Cell

Written by Stephen King

Narrated by Scott Campbell

Stephen King's bestselling apocalyptic thriller is a major motion picture starring John Cusack (1408), Samuel L. Jackson (Django Unchained) and Isabelle Fuhrman (Orphan) coming in August.

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 throughout 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 he switches on his little red mobile phone . . .

(p) Simon & Schuster 2006

• Language: English
• Publisher: Hachette UK Audio
• Release date: Jun 5, 2006
• ISBN: 9781844563258

Stephen King

Stephen King is the author of more than sixty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes the short story collection You Like It Darker, Holly, Fairy Tale, Billy Summers, If It Bleeds, The Institute, Elevation, The Outsider, Sleeping Beauties (cowritten with his son Owen King), and the Bill Hodges trilogy: End of Watch, Finders Keepers, and Mr. Mercedes (an Edgar Award winner for Best Novel and a television series streaming on Peacock). His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller. His epic works The Dark Tower, It, Pet Sematary, Doctor Sleep, and Firestarter are the basis for major motion pictures, with It now the highest-grossing horror film of all time. He is the recipient of the 2020 Audio Publishers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the 2018 PEN America Literary Service Award, the 2014 National Medal of Arts, and the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King. 

Reviews for Cell

[martensgirl · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Initially, I enjoyed this book. The premise was quite original: cell phones were transmitting a signal that turned people into zombies. However, for me the book fell flat. It seemed unnecessarily long and I found the talk of 'worms' 'mutating' rather unbelievable. The ending was a bit of a let down.

[steve02476 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Fine for a Stephen King horror-zombie-apocalypse book, I guess. Not my fave genre.

[clairefun-979518 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

ooh! a fun, easy-to-read, modern life is rubbish apocalypse book! And it's not taking itself too seriously!

[irenecole · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

If you like a good end of the world story, or at least the end of the world as we know it, I would recommend Cell for you. Being a New Englander I loved the setting. I think it added to the chill factor for me that my husband has worked in many of the towns mentioned, and would likely be in one of them should the "pulse" ever actually hit us. (giggles) I did read some reviews before I bought the book, and noticed quite a few people were unhappy with the ending. Several felt that it was left unresolved. King has often left room for the reader's own imagination and that is not a style that bothers me. The ending is whatever you make of it. I am satisfied with the ending that was conjured in my mind.

[booknookretreat7 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was a classic Stephen King novel! Roller coaster ride of thrills, twists, and turns! I read the first half of the book in one night as I could not put it down. Last night I finished the other half. The book is about cell phones that get hit with a pulse phenomenon that practically turns the human race into zombies. It was a different kind of zombie experience. You have a rag-tag of survivors that are trying to get out of the city and they meet up with other survivors along the way. Definitely an interesting read. Giving it five stars.

[livelylady · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Two stars for imagination only....horrible story of a mutation to the population through cell phone connection and one man's effort to find his son. Lots of blood and gore, not the good suspense of the early Stephen King novels, where plausibility is an option.

[kittycunningh-815148 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Telepathic zombies!! What's not to love?

[dandailey-212203 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Not King's best work. The characters are rather cardboard in spite of verbose descriptions. The whole tale moves slowly and the climax leaves the outcome unresolved. I actually found that I had to force myself to finish this book.

[eric_j._guignard · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

The idea of this story was interesting, but it just fell short in its execution. The ending, especially, was such a let-down, just a "cliff-hanger" which is inexcusable when investing in a long novel. Stephen King is my favorite horror author - I love his classics, but not everything he writes can be a masterpiece, I suppose. It somebody else wrote this book, I would give it three stars, but I only give this two stars because I expect much more from King.

[carl_alves_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I wanted to preface this by noting that Stephen King is my favorite all time writer and I have read most of his novels. Having said that, Cell is an absolute mess of a novel. There was nothing about it that made any sense. King must really have been fixated on phones and computers while writing this. From what I can gather from reading this novel, the human brain is basically a hard drive that can be wiped out and reprogrammed. It can also be exposed to viruses and worms just like a computer. In this novel, some mysterious pulse occurs, which turns people into ultraviolent, nonsensical monsters, but these are only the people who have cell phones. Good thing this didn’t happen now or the whole human race would have been taken down in one shot, since I don’t know very many people who don’t have cell phones.The story follows a group of survivors from Boston, where Clay, a struggling comic book artist who finally gets his break, is trying to return to his ex-wife and son in Maine. Along the way, they meet other survivors and have confrontations with the phone zombies. The best part of this novel is the characterization. I thought that the characters in this story were well done, starting with Clay but also with the other members of the group. Where the book falls apart is that the plot and concept behind the book are a train wreck. There is no explanation for anything. Somehow, I’m supposed to believe that a pulse, whatever the hell that is (is it a solar flare, an electro magnetic event, something supernatural) can wipe clean the brains of anyone who has a cell phone, and then give the phone zombies a hive mind, telepathy, voice projection to the normal people who were not affected, the ability to control the minds and actions of those unaffected, and even the ability to levitate. With no explanation whatsoever how any of this is happening. I’m sorry, but in a book like this you need some type of explanation, but apparently King didn’t feel that his readers deserved to know how any of this was happening. This novel came in that time period after King’s accident where he was putting out the worst material of his career, e.g. Lisey’s Story, Bag of Bones, the final chapter of the Dark Tower, etc. I’ll give him a pass because the body of his work is so much better than this.Carl Alves - author of Battle of the Soul

