Faustian Contracts are always a joy to read about. And, at the end, the person regrets it but it's too late. When I started reading "Fair Extension" I expected the same. But the changes Stephen King made to the story made it more than a little disturbing.
Title: Fair Extension
Book: Full Dark, No Stars
Author: Stephen King
Released: 2010
Rating: 5/5
Basic Plot: Dave Streeter has cancer and makes a deal with Elvid to have him live longer. But everything has a price.
Best Friends. Not!
Dave and Tom have been best friends for years. But Dave is secretly jealous of Tom. Why? Tom took his girl (and is now married to her) and has a much better life than Dave. Dave has cancer and Tom doesn't. There are more things but the basics are that Dave is jealous. To make his life longer, Dave has to have bad things happen to a person that is close to him. I figured that once bad things started happening to Tom (and his family) that Dave would regret and try to stop it. Nope, Dave lets things continue and is happy about it. Even at the end of the story, Dave wishes for more. And these aren't little things that happen to Tom. It's just really eerie how Dave reacts to things.
Elvid
It took me a few minutes to get that. It's just rearranging the word Devil, therefore implying Elvid is the Devil. Some of the comments that Elvid makes furthers that assumption. Does the story make clear if Elvid is the Devil? No. It's left up to the reader to decide.
25 Years
The deal that Dave makes with Elvid is that his life is 25 years longer. In The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus (by Christopher Marlowe) Faustus is given 24 years of unlimited power. In "Fair Extension" Dave gets one more year than that. It might just be coincidence, but it is interesting nonetheless.
Final Thoughts
I liked this story and the confusion it gave me. I was just shocked that Dave didn't ever waver in his decision. That he didn't care about a fellow human being. However, I didn't give it a 6/5 because it didn't pull major heartstrings. It got a 5/5 because it has a nice twist and the story is engaging.
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