The Green Mile
1996
- horror fiction
- fiction
- death row inmates
- prisons
- executions and executioners
- jails
- sisters
- murder
- horror
- prison officials and employees
The story
The Green Mile is a 1996 serial novel by American writer Stephen King. It tells the story of death row supervisor Paul Edgecombe's encounter with John Coffey, an unusual inmate who displays inexplicable healing and empathetic abilities. The serial novel was originally released in six volumes before being republished as a single-volume work. The book is an example of magical realism. The Green Mile won the Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel in 1996. In 1997, The Green Mile was nominated as Best Novel for the British Fantasy Award and the Locus Award. In 2003 the book was listed on the BBC's The Big Read poll of the UK's "best-loved novel". --- Contains: 1. [The Two Dead Girls](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL149165W/The_Two_Dead_Girls) 2. [The Mouse on the Mile](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL149147W/The_Mouse_on_the_Mile) 3. [Coffey's Hands](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL149107W/Coffey's_Hands) 4. [The Bad Death of Eduard Delacroix](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL15861106W/The_Bad_Death_of_Eduard_Delacroix) 5. [Night Journey](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL16252000W/Night_Journey) 6. [Coffey on the Mile](https://openlibrary.org/works/OL15136222W/Coffey_on_the_Mile)
What it’s like
Slow, close-quartered prose set almost entirely within a 1930s Louisiana prison, where the air is thick with heat, sweat, the stink of bodies and lye, and the wet, buzzing hum of the electric chair. King's voice is that of an older man recalling the past in plain, unhurried sentences, with plenty of small domestic detail: bad knees, a stubborn mouse, the squeak of a cell door, the flicker of a lamp. Its vibe is melancholy and quietly tender, with an undercurrent of dread that stays mostly in the anticipation rather than the act. Violence and executions are present and sometimes described with unflinching precision, including one prolonged, badly botched death, but gore is kept sparse and the emotional weight lands harder than the physical. There is also a rare, unforced sweetness in the bond between the warden and a gentle giant whose strange powers test everyone's faith in the system. Best for slow, rainy-afternoon reading, for readers who want a sad, humane story with a supernatural thread and a strong sense of place, and who can handle a steady current of cruelty without wanting it dwelt on.
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