[thedivineoomba · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I read this book right when it came out and I hated it. Stupid plot, stupid reasoning. I found it overwritten, with a "that's it?" ending.

[carol420 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

"Cell" has a great underlying premise: The human brain is an organic computer that has a basic operating system, which is capable of being erased. In this case the erasure is triggered by a "pulse" that is sent out to millions of people through their cell phones. The twist comes when the "normies" (those that had their phones off), realize that the "phoners" ( those that had their phones on), are evolving over time. They appear to be developing more sophisticated traits that are, in some cases, superior to those of normal humans. For instance, they communicate via telepathy and move around by means of levitation.

From the first page to the last, you're hooked. It doesn't matter if the reading calories are empty; you can't stop reading. That's why Stephen King, above everything else, and perhaps in spite of everything else, has remained one of the best selling author in the world. You just can't stop reading him.

[daniel5estes · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I resisted starting Stephen King's Cell mostly because cell phones have evolved so much since 2006, as has our relationship to them. What was once a new and feared gadget is now more common than ever. (Seriously, it's only a matter of time before we think of ourselves as cyborgs, and not in a sarcastic way.) And King's a bit of a technophobe, at least in his stories, so I thought whatever anxieties cell phones caused 10 years ago would be so much worse today. Also, I'm not really into zombies so there's that too.Turns out most of my initial impressions were unfounded. Cell is a fun, post-apocalyptic adventure. Give it a try.

[elle6kay-554079 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Definitely not his best work, but still terrifying & gory, just the way I like King's novels.

[lukerik-1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I loved the idea of everyone being turned into morons by their mobiles. There are good point about the novel as a whole: good narrative drive and everything's drawn in primary colours. It's essentially a zombie story built on the same framework as The Stand and more than a few similarities to Spielberg's version of The War of the Worlds. Beyond the mobile idea there' really nothing original about it. Even the ending is Pet Sematary esque. Ultimately I found it a little unsatisfying, perhaps, because of the light characterisation it never really rises above the story. What really annoyed me (and this is a spoiler) was the first bombing. At this stage they don't know what's going on. They think the mobiles have caused the problem but correlation is not causation. They can see the condition of the zombies is improving and they know there's some sort of organisation up north. For all they know they're killing people that can be saved by egg-heads. But I suppose the story demands explosions.

[stahl2ricco · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

King's take on the zombie apocalypse novel! For him, the root cause is "The Pulse" as delivered through a cell phone! From then on, it's the phone crazies vs. the normals! It's a pretty good, quick read, and it gets to the action right away! The main character is Clay and he picks up some help along the way. And his main adversary is the Raggedy Man, who is pretty dang creepy! I'm still not sure how I feel about the ending, but it does work.Spoler alert:I did not like that the origin of "The Pulse" is never given. Nor how it would enable the phone crazies to gain the powers of telepathy and levitation. Very frustrating for me.

[jlsimon7 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I loved this book. I have seen many reviews in the last year on other Stephen King books that rant about how bad this book was, and honestly I just don't understand why people weren't transported by the story.

King walks us through an apocalyptic experience that rather than the world being destroyed, the essence of humanity is wiped out. It is not the population, but our evolution of knowledge and technology that destroys us. It is our technological tower of Babel, the cell towers and signals that destroy civilization in this tale.

It was absolutely fascinating to imagine a world that was destroyed by the technology it reveres and the only ones not effected are those that are not held hostage by their cell phones.

It was an amazing experience that I enjoyed tremendously. My best friend and daughter are on board with most of the other reviewers, they didn't like the book. But as for myself, the imagination of this story is unique and delivered the way only Steven King can bring it to you.

[jan0fleming · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

"The event that came to be known as The Pulse began at 3:03 pm., eastern standard time, on the afternoon of October 1. The term was a misnomer, of course, but within ten hours of the event, most of the scientists capable of pointing this out were either dead or insane. The name hardly mattered, in any case. What mattered was the effect."

