the kid dies of heat/exhaution. Let me add that this happens more due to the mother's inability to do anything daring and constructive than the menace posed by the dog. Sad, definitely, but scary? I don't think so. I define a good horror story as one which makes me just a trifle uneasy about looking at my Window, or going into a dark room etc soon after reading it. And honestly none of Stephen King's novels has managed to do it. Ok, a dog goes rabid and kills some people. Or aliens come and mutate some people, or the devil's agent comes and makes people kill each other. In all these situations, the story is told so blandly and descriptively that there is no fear invoked, it is just like reading a news report in your morning paper. Creepiness and horror comes when you leave something for imagination, something unknown.

I am not saying the books are not good, just that they never manage to scare me. May be a problem with me as Mr.King is the acknowledged "King" of horror fiction.

If I remember correctly, Cujo is a Saint Bernard, and the untimely victim of rabid bats. King's book is quite scary, and the characters fleshed out in very realistic tones. I've noticed from King's books that I've read ("Cujo", "Pet Semetary", "Bag of Bones") that he relies heavily on the psychological states of his believable characters. "Cujo" is one of his earlier books, so it does not show the maturity that I observed in "Bag of Bones". Well, Mr. King, I'm certainly more wary of rabies now!

An amazing book, even if it was written during one of King's narcotic spells. The way King draws out every character, even the minor ones, is unforgettable. One of my favorite passages comes right after Vic has discovered Donna's infidelity. He asks her the inevitable question "Why?" and her thoughts spill out to the reader in a way that proves King isn't a run-of-the-mill pulp writer (88-89). The way he sustains the very tense last half of the book is remarkable. And that ending: tragic, honest, and heartbreaking.

In Stephan King's, "Cujo", King uses many of his characters and sub-plots to show many different ways of three literary devices being used in the story. Foreshadowing was used (...). Dramatic irony was placed throughout the story when the reader knew many details that the characters did not know. Also, suspense is built up throughout the story when they would change to a different setting and different characters while leaving the reader in mid-air. These literary devices are important throughout the entire novel to help keep the reader interested and the novel, entertaining.
Tad is only a small, four-year-old child, who believed, deep in his heart, that there was a monster in his closet. While Tad was trying to go to sleep in his bed, thecloset door would open and dreadful, deadly red eyes would appear and talk to Tad. He was told that each night, it would come closer and closer to the bed and one night, jump on him and kill him before he gets the chance to call for help. (...)
While the book changes its plot frequently, suspense builds up throughout the story.
There are many times throughout the story in which the plot changes into a new setting with new characters. When the plot is changed, the occurring events are stopped in mid-air and have left the reader with a cliffhanger. Cliffhangers help build suspense because the reader is unaware of what will happen next in that sequence of events. The reader is forced to read on and wait for those events to come back into play in the novel, while the story continues in other elements. This novel is built up with many different stories put together which also makes it easier for suspense to be built up throughout the story. These literary devices make the novel.
The use of literary terms in a novel is used to make a story worth reading and to keep ther reader interested throughtout the entire novel. Forewshadowing cn be hidden in the novel, but will make sense in the end, the same way that these examples showed. Dramatic irony can keep a reader interested by showing them everything that is going on, and when a character is questioning what is happening, the reader knows and wants to tell the character but is unable to. Suspense can easitly keep a reader wanting more and more until the story is sadly, put to an end. King has used these literary devices extremely well and has made it easy for a reader to come back and read more of the story.

I've enjoyed reading some of King's work, but this is by no means one of his best. Although the premise of the story was good and kept me wondering what was going to happen next, I felt that some sections were overly detailed and at times tedious; I don't feel like reading long descriptions of scenery when I'm sitting on the edge of my seat wondering what's going to happen next in the story.
Overall, not bad. I recommend Cujo to people new to King's work because it's not overly gruesome like some of his others but still retains his unique flair.

Am I the only person on Earth who noticed that Cujo's supernatural sub-plot has NOTHING WHATSOEVER to do with the story? King starts by showing us a monster in a small boy's bedroom closet. Said monster never reappears in the story. Is Cujo possessed by an evil spirit or does he simply have rabies? King bends over backwards to point out that all his behavior is completely consistent with rabies, so who cares? When the kid's dad looks for him, he goes into his son's closet and finds himself transported to "the Black Forest." His reaction mirrors King's own: he looks around briefly, leaves, and continues the search elsewhere in the house as if nothing unusual happened. Meanwhile, the actual story, about the kid and his mother trapped in a stalled VW by a rabid St. Bernard, goes nowhere -- literally! This is a quirk of King's: the story that never changes location [The Long Walk, Misery, Gerald's Game]. He's such a talented writer that he gets away with that aspect, but I was offended by the "occult" parts, which read like discarded ideas he forgot to cut out.

I liked this book and liked the movie. King does have a penchant for fleshing out useless characters, but give the man a break. He combines to things for us the readers...ONE: He writes his fiction similarly to the classics none of us want to read, he fleshes out his stories slow and his characters thick. TWO: He writes books like we like to read today, fiction that is fast and breezy. Think of it this way, when you are reading a King novel, you are getting the best of both worlds.

Cujo was a good book but not if you are looking for one of Stephen King's usual fast paced thrillers. This book was not very exciting until the end and it was a little to realistic to be fun, unlike King's other supernatural novels. I think that his other works like It and Needful things were much better and i would recomend them to any true fan. You will like this book if you are a patient reader, but you will fall asleep fast if you are expecting thrills right at the beginning.

I suspect King was trying his skills at non-horror writing but when it failed he fell back on what he knows best, horror. I can even decipher a hint of King's sadness in this book when he found out he can't cut it as a non horror writer. The salvaged whatever as a horror novel fails to deliver the gore, mayhem and thrill sought by the readers of the genre. This is a good example how not to write a fiction novel. 5 stars for the lesson.

this book was probably having its golden age when people more feared rabies. that was before my time though, so perhaps i couldn't relate. i never saw what was so great about this work. a family has a big dog. the dog gets bitten by rabies-infected bats. in the end it becomes a treath to a family that seem to be unable to escape. ok. the suspence wasn't that much, that is what i consider to be the greatest flaw. never been much for "people standing around trying to make a stand"- plots. but the way K describes cujo's mind, as it goes through the phases of rabies, and how it considers things, is the book's real greatness. this was between 2 and 3 stars. a little too dull for my taste

"The World was full of monsters" This book is King at his most pessimistic and realistic. He tells it like it is. The book is suspense driven but there is an underlying fatalism about the book that can't be missed. The early section detailing the monster in the child's closet is really significant to later events in the book. I liked this book because the characters aren't really likeable but they are realistic. Its a great entertaining read.

