Product Description

'Civilization slipped into its second dark age on an unsurprising track of blood but with a speed that could not have been foreseen by even the most pessimistic futurist. By Halloween, every major city from New York to Moscow stank to the empty heavens and the world as it had been was a memory.' The event became known as The Pulse. The virus was carried by every cell phone operating within the entire world. Within ten hours, most people would be dead or insane.

A young artist Clayton Riddell realises what is happening. And together with Tom McCourt and a teenage girl called Alice, he flees the devastation of explosive, burning Boston, desperate to reach his son before his son switches on his little red mobile phone…

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #18009 in Books
• Published on: 2007-01-25
• Binding: Paperback
• 512 pages

Guardian
`Very clever and brilliantly written... you won't use your mobile for days.'

Review
'Very clever and brilliantly written . . . you won't use your mobile for days.' (Guardian )

'The true narrative artist is a rare creature. Storytelling - the ability to make the listener or the reader need to know, demand to know, what happens next - is a gift. I don't think it can be taught . . . Stephen King, like Charles Dickens before him, has this gift in spades.' (The Times )

'What makes this one of his most poignant books is not the gore or the sinister threats . . . It is a father's helpless dread of what he has not been able to prevent.' (Time Out )

'Fans will rejoice that King has gone back to his horror-novel roots' (Daily Mail )

'King's genius for storytelling ensures there is plenty still to chew on. is King just scaring us into binning our mobiles? For now, I'm sticking to the landline.'

Synopsis
'Civilization slipped into its second dark age on an unsurprising track of blood but with a speed that could not have been foreseen by even the most pessimistic futurist. By Halloween, every major city from New York to Moscow stank to the empty heavens and the world as it had been was a memory.' The event became known as The Pulse. The virus was carried by every cell phone operating within the entire world. Within ten hours, most people would be dead or insane. A young artist Clayton Riddell realises what is happening. And together with Tom McCourt and a teenage girl called Alice, he flees the devastation of explosive, burning Boston, desperate to reach his son before his son switches on his little red mobile phone!

Customer Reviews

I thought it was excellent but can understand why others wouldnt
There are a lot of bad reviews for this book scrolling down the comment box and far be it me to say those comments are wrong and mine are right because its a matter of opinion so let me clean it up for all those confused about the mixed reviews.
Most of the people who are giving it a bad review mention that they love stephen kings older work and i think i know whats different that they perhaps didn't like in this new one
in stephen kings older work there was a lot of build up and charecterisation throughout most of the book and a spectacual ending which makes you stay up all night reading because after all the charecterization you care about whats happening to the charecters as if they're real people.
In Cell the action starts a few pages in and goes on throughout the book. The charecterisation goes on throughout the book with what drives the charecters. Many of the sub charecters do seem a bit too dimensional and it is not fully explained what "the pulse" actually was apart from charecters speculation and the main plot of the story is what happens after "the puls" where as in stephen kings older books the pulse would have been the last thing to happen and there would be a lot of build up too it
it all depends on what you want from the story. If you want a start from page one and grips you right until the end exciting story then press the order button right now cos this is a book for you however if you think that stephen king has lost his touch, you didnt like dark tower and you prefer a more sophisticated story with charecterisation and description then please do read his older books such as the stand
the thing to remember was that this book was marketed towards a younger audience given its theme and i being seventeen enjoyed it very much and am not affraid of using my phone
i hope this has been helpful

DISAPPOINTING EFFORT FROM THE ONCE "KING" OF HORROR
I don't usually do this, but, this book has driven me to venting my spleen - so to speak.

I am (was) a great Stephen King fan when reading the likes of Christine, Carrie, The Shining, Salems Lot, The Stand and Misery etc. even Cujo, however, I became disillusoned with efforts such as It, The dark Tower Series and Pet Sematary as well as his more recent publications.

Then, someone recommended Cell, and I thought, yeah, this is good tag-line and up-to-date with technology . . .

Oh My God! I have to say, when 'Book Worm' Says " . . . keeps you hooked and turning the pages . . . " they're not wrong, but, I kept turning the pages wondering when the story was going to start!

I have to say that for such a unique and promising premise, this book massively disappoints; no new scenarios, no explanations, and for me, no closure - sorry 'Book Worm' it keeps screaming sequal at me [please Mr King, NO!].

I pretty much agree with 'Deju Vu' this is a poor book given Mr King's previous body of work - albiet recent releases have been dubious as far as I'm concerned - but! I would recommend you give this one a miss and pretend he never wrote it and get yourself straight onto Duma Key which

My first King read....and I'm unsure!
I was told by a friend at work that King would be my kind of read, so I chose 'Cell' to be my first taster of his many novels, and what a mistake that turned out to be! I am very unsure about what exactly to say about 'Cell', apart from that I found it very hard to get in to. It seemed highly repetitive and didn't feel as though it had any form of consistency... It was only nearing towards the end of the book that I felt an urge to read on. There is no real suspense or build up and it can be quite slow in places. However, I have not been discouraged by this read and a going to give King a chance to redeem himself, my second read being, 'The Shining'. I hope for more with this next one.