Artist Clayton Riddell had been in Boston negotiating a successful deal to sell his graphic novel project.

His joy at finally being offered the deal of a lifetime is short lived by an event called The Pulse which causes everyone using their mobiles phones at the time to have their brains rewired…and ...well mayhem and murder aplenty ensue

Fortunately for Clay, he does not own a mobile phone.

In the panic to get out of Boston and find his way home to his wife and son (who does own a mobile), he is joined by Tom McCourt, a man he meets in the meleé immediately following The Pulse and a young girl, Alice, who they rescue from being killed by one of the “phoners.” The story follows their terrifying journey, avoiding capture—and worse—by the “phoners” who are beginning to “flock” and are led by one they call Raggedy Man.

A rather unique spin on the zombie genre, high entertaining with engaging characters makes this a very readable romp framed between a cinematic opening and an ambiguous ending… King's words describe it perfectly like "cheap whisky . . . very nasty and extremely satisfying." The pulse is never explained and this left to conjecture and speculation both by the characters and the reader.

King does have a message regarding humanity and how much of it is left when "Civilization slips into its second dark age” as Clay says "This is how it goes when the bottom drops out," Clay realizes. "This is how we act." and it is not nice at all

[selinalynn69 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

futuristic and scary. I forgot how much I enjoyed king.but after all these years he still delivers a great story

[nikkiplusbooks · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I'll say this a million times, but I am a sucker for apocalyptic stories. I just love it, no matter how cheesy it is. I honestly felt that Cell by Stephen King was phenomenal. I can't understand how someone wouldn't enjoy this book. I was hooked from the first page. I literally couldn't put it down. The characters seemed a little bland at times, but overall I thought that Clay was a badass. It's not zombies, it's something new, something fresh, and I think that's why some people might have hated it. They complain about the overuse of the living dead, but when someone tries to shake up the theme, it gets back lash. Screw that. Cell was a great read, it's officially one of my favorites, and I think it deserves five stars.

[csweder · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

At first glance, this book reminded me a lot of the movie, The Happening...which was a terrible movie. However, this book wasn't terrible. This leads me to believe that perhaps Happening could have been wayyyy better as a book.

The premise of the book is a great one. As a person who is attached to my cell phone, this book gave me the creeps. On October 1st, something goes wrong. Every cell phone on Earth begins sending out a signal, the 'Pulse', which essentially drives whoever is talking on the phone (or even near enough to a phone to hear the pulse...) BAM! You've got a one way ticket to Crazyville, Population: EVERYONE who has a cell phone.

There was some discussion in the book about this being a terrorist act (but in the end, this was never established). And on that count, creating something that makes every cell phone user insane is BRILLIANT. Just think about it, what would YOU do if you saw everyone going crazy, in the homicidal-kill-you-with-anything-I-have-including-my-teeth way? I don’t know about you, but I’d pick up my phone and call someone to ask, “WTF?” And then I’d be a crazy.

In this respect, I really love this book. There were times it was repetitive, and times when I didn’t necessarily agree with what the characters did/thought…but all in all it’s a great dystopia book—perhaps the first I have read by King.

[zophar53 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book starts out with a bang and gets really interesting really quickly. Unfortunately, it gets pretty boring about halfway through.

[soireadthisbooktoday · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Much like "The Stand" and the "Dark Tower" cycle, "The Cell" takes what could have been just another of Kings' amusingly creepy horror stories and expanded it into what I prefer to interpret as a rather interesting bit of symbolism.

It has long been known that human brains operate on electrical signals, and functions much like an organic computer. Though it may not be possible at this time for some supposedly "terrorist" group to 'short out' human brains via cell phones and satellite "signals, it is certainly not out of scientific possiblility.

And who is to say it wasn't some branch of our own government, a'la the Tuskegee experiments, biological, chemical, and radiation experimentation on American citizens, all carried out by the American government, (or, of course, "The Stand") who, through monkeying around with a program they are neither intelligent enough, or responsible enough to control, inflicted the signal through sheer carelessness?

Further, it is far from impossible that, given a total 'disk wipe' of the human brain, humans would revert to the most base, vicious animal behavior. Humans began as the most vicious of animals, using the intellect they developed in lieu of teeth and claws in order to slaughter themselves to the top of the genetic heap. Civilization has laid a veneer of gentility over the basic nature of humanity, but the very fact that true sociopaths and psychopaths exist in society tend to prove the base nature of humans as displayed in "The Cell".

There has been scientific iniquiry into the psi capabilities of early humans, which gives weight to the book's concept of a wiped, reverted human mind being able to utilize strong psi capabilities. It is certainly not totally out of the question that the psi capability could be there - humans are pack animals, and any pack animal with psi communication capabilities would be well served by the ability to send signals among pack members, especially when surrounding herds of animals for hunting purposes or to communicate with other pack members over distance, especially before language was developed as a human communication tool.