Cujo is an excellent novel written by stephen King and I would recommended every one to read it sometime in their life, because you never know what horror might be written on the next page. Some say it's most heart-squeezing novel that Stephen King has ever written. The novel Cujo is a very intresting peice of literature; it makes the reader imagine what else could possibly happen in life, not just the nice pretty things. Its gut wrenching detail is about how a two-hundred pound, rabid Saint Bernard dog tears each of his victims apart one by one. The other characters in the novel are Vic Trenton, who has moved his family to a town called Castle Rock, Maine, who is trying to keep his ad agency from losing a large account and going under. That's not his only problem he has to face; he finds out his wife Donna has been cheating on him with another man for several months. As they worry about the problems they are facing now with each other, it's nothing compared to what they are about to face, and that problem's name is Cujo. When you are done reading this novel you will never look at a Saint Bernard the same way again.

Not a real long story, but very gripping. Without trying to give too much away, I'll just say that I preferred the book's ending to the Hollywood movie ending. While it might not be real plausible that such a thing could happen, it does have a bit more "real-life" feel to it than some of King's more supernatural stores. There's really nothing in this book that *couldn't* happen, and that gives it a very real, and scary, feel. Definitely worth reading.

I have read almost all of Steven King's novels, but decided to go back and read some of the older books that I have not read. Cujo is really good! Good writing! Good scareing! Good story! I could not put my Kindle down until it was finished! Certainly not a waste of time to read!

I don't understand all the people who thought that this book was boring or not enough action. Guess what, not every book has to be filled with complete action and not have one or two boring parts. Well, when I read this book I thought it was great! It wasn't his best but it was still very good. The ending was very exciting and good. The begging was good too. The middle could of used some work, but other than that I loved it!

Non-stop character development. Cruelty to animals. No point whatsoever.
"Cujo" is about a dog who gets bitten by bats and goes on a rampage... all within or around his house. Grrrr...
First, for 100 pages, no blood is spilled, and everyone is talking about an affair, a "failed" ad campaign (more like controversy), and a monster in a closet. Excuse me, is this horror, or a stupid drama with a dog going rabid?
Then we get up to speed and Cujo kills two people. That's the body count of his murders. Please...
If you look at it as a horror story, you won't find enough horror. If you look at it as an affair story, all that action (no dirty pun intended) happens at the beginning. If you look at it as anything else, nothing's there.
No wonder King doesn't remember writing this. Speaking of King's works, why all the sex? Every book of his has mention of sex!

I have read alot of King's books but when I read this I couldn't believe it was his writing. In the book there are too many loose ends in it. What happened to the guy she had an affair with? What happend to the woman and her son and their aunt? What about the two men who Cujo killed before he found the Pinto? What about the cop Cujo killed. What happened to the husband and wife after their only son was dead? If he had planed this to be part of a series then I wouldn't be so upset about how terribly crappy this book is.

i guess i gave this book a "7" because altho it is not a truly GOOD book, it is certainly an entertaining one. there are a few confusing parts but enuf good ones are in there to keep the reader's attention. i would recommend it if you're just lying around, or if you're stuck in a car or something (not by a rabid dog but a family trip). i bet this review makes it seem like a pretty bad book, but it really isn't. it's a great one for lazy summer days!

Stephen King is definetely the king of suspense. He lives up to his name in Cujo. This had the most amazing suspense with a climax to leave you breathless. If you haven't read Stephen King yet you have to read Cujo to really see how amazing Stephen King is at writing. WARNING TO THOSE WHO LIKE HAPPY ENDINGS. He doesn't write one in this story about a boy and his mother trapped in their pinto while a menicing dog leaves them trapped.

CUJO is a book about a small town in Maine, that gets haunted by a rabid, huge St. Bernard. The story is told from many points of view, but mostly from the members of tow different families. There are a few stories intertwined into this book. One about people trying to get away from the rabid dog. Another is about a family that is trying to stay together after the wife is caught cheating. The last one is about a farm family torn by alcohol abuse and a mother who doesn't want to see her child end up like his no-good father.
The book overall was O.K. It was very violent book, with very graphic imagery. It is also very inappropriate for young readers. It is considered to be a horror story but in fact is only partially suspenseful. It had a good plot and characters and I would recommend this book to anyone who likes suspense and violence, or any of Stephen King's other books. I thought the ending to this book was a little fast and didn't tell much, but was otherwise good. I gave it a 2 because it wasn't very scary and was really gross, not a very good book overall.

"Gut-wrenching." - The Newport News Daily Press
I don't think I could agree more with this one word description of this book. Throughout the book I could, well, feel my guts being wrenched out. Now the book has made me forever scared (or just having a long temporary fear) of closet doors, dogs, and rabies. His style of writing makes it a very fast read - I believe it was also written very quickly, since he was entirely drunk when he wrote this book. Some parts were rather easy to see that they were written when he was drunk - they weren't exactly what you would call coherent (there were rambling sentences and extraordinarily long paragraphs sometimes). One odd thing I noticed is that this book has no chapters. It's all breaks in writing to show changes in scenes. Now, "Cujo" is particularly horrifying in this sense - it seems like it could happen on any given day - and it's these kind of things that scare me the most. So if he was aiming at writing a scary scary novel, it worked. Some of his other novels (like IT) had extremely far-fetched ideas, making it hard to believe some of the things that happen. Because of this, I enjoy the realistic feel of Cujo. This book ranks among one of the highest rated books I've read, simply because it is so well written (especially when you take in the fact that mot one part was written while he was sober). However, one part of the book that I didn't exactly grasp was the closet door part. It was terrifying, sure, but what did it have to do with the book at all? It's not like Cujo could have come out of his closet. That aside, this book is great. I highly impress this book upon you. Read it!

Cujo is a book about a lovable Saint Bernard dog that chases a rabit into a bolt-hole and obtains rabies. Despite his efforts no to kill, rabies tells his brain to destry everyone, they have all caused his pain. In response, Cujo does just that, until his body can take no more and dies. I would recomend this book to anyone who loves dogs, and I stress everyone who owns one to read it.

"Except that the monster never dies. Werewolf, vampire, ghoul, unnamable creature from the wastes. The monster never dies." This quote is typical to the horror genre, in that most horror novels focus on some monster or beast whose whole existence revolves around killing, maiming, or tormenting the innocent. This book shows how the monster affects the relationships the characters share. Even though the creature happens to be just an ordinary dog, it is their relationships that help them overcome the evil that "...never dies."
In a little town called Castle Rock, Maine a dog named Cujo contracts rabies. His symptoms go unnoticed until he becomes violent. Believing every other person is the cause of his unbearable pain; he begins his rampage around the outskirts of Castle Rock. Having car trouble, Donna Trenton and her son, Tad, decide to take the car to a local mechanics house to see if he can fix it. When they get there, however, they find no one home and soon after their car dies. With Cujo patiently waiting outside they find themselves in a standoff with a mindless killing machine.
Castle Rock, Maine provides an excellent choice for the setting. Many horror novels occur in small town settings. This is because they are the best choice for the genre. Usually in small towns nothing happens out of the ordinary. Almost everyone knows everybody else which makes it easier to connect characters. Characters can be killed off easier without anyone noticing. Quiet, peaceful places, rural areas present a perfect scene for serial killers, or in this case a dog, to roam around killing whom they please.
The characters of the small, peaceful, little town of Castle Rock at first seem fitting for the dull, "little town lives", expected of people that live in a rural area. Mainly dynamic characters all with a dark secret or fear, they seem more fitting for a soap opera rather than of a horror novel. They all have a fear or secret that they conceal. Donna Trenton fears her secret affair with Steve Kemp might one day leak into the public. Tad Trenton fears the beast that comes out of his closet every night threatening to kill him. Vic Trenton fears the loss of the Sharp account that keeps his family afloat during tough financial times. Charity Cambers fears her husband's abuse might one day impact their son. This adds a little too much drama, but still proves positive for the book.
The plot of Cujo is a giant flashback of a mysterious narrator. Only at the very end does someone start speaking in third person past tense. The plot is good, but the many coincidences and happenstances in it make the story a little unbelievable. The fact that someone nearly saves Donna 4 times from her impending doom but something happens or comes up at the last minute that prevents her rescue proves a tad beyond belief. A dog (granted a large dog) gets it's neck nearly severed by a car door, numerous ribs smashed in, and an eye gouged out and still has enough energy or will to take down a full grown human being attests to the inconceivable role that fate plays in this book. Even in a small town scene, 2 of 4 deaths could not go unnoticed for days (people in rural areas are distant but still stay in contact). With all of these under consideration the plot seems a little stretched, but it still retains some redeeming qualities (bloodshed, gore, etc.).
After Stephen King sets the setting, he doesn't really exploit their northern accent very much. He uses a northern "Maine-ish" accent that draws out certain vowel sounds (a's, e's, i's, o's, u's). At some points it seems as if Mr. King is poking fun or attempting to add a little humor to the action/terror-oriented book.
With the typical and not-so typical horror motif throughout this book, combined with the drama and sometimes-unbelievable coincidences, I give this novel a 4-star rating. I recommend that if someone would like to read a Stephen King book to give this one a try. If you like a little drama and comedy mixed with your horror flick then try this novel (plus Stephen King wrote it, so you have his credentials to go with it.).

I thought cujo was a great book by Steven King. He is also my favorite author. Most of the reason that I liked the story so much is not science fiction.
To me this is a book about a good dog gone bad. It was fun to read. I enjoyed every bit of the book and it makes want to keep on reading. this book tells a story of a killer dog that is vary paranoid. By the time they find out what has happened it is to late.

Cujo is great...when the story focuses on Cujo. The side stories slow down the read and take the reader out of the element of suspense and tension. The lack of chapters jumble the whole story into one time frame, which would have worked, but the story lasts too long to be effective.

I can understand this book being an allegory in several ways, but it doesn't mean it's real great. It was hard to keep interested in the book, even during the Pinto experience. What really got me was the closet part at the beginning. The story just didn't need any supernatural stuff in it. It would have been better without the closet monster bit.Worth reading but not buying.

I LOVE THIS BOOK BECAUSE KING TAKES YOU INSIDE THE DOGS HEAD.WHEN I WAS READING THIS BOOK I FELT ALL THE DOGS ANGER AND RAGE.WHEN I WAS READING THIS BOOK I FELT AS IF IT I WAS THE ONE THAT WAS TRAPED IN THE CAR.I FELT AS IF I WAS THE ONE TRYING TO SAVE MY SON.AS I WAS READING THIS I FELT AS IF HE WAS WATHCHING ME.THIS IS THE BEST BOOK I HAVE EVER READ.EVERYONE SHOULD READ IT.

it just could be. in the dead zone there was a castle rock serial killer named frank dodd, and in the course of in the book he meets his demise. now in cujo, KING eludes to dodd's evil spirit (or the evil that possessed dodd) somehow entering the dog cujo. an evil that never dies...just takes new forms. now i know most of you think of the lame movie when you hear CUJO, but the book is more about a family struggling to stay together then the rabid dog. you can tell KING was going thru some hard times when he wrote this novel, it shows (by his own admission in his book On Writing, he says he was doing a bunch of coke during the writting of cujo). the rabid dog is almost an after-thought for most of the story...and when ol' CUJO does show up it freaks you out. check it out. -erik

it just could be. in the dead zone there was a castle rock serial killer named frank dodd, and in the course of in the book he meets his demise. now in cujo, KING eludes to dodd's evil spirit (or the evil that possessed dodd) somehow entering the dog cujo. an evil that never dies...just takes new forms. now i know most of you think of the lame movie when you hear CUJO, but the book is more about a family struggling to stay together then the rabid dog. you can tell KING was going thru some hard times when he wrote this novel, it shows (by his own admission in his book On Writing, he says he was doing a bunch of coke during the writting of cujo). the rabid dog is almost an after-thought for most of the story...and when ol' CUJO does show up it freaks you out. check it out. -erik

I liked this book a lot, but was expecting something more, well... gory and grotisque. It had unbeleivable suspense and a great ending. It is about a dog that has gone rabid, terrorizing a town. It isn't that scary, but more intense and suspenseful.I thought it was a little boring at some parts, or a lot boring. But everthing else was great, and I think you should get it.