Overall, I like to think that, though King excels in the horror genre, he has a much firmer grasp on the scientific literature, and of human development and politics, that he likes to admit. While "The Stand" was more deeply entrenched in pure religious symbolism, "The Cell" seems to me to explore the darker side of the human belief systems than even pure 'good and evil'. Instead, I interpret the 'mentality' of the Phone Crazies very much as I interpret the terrorist mentality. Pull out the cruelest, most base portion of a belief, wether it be religious or, in the Phone Crazies case, the basest portions of the humans brain, and use that as an excuse for 'justice' - degenerate the belief system to its base component and force every other person to believe in that component or die. Religious fanatics (terrorists), whatever their denomination, never seem to find the purest, kindest, most generous portions of their religions to put forward, but rather the darkest and most violent. Could this go back to the base, cruel nature of the human brain? Or is it simply that, by reverting humanity to cave dwellers, fearing the dark and the vengeful 'god' figure, that it gives a semblence of control to those who are so mindless and fearful themselves?

"The Cell" is a gripping read, with characters you care about. It does, in inimitable King style, refer to characters, and of course, locations, we came to know and love in previous King novels. Who can ever forget the loveable, and frightening, Charlie the Choo-Choo? Classic.

As for those who are so unhappy because the book wasn't "Finished", I must disagree most stringently with their complaints. No, the book isn't all wrapped up and tied with a big red bow of an ending. But novels, good novels, are designed to make you _think_. To go beyond the imagination of the author to expand the imagination of the reader. King pointed this out in the ending to "The Dark Tower", at least on the CD version. He didn't want to write a 'big red bow' ending to the book - and I would have been deeply disappointed if he had done so without warning me that it was coming. On the CD he gives the thoughtful reader a chance to stop the disk before you got to the bow - to use your own imagination to end the book. Bless him! For those without the wit or imagination to carry forward on their own, he wrote (at his publisher's insistence, I believe) a 'closure' for the book, which described what happened when Roland actually did "To the Dark Tower c(a)me". I never read it, and I never will. What is life without imagination?

The four stars instead of five? I would give it 4.5 if I could, it was indeed a good book. I liked The Dark Tower cycle better for its depth of characterizations and the heart that went into it. I do think that King could have done a deeper bit of work on The Cell, but given that it seems the whole thing started from a bout of frustration over the rudeness of cell phone users - well, I suppose he deserves a five for not simply biting out the offending cell user's throat.... ;-)

[claireh18 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Quite enjoyed this story about mobile phones infecting the people using them with some sort of plague that turned them into zombies - classic King!

[amyj96 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Started off as a typical (but well-done) zombie apocalypse story, but got very good further in. I ended up really involved with the characters and the story.

[jeb5 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Stephen King’s novel, “Cell” is a tour de force that harkens back to such novels like “Salem’s Lot” and “Christine”. Without a doubt, King has finely honed his craft and has offered up yet another work of horrific art. In “Cell”, instead of building up to the story, you are thrust right into the thick of things from chapter 1. While “Cell” is reminiscent of King’s previous horrific novels, there is an element of twisted humor that is scattered throughout the pages of this novel that wasn’t in his earlier works. The one liners and quips come across as coping mechanisms for his characters but are in fact things that we readers might say in our everyday lives. Just when you think you can’t be more disturbed, out comes a comment like “assume makes an ass out of u and me”. The man who made us fear cars, dogs, cemeteries and hotels has succeeded in doing what he has always done – he has made an everyday item a thing of terror, our cellphones.

[gopfolk · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

…ending leaves you wanting moreI’ve always loved King’s novels and this one did not disappoint. The story line is curious and intriguing but the ending will leave you wanting further answers.

[clair.dlune · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

While perhaps not one of King's most noteworthy, this was a fun & fast read. I'd highly recommend it to Stephen King fans or anyone that likes apocalyptic horror novels.

[hayduke_1 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

My original rating was three stars, but overnight it dropped to a mere two stars. Why? Well, I figure that during the last 50 pages of a Stephen King book I should be turning pages like a crazy man, but I was bored! Plus, I didn't feel emotionally invested in these characters, even the father/son relationship that is a theme throughout, and ends on the strength of this relationship. If you cannot get me emotionally involved with the characters after 450 pages, then that is a fault in the writing. Oh well...at least it was quick, and fairly painless.

[srboone · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Relentless, but familiar tale of the undead acopalypse. Benefits from a genesis vastly different from other similar tales. The ending is the best part of the novel, though fans seem to be split.