I thought cujo was a great book by Steven King. He is also my favorite author. Most of the reason that I liked the story so much is not science fiction.
To me this is a book about a good dog gone bad. It was fun to read. I enjoyed every bit of the book and it makes want to keep on reading. this book tells a story of a killer dog that is vary paranoid. By the time they find out what has happened it is to late.

Cujo was a danm good book. Not the best one I ever read but still good. King explains everything in great detail. It makes you feel almost as if you were the one trapped in a pinto as a huge dog with a bad attitude tries everything to eat you for supper. It was a good book an the scary part is that this really could happen! It really makes you think

I started this book as it was the first king book i had ever read, i sat down and started and that same day as 3:00 am i finished it. I could not put this book down i loved it. I then started on aother King books like It and Fire starter. King is my favriote author. He knows how to get to the pits of fear in your mind and bring out all of you fears.

This book is Awsome!!!!! Mr. Stephen King, (Though Dosen't remember it) has written a great book of supernatrural horro that seems to hold true in the world were we live. It was also one of the best endings of any book that I have ever read. Pick it up and read it with the lights on and the windows up. Man's best friend has become your worst nightmare!

by Bryce B.

The plot of this book was that a big dog a Saint Bernard named Cujo. The dog gets scratched by a bat and gets rabies. The dog goes "insane" and starts attacking people in the town of Castle Rock, Marine which that's where the story takes place. If I had to recommend this book I would say that it kind of "drags on". The story doesn't get good till about page 100. The best scene is when the son and the mom get stuck in their Ford Pinto. The boy and his mom drive to Camber's place the owners of Cujo and their car brakes down then out of nowhere Cujo jumps at the car and tries to get in but cant. The mom thinks of running inside and call the police but if she cant out run the dog she'll be eaten! Will the she make it to the house in time?

By itself, this novel is very scary and very haunting. However, when you begin to compare it to other King novels like "The Stand," "It," and "Misery," it just doesn't match up to the calibur of those others. Still, it is very suspenseful, and I would recommend it to anyone looking for a short, scary book.

This is a story about regret and second chances and terror. It is realistic and could happen in just about any town. It is not a horror story but it will scare the heck out of you. So scarey, I had to put it down at times. Very descriptive - you'll feel like your there, in that car trying to hide! King at his best. Thanks Mr. King!

Cujo is so well-paced and scary that people tend to read it quickly, so they mostly remember the scene of the mother and son trapped in the hot Pinto and threatened by the rabid Cujo, forgetting the multifaceted story in which that scene is embedded. This is definitely a novel that rewards re-reading. When you read it again, you can pay more attention to the theme of country folk vs. city folk; the parallel marriage conflicts of the Cambers vs. the Trentons; the poignancy of the amiable St. Bernard (yes, the breed choice is just right) infected by a brain-destroying virus that makes it into a monster; and the way the "daylight burial" of the failed ad campaign is reflected in the sunlit Pinto that becomes a coffin. And how significant it is that this horror tale is not supernatural: it's as real as junk food, a failing marriage, a broken-down car, or a fatal virus.

This book is simply a masterpiece. Incredibly deep, this one should be on all high school required reading lists. There's so much more to it than a rabid dog on the loose. The book gives a pessimistic message about the fate of everyone, that bad things will happen no matter how good you are, and everyone is responsible. Make sure you read this carefully and thoughtfully. One of King's best, and definitely his most thoughtful.

This tale would have made a wonderful short story/novella/Twilight Zone episode, but the drawn out novel becomes tedious. We learn endlessly about the characters, although they don't actually do much. The ending of the novel is when it kicks into high gear, and shows why this would have been a better short story. The only reason this is novel length is the overdrawn character studies. I read this as a kid when I was much more forgiving, and I loved it. Looking back, most of the novel verges on soap opera theatrics: infidelity, domestic and work troubles, disgruntled lovers, even winning the lottery! Way too much going on here.

One of King's underrated works in my opinion. It's pretty short which is unusual for King, especially in his more recent stuff it seems like (seems like every novel nowadays is 600+ pages). Keeps your riveted and nerve-wracked throughout. Well edited. Lots of action.

I love Stephen King; to use his term, I am a Constant Reader. Of course I enjoy some books more than others (faves: "The Shining," "The Stand," and "It"). I read "Cujo" in one evening. I could not put the book down until it was finished. I was completely entertained and on the edge of my seat the entire time!

If you hate or are afraid of dogs, DO NOT READ THIS BOOK!! This book is friggin scary, and the imige of cujo and the book will pop into your head every time yo hear a dog growl or see a dog give you a dirty look, or bark crazily at you. This book is scary as hell. A MUST READ. Don't read if your really DENSE though.

i loved this movie growing up , and i have to say the book is a lot different. there is so much to this book that is not in the movie. i dont really care for reading books that i already seen the movie for , this is worth it.

Cujo is yet another masterpiece by SK. The slow building up to the finale is excellent. It's about a boy & his dog. A dog named CUJO. Cujo fine at first, but when he goes chasing rabbits he gets bit by a bat & contracts rabies. The rest is a descension into madness(for Cujo) & confusion for everyone else: Why is cujo acting so weird? I guess they've never heard of Rabies. Still a great piece of work & worth having

I am really confused on how muched I liked the book. It was fun reading about the dogs chewing peoples throats open but it was really hard for me to read for more than ten minutes because it had really long boring parts and some parts drug on. But all in all I thought it was cool and I'm glad I read it.

This book only requires finishing because of the cute little boy. If it hadn't been for him, I don't think I could have forced myself to care about anyone in this book. The mother is a shallow bimbo who locks herself in a car with her dying kid and only finally takes action at the end. The horror element isn't really there. The father is lame and doesn't pay any attention to what is right in front of his face. I kept waiting for the usual SK carnage to begin, where everything goes crazy and pulls you into another world, but this time it just didn't happen. You could always see what was coming next in this book and I really hate it when that happens. It wasn't awful, I have to admit though, I was rooting for the dog!

This book has great introuction and conclusion! The introduction makes the reader want to read more. The introduction made me wanna find out what was happening next and i liked it. I didn't like how they kept adding new characters. The characters would get confusing at times. I liked the main characters and the main settings. The main characters were described very well and had lots of narratives! I don't read horrors and i don;t like them. This book wasn't that scary compared to other horrors that i have read. Cujo was both sad and thrilling. There was lots of suspense. I recommend this book to people that like horrors and Stephen King. This book would also be more appealing to the male crowd.

Cujo is a dark novel that becomes very claustrophobic in the end. It is a good book, and despite it being by Stephen King, there is no element of supernatural terror here. Just a well written drama about a family, and a Saint Bernard who chases a rabbit into a hole and finds something bad in there.

I am a student attending Mountain View High School, and for a project we had to read a book and give a presentation on it. I read Cujo and I thought it was very scary and climaxful. Then entry of the book I thought was good, then it gave you all the good settings that books usually do and after that it was like climax city. The last half of the book always kept you on your seat always wanting to know what was going on with each character and how they would react to what happened. I would definetly say it was a good book and I would recommend it to many people. One thing that some people might not like is the amount of profanity and the details of sexual relations, but I have no problem with that and I enjoyed the book

My problem with Cujo was that it just was not scary. Sure, it was an interesting, even exciting situation with the dog pinning the people in the car, but how was that ever really scary? Also, this book should have been a good 150 pages shorter. Mr. King, I like detail and atmosphere and background, but this was pure overkill. Sometimes it was just enough already, get on with it

When I first picked up this book, I got a little suspicious. I knew that King was a excellent horror-writer, but a story about a rabid dog....?, I mean, that sounded like a b-movie to me. Luckily I had no reason to be suspicious. This novel is just as horryfying and pessimistic as it is excellent.

This book by Steven King as so far an awesome book it is an exciting non stop thriller, he makes it so you want to put the book down but you can't and what I mean by that is the book is really descriptive and a little on the scary side I wouldn't recomend reading it late at night if you get scared easy but on the other hand you want to keep reading to see what is going to happen. This book is based around a little boy and a saint bernard who is well a man eater. I enjoy Steven Kings books for many reason and this is one of my favorites the book gives so much detail that you feel you could be there, I've seen the movie and I prefer the book it has more detail and makes you think a little about what is going to happen next.

Before I read "Cujo", I had never read a Stephen King novel in my life. When I got this book at my public library, my mom warned me that even adults thought that Stephen King was scary. When I got home, and started reading the book, I was captivated from the very beginning! From the haunting memory of Frank Dodd to the wonderfully suspenseful climax in Joe Camber's driveway, the book attracts the reader to it with more power than a supermagnet. After I read this book, I was inspired to read even more Stephen King, and since then have read "The Green Mile," "Christine," and am working on finishing "It." All of them are wonderful stories, but none of them quite compare with the moving work of "Cujo"!

Doesn't live up to how good the Shining was, but still a good read. I like this book it's basically just Jaws with a Saint Bernard with rabies. Just make sure you don't have a nonvaccinated Saint Bernard at your house!

this was the first stephen king book i got and i went through it like a knife through hot butter one of the stephen king classics that will never die even if they outlaw books. read this and i bet you will never see that big friendly dog at the end of the street in the same light ever again

Another very good Stephen King book. The main idea is about a rabid dog named Cujo who terrorizes a family. I think it is very well described. This is another one of Stephen King's best books. I would reccomend this book to anyone who liked "Misery" or "The Shining".

Cujo wasn't a good book. King had a good idea about a rabid dog, but he limits his attacks. I expected Cujo to have a rampage through Castle Rock and attack many people. Instead, he limits it to just 3 or 4 people. And half the novel is spent with other charactors and places. Cujo is alright for a light read or if nothing else is availible, but The Green Mile and Diffferent Seasons are much better.

Ok.... I am in the middle of the book and all I have to say is this book is creepy. The atmosphere it sets for you in Castle Rock is beyond words. Its not that scary when your reading it, but once your alone and you think about all the connections in the book, IT FREAKS YOU OUT!!!!!

Great book by King. Nothing supernatural about this, but it's still roaringly good. I agree with the person that wrote in from [email protected]. This is more of a tragedy than a horror book. After all, poor old Cujo didn't ask to be infected with rabies! Good book, though

The story was damn dragging with family ties and business prospects brought in meaninglessly. I couldn't find the relation between Frank Dodd's monster, the boy's dreams and Cujo. Only part I felt like reading was from when the mother and the child were trapped in the Pinto.

I READ THIS BOOK at the end of summer amd finshed at the beggining of 7th grade wich was september something.This book keeps you on the edge of your seat the whole book is interesting except when Vic is talking about ad worx or old man sharp.It is
about a 3 year old boy who is scared of his coset because every night it opens and he sees a monster.also there is a st. bernard
who has gotten rabies from a rabbit and is killing everyone
andmeanwhile the boy brett owner of st. bernard is in conneticut with his mom.This is an awesome book and king doesn't let you down in this book!!!

Stephen King has done it again! In Cujo,King delivers the ultimate horror to his fans.It is about a rabid dog cujo that ravages the town of Castle Rock and traps a mother and son in their Pinto which has some technical problems.It kills three more people including a cop who attempts to catch it. About the narration,it is simply awesome!King lets us see the world from Cujo`s point of view and a good choice of the breed,I should say. a simple advice to those with cardiac and blood pressure problems: DON`T READ THIS!YOU WILL BE SCARED TO DEATH!

Sad. Family dog gets rabies and holds a mother and her son hostage in a car on a deserted farm. The writing was great with some creepy parts but overall just a sad story. When there was nothing left but survival, when you were right down to the strings and nap and ticking of yourself, you survived or you died and that seemed perfectly all right.

This might be possibly the worst book ever written by Stephen King. It was boring, slow, and could have used a little bit more excitement. I urge you not to buy this book, but just go the library and see how bad it is. I figured it made the best seller list by Stephen King buying a couple thousand copies of his own book!

I have not read all of this book. I pretty much took a look and read most of the good parts. After seeing the film I took a look again and thought the film was beter by a long shot. What is keeping me from giving it five stars is the use of much profanity, a little overuse of blood (mostly in the last third of the novel), and the very sad ending. All in all, not great, but if you are a hardcore Stephen King fan, I would recomend it. And do check out the 1983 movie by Lewis Teague for it is one of the best Stephen King adaptations ever.

I'm not the biggest Stephen King fan, but this book was excellent. After reading this book I think I can finally see why he is the most popular author of our time. This book had so much suspence that I found it difficult finding a good place to stop and finally go to sleep at night. If your a Stephen King fan then you have to read this book. And if your not, read it anyway.

I have to agree with the people who said that this book has a lot of unconnected ideas, but I think the scariest aspect is the fact that unlike most of King's books, this is a plausable situation that could occur in real life... watch your back...

Regardless of any other reviews of this book, this is one of my all-time favorites. As an avid fan of Mr. King's, and having seen the movie long after reading this book, I can only say that the movie, to me, was a disappointment. The imagery created in my head far surpassed what was seen on screen.

Imagine getting into the head of a St. Bernard, getting sicker as the pages turn, wondering to himself why his behavior is changing for the worse - as the illness progresses it just gets better!

If you've only seen the movie - READ THE BOOK. If you're a King fan and have not read this, shame on you!

Cujo is not like the other SK books that i have read, in the sense that it is not so supernatural. But there is no lak of horror, or suspens, that you feel while reading it. And after i read it, i stopped letting my dog sleap in my room.

Cujo was one of the first novels I had read by Stephen King. I remember feeling appreciation for his writer's ability to take a rather discreditable situation and turn it into a survival horror story, one of endurance by a desperate mother.

THIS BOOK WAS AN EVEN BETTER BOOK THAN THE MOVIE. THE STORY OF TORMENT THAT CUJO WENT THROUGH AS IF WE WERE INSIDE THAT POOR SICK DOG'S MIND ...FELT THE TERROR AND HORROR OF THE PEOPLE TORMENTED BY CUJO IN HIS HOURS OF AGONY

Cujo is about a rabid dog who bit and threatened everyone he saw a Mom and her son could not even get out of their car because of the evil,rabid pitbull who never did what he was told and always had a bad,evil attitude

If you think a dog can't hurt you, then think again! Cujo is a Saint Bernard infested by rabies and stalks his owners!!! This is a novel that begs for attention as the unspeakable horror turns out to be a two-hundred pound dog. Buy this book! You won't be disappointed!

Cujo was scary! Another one where the book is better than the movie. You are actually inside the dogs head at one point. Although the story is a bit far fetched, it's still entertaining and very well written.

This is a look at everyones monster in the closet, not just Cujo as Tad's monster in the closet. The book explores substance abuse, what its like to live check to check, marital affairs, family violence. Of course Cujo is the main focus, not even knowing he was a monster, and the scene with Tad and his mother in the car is both sad and frightening.

Now I know what you're thinking. You've read all the books that say "Page turner" and "Cannot put it down" on the back cover and gotten bored or tired half the way through. This is not one of those books. It is a kick in the balls from beginning to end.

Typical Early King, less (but not insufficient) character build up and more of both, suspense and action. I have to say it is the suspense that increases the most and therfore carries the book while the 'sitting on the edge of your seat' action is not quite there. I didn't feel the goosebumps or even the outright fear I have felt in several of his other books. Le Guepe
(Dan Newell)

Stephen King is the sort of man people discuss in hushed
whispers, muttering of the terryfing events he unravels in
his novels, yet Cujo not only comes up short of these
expectations, but fails them completely.
Before Cujo, I had never read a Stephen King book. A few weeks ago, I decided it was time to indulge myself. I checked the book out from the school library and brought it home, already a nervous knot forming in my stomach, expecting non-stop sequences of completely unpredictable peril. Instead, I read the first dozen pages utterly bored and puzzled. The only remotely scary instance was the realization that I had 192 more pages to read until the end.
King opens the story with a small summary of a recent suicide by a lunatic named Frank Dodd who apparently molested and murdered a various assortment of girls and women in the small Maine community. The plot then shifts to a small family, the Trentons, whose four-year old son, Tad, is panic-sticken by an apparent monster in his closet. This proves irrevelent to the overall story and is used as a ruse by King to keep the reader hooked. Tad's disbelieving father Vic, is in the advertising business with his friend Roger. Vic has a lot of stress hanging over his head because the money inflow is at a low and he fears his wife, Donna has been cheating on him. King also aquaints us with some other potential victims, the Cambers, a classic country family with a young boy named Brett, whose dog is named Cujo (surprise).

I understand that in order for any well-written story, the author must introduce and set up the characters and setting. However, King does this in a rather simple, boring approach which lead me to believe I was watching a drab documentary with my grandparents.
As the tale continues, Cujo, once a kind and loving dog, becomes a ruthless monster and hunts down isolated victims around his residence. These situations prove very predictable, as it is very difficult to brainstorm various outcomes of a bloodthirsty dog and petrified people alone in a deserted country side.
The ending is without any doubt the best portion of the book, being somewhat suspenseful and emotional. The investigative team makes you want to cry out in frustration, as they do everything but fulfill their duty to the missing people. The mostly-predictable ending has a tragic twist at the end that adds heart to a heartless legend woven of attempted intrigue.
Although the book has some good life lessons, a horror novel is not supposed to focus on values, and this unneccessary focal point takes away from the overall quality of the novel. For example, King zooms in on Vic as he struggles with the realization that his family should come before his work and that carrying the burden of anxiety is not always necessary. I took away nothing from reading this disappointing novel, except that I should not base my choices on critics or acclaim, as this book was the #1 bestseller. I would not recommend this book to anyone unless they are looking for a very mild horror book and have more than enough time on their hands. I would doubt that other high-schoolers would have the time or patience to read this book for fun or enjoyment. If you are looking for a scare, I suggest you rent a movie and stay far, far, away from this disappointing book.

This is a lovely story about somebody's pet dog and the wonderful adventures that they have with him. It's a wonderful story. I read it aloud to my first grade class. They loved it and so much that none of them could talk for months. All of them just sat there, pale faced, shacking. I didn't know that they would like it so much. It is a wonderful book, a must read for all animal lovers.

My favorite Stephen King book. I've read most of his work and none of them can compare to just the sheer amazingness of this book. Such well-written characters, such a great ending, such suspense leading up to that ending. I really hope people don't just characterize this book as a mindless horror book because it's so much more than that. Seriously one of the best books I've ever read.

I have read many of Stephen King's great works, and found Cujo the most thrilling. I read the entire book in one weekend. The intensity of the story kept me wide-awake as I flipped the pages. This horrific plot is about a giant St. Bernard whom gets infected with the virus known as rabies. He then starts to kill random people on impulse. Every page in this book has something interesting to it, unlike many other books that start out boring. The story is definately not for the timid.

Everyone knows Stephen King is a great author who writes a lot of great books, but this one has to be one of his best. I'm thirteen years old and it took me a few days to read it. I thought one of the reasons that made it so scary was that it can actually happen. Dogs CAN get rabies. Also I love how Stephen King explains in great detail. You can see, in your mind, a huge, rabid dog, eager to kill. Good job to Mr King! And keep them coming!

If you put this book under a magnifing glass next to King's other book it just an okay story. I thought the twist about the closet and Frank Dodd were good, but otherwise it is the original "Jaws" (book version) w/ a ravid dog. If youv'e read them both think about it. Both books have major charictor affairs both books have a killer animal on the loose really it is not to original, but its not bad or good

ok well CUJO, CARRIE, SHINING, MISERY are some of STEPHEN KINGS hugely succesfull books that has SPOILER in the title itself........
welll CUJO about a MAD DOG...
SHINING about a MAD MAN....
Misery About a MAD NURSE...........
Carrie-------well do u have to guess???????
anyways dispite it all i read CUJO and i must say it is a well written book with tht scary dog pouncing each and every monment........

the climax is superb with the baseball bat........
the horror is good but nothing supernatural here......just a mad dog thts all.........
if u read the book i guess gtheres no need to watch the movie........
but if u watch the movie i guess the book is ruined for you..........

all in all, dispite the fact this is a very well written book with such horrifying gruesomeness in every page.......this aint my cup of tea.......
i need more than a CAR and a DOG to make a GREAT READ!!!!!!!!
2/5

This note is not about the book but the product description as seen from my Kindle. Acute should be a cute I imagine. With a space. It is scary to see that on an ebook as it lends one to think there will be typos in the ebook as well. Thanks.

The book was scary,sad,suspenceful. I loved it!! I must warn you though it's a bit different from the movie so don't except it to be anywhere near as cheerful as the Hollywood version. This book was Stephen King at his most morbid!!

I have only read two Stephen King Books.(The Shining and Cujo) I like Cujo more. This book can get very scarey and sort of sad at the end. I can't understand why so many people gave it a low rate. This book is full of action at the end and down right scary because this book seems as it could be true. All you need is to be stuck in a broken car with a 200 plus pound rabid dog outside that just wants to kill you. I recomend this to all King's fans

This is a great work of horror, king expresses the feelings of the characters and their struggles beautifully. Although i must admit the best part of the book has to be the last 50 pages or so, when the child and mother are about at the breaking point with cujo and must escape. There are a couple of little twists and turns to make it interesting. Overall i thought the book was great.

So you say that you are in the market for a dog huh? Well after this book you'll settle for a chiuaua. Cujo though slow to start certainly makes up for it in the last 3 quarters. After reading this spin chilling tale about a rabid St. Bernard you will never look at a large dumb looking dog again. And you will make sure to check for dogs before you get out of the car.....Happy reading

This story is very real to some people. This is one of my favorite Stephen King books. In this particular story, Stephen King has a very unique way of taking you into a dimension of horror that very few people will ever experience - even in their nightmares!

This was the fourth book I read by Stephen King and to put it mildly, it was a disappointment. Actually, reading it was like getting your teeth pulled out by a tow truck with no novicane. I usually read through books pretty fast, but with this one, I only made it halfway through after a week and a half. It was such a slow read because it was so ...boring. I read The Stand, The Shining, and Misery before this one, I was actually angry that Stephen King could produce such a .... I would rather read the phone book then attempt to read this book again. I think the only use for this book is to light my fireplace. TAKE MY WORD, DON'T READ THIS BOOK.

Cujo has been banned from many school's librarys and it is obvious why. It contains graphic violence and other unappropriate content for children. Who could forget the graphic scene with the mother and her son trapped in the car with the dog waiting for them outside. The deatail of each horrific death is so graphic that it must only be read by a mature reader. The language is also completely unapproriate for children. But please don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that this book is bad, I actually enjoyed it.

This is a superb fall read, with a gripping cast of characters, terrifying antagonist, and heart wrenching ending. I highly recommend it to any other King fan or horror reader looking for a good monster book.

Cujo by Stephen king is a great book. It kept me on the edge of my seat waiting to see what happens. The story starts of a lil slow but then gets better about half way through. Cujo is about a St bernard dog that was lovable and a very nice dog but then he came down with the rabies and went crazy. The book and movie were very similar with the exception of the en. I think everyone should read it.

This is one of the better King books that I have read.It was very gripping and I literally found it hard to put down until I had read the last page.The entire section where Donna and Tad were trapped in the car reminded me a lot of 'Gearlds Game' where the wife was trapped in the holiday home.If you havn't already read this then read it now.

This novel is fantastic, although it can be confusing to follow each different story line as it all comes together at the end it is tense and made me unable to put it down. As always King is a genius.

If you had to pick a sick, rabid dog to be terrorising you, I am pretty sure that a Saint Bernard would be really really low on a lot of people's list, down near Rottweiler, German Shepherd, Doberman, etc.

The woman and kid in this book have the misfortune of being cornered by such an unfortunate beast.

King has 33 books, not counting collections, 41 counting 4 past midnight and 4 seasons. This is his worst. Save it for when you have nothing else to read of King's, you may appreciate it a little better.

This was definately one of Stephen King's best books! It was a great suspense and It didn't take 6 weeks to read. Stephen King combines his talent with your imagination in a short but AWESOME book that can easily be read on a lazy weekend! You MUST read this book!

Cujo is about a Dog, named Cujo owned by a mechanic named Joe, who cases a rabbit into a cave and gets bitten by a rabbid bat. At that same time a women, named Donna, is on her way to drop off her son at school when her car breaks down in front of Joe's garage. So she kindly asks Joe to fix it. But now Cujo is a mounth foming, man-eating dog. After killing Joe, Cujo is now after Donna and her son.

GREAT BOOK!! I love this book along with Pet Sematary (I'm CRAZY about that book!) What makes the story even scarier is the fact that something like a rabid dog attacking someone could happen to anybody. It is very realistic. (that's what makes is sooooooooo scary!)

It focused way to much on the parents possible divorces and on the dads job and not nearly enough on the dog killing people or any horror. This is one of my least favorite King books and I think the movie is much better because it cut out most of the drama and stuck to the horror. But I did like the ending in the book a lot better than the movie ending.

Most annoying book ever. I love most King's stuff. But he must've been drunk when he wrote this, for he forgot to have the decency to put a chapter or two in the dang thing. So, we have this slow ass St. Bernard that somehow tails and catches a rabid rabbit in wabbit hole. The problem? Well, if it's rabid, wouldn't stay and play? But anyway this dog decides to get into with the floppy eared wascully thing. Get's rabies, but I still think he may have gotten into the old man's bath salts. The dog keeps mommy and son in the car. But I knew he'd make it... I watch Who's the Boss? Which by the way, I couldve watched a marathon of, if I wouldn't of wasted my time on this. There was some extra nonsense with the husband, and the closet scene could've been better. What I want to know is... who's the guy that voted 5 stars 159 times? Next.

As usual with Stephen King, you have to wonder what would you do in this situation, whihc really could happen, trapped in a hot car with a rabid dog outside, hope I never have to find out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I THINK THAT STEPHEN KING'S CUJO SHOULD HAVE A FIVE STAR RAITING ANDBE A TWO THUMBS UP BOOK. IT'S GOOD WITH PLENTY OF SUSPENCE; BUT, WITHA LITTLE INAPPROPRIATE SEX. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND THIS BOOK FOR KIDS IN HIGH SCHOOL AND UP... END

You could find this book at your local Goodwill for under a buck, but even if someone offered to give you a dollar to read Cujo, you should turn it down.

The story of the owners of Cujo had no connection to the main plot (they were out of town), the plot was regularly driven forward by multiple characters having strange dream sequences on the same night (lame!) or by their endlessly wandering thoughts, the man's marketing career was so uninteresting that it was painful, his wife was constantly filled with self pity as to be beyond annoying (though she deserved everything and more), and when she was stuck in the car (for over half the book!) she was boring and stupid - thrice she brought to her mind the "greenhouse effect" but still did nothing about it for her boy, so the ending was not all that surprising (the real surprise was that she wasn't charged with severe child neglect).

What's worse was that there was some vague connection between the monster in the boy's closet and Cujo, which was twice mentioned very briefly (beginning and end) but then was never resolved - it was the only thing this story had going for it, but nothing was done with it. A let down.

I read Cujo a few months ago, and this was my first King novel. Where the story was quite weak and a little boring at times, King makes up for with great writing. I'll definitely continue reading King.

the book was very slow in the beginning. you don't even get into the action until about page 125. then it is slow for a while then the action starts again. I think it is one of the worse I have read of stephen kings books.

This is the worst Stephen King book I've read, ever. Stephen King says he can't remember writing this book; that explains it! King was so piss drunk that he forgot to add important things in his novel like reader interest...

In the beginning, King adds a connection to The Dead Zone, making this seem like it would be an interesting read. Wrong. Cujo is a stunningly simple character, with him being good and then he becomes rabid and kills one kid. Whoo! This book is one of his shortest, but it's also one of his most boring. I do not recommend this at all.

The editorial review gives a pretty good synopsis of the book:

A woman and her young son in desperate need of a car repair are trapped by a rabid dog. And there is no help in sight. As the synopsis accurately points out, besides the woman trapped in her car, much of the story focuses on the woman's troubled marriage with her husband and the family of the dog and the problems that they're having.

I disagree that the novel is well paced. It moves very slowly. King spends page after page describing scenes that add nothing to the story.

What makes Cujo unusual for a King book, is that the plot is completely unoriginal. The story just isn't interesting and the reader is left with the feeling that King is just unnecessarily dragging the story on. This book could have been wrapped up in 75 pages, but King found a way to stretch it to 320.

The editorial review states the book is: "as real as junk food, a failing marriage, a broken-down car, or a fatal virus".

Here I have to agree. Just like junk food it's completely lousy. Who cares about a fictional broken marriage? Yawn times a million.

A broken-down car - It's a Pinto what would you expect?

A fatal virus - The fatal virus is rabies and is nothing new. Completely unoriginal.

Overall, this book fails to deliver in so many ways. But the biggest issue is that it's BORING! The characters aren't interesting. The events aren't interesting.

To say this book is bad is an understatement. It's torture.

Zero stars.

This was my first Stephen King book that I attempeted to read and I must say it was very interesting. Thank you so much Mr King. Thanks for writing a book that completely wasted my time and filled my mind with something far worse than suicide - BOREDOM. And why name the book Cujo, when the story doesn't even revolve around the fat two-hundred-pound dog anyway? What further irritated me was the fact that the book dragged. If Mr King used this slow-revealing technique to build up some suspense, then I'm sorry, it failed badly. The only thing that it succeeded in doing was to prolong the torturous agony of reading such stupidity. So, if you're hoping to find something scary (or even remotely intelligent) in this book, you're in for a rude awakening!!!