Hit Lit: Cracking the Code of the Twentieth Century's Biggest Bestsellers (31 page)

Meanwhile, in Sicily, Michael falls in love with and marries the beautiful Apollonia. Don Tommasino, charged with the protection of the young Corleone, warns him that his marriage has made his whereabouts known to his father’s enemies. Passionately in love, Michael ignores the warning, and a short while later an attempt is made on his life. The bomb
meant for him kills Apollonia instead. When Michael regains consciousness, he tells Don Tommasino that he wishes to return home to be with his father and to ascend to the position that’s been waiting for him his entire life.

Back in America, Michael marries Kay Adams, his longtime girlfriend. He confesses to her that he’s now running his father’s empire and vows that within five years the enterprise will be completely legitimate. Before that can happen, however, he has a few loose ends to tie up.

Michael heads to Las Vegas and makes Moe Greene (a wayward member of the Mob) an offer he can’t refuse. Moe refuses and is ultimately killed.

Then the Don, joyful since his retirement from the “olive oil business,” dies of a heart attack while tending to his tomato garden, and although the death is sudden, Michael’s plan is already in motion and the Mob war begins.

Philip Tattaglia is murdered in a motel with his mistress, Don Barzini is killed by a hitman disguised as a cop, and Tessio, one of the Don’s most trusted
caporegimes
, is sniffed out as the rat and “taken for a drive.” Michael personally visits Carlo and says he knows he was responsible for Sonny’s murder. Carlo is strangled to death.

And just like that, with a series of swift and brutal moves, Michael Corleone rises to take over his father’s throne and to restore power and respect to the family.

But this, of course, was the last thing he ever wanted.

Chris MacNeil, divorced single mother and celebrated actress, moves to Washington, D.C., with her daughter, Regan,
to finish her latest film. Regan soon grows bored and starts using a Ouija board to play with Captain Howdy, an imaginary friend who finds it amusing to move Regan’s furniture around and make things go bump in the night.

Regan’s father neglects to call her on her birthday, and Chris believes that’s the reason for Regan’s sudden shift in mood. Once curious and cheerful, Regan grows sullen, temperamental, and capable of some seriously salty language. Doctors believe she’s suffering from a strange form of epilepsy, with symptoms that include speaking in tongues, lifting the bed into the air, and feats of superhuman strength.

Unsatisfied with the diagnosis, Chris reaches out to Father Damien Karras, a handsome young priest who is dejected and full of doubt about his faith. Karras agrees to see Regan, but he warns Chris that the church does not easily hand out permission for exorcisms. He has to make an indisputable case for demonic possession.

When Karras first meets Regan, the child claims to be the devil, impersonates the voice of Burke Dennings—the film director that the demon threw out of Regan’s bedroom window to his death—speaks in the voice of Karras’s recently deceased mother, then covers him with a stream of projectile vomit. Karras, still unconvinced, decides to record the demon’s voice.

After studying the recording, Karras realizes the demon isn’t speaking an ancient language but is instead talking backward in English. The following day, he’s given the go-ahead by his superiors to begin the exorcism, and to assist him, the church sends Father Lankester Merrin, an elderly priest who has struggled with exorcisms before.

Merrin arrives immediately, prepares Karras, and sets about performing the exorcism. After three days of nonstop
exorcising, the men are beset by emotional and physical fatigue. Merrin falls dead of an apparent heart attack, and Karras, enraged by the death of the priest, demands the demon leave Regan and take his body. The demon gladly accepts, and once Karras is fully possessed, he leaps through the window to his death.

It’s mid-June, and the resort town of Amity is hoping for another prosperous summer catering to the beachgoers from the city when a young woman is killed by a shark attack during a late-night swim.

Police Chief Martin Brody meets with Harry Meadows, editor of the
Amity-Leader
, to issue the beach closure. Meadows insists that he will not run the story of the girl’s death, nor will he issue the beach closing. Meadows tells Brody that a number of local businesses have already demanded the
Leader
not run the story for fear of scaring off the tourists Amity so desperately needs.

After the tourists begin arriving, the shark soon attacks again, this time taking the life of a six-year-old boy. As Brody is hosting a press conference regarding the attack, another victim, a sixty-five-year-old man, is claimed.

The next day the
Amity-Leader
admits the three fatalities, including the first victim whose death went unreported. The mother of the young boy storms into Brody’s office and blames him for the death of her son. Brody, racked with guilt but sworn to secrecy, accepts full responsibility.

Brody and a fellow officer take a boat to visit Ben Gardner, a fisherman hired to track down the shark, only to find the
boat deserted and damaged, with all signs pointing to Gardner’s being the fourth of the shark’s victims. Back at the police station, Meadows introduces Brody to Matt Hooper, a scientist from the oceanographic institute, and Brody realizes that the only way to return the town to normalcy is to kill the shark.

Brody learns of a shark hunter named Quint, and when Brody reaches out to him, Quint agrees to hunt the shark (for the right price, of course), with the help of Brody and Hooper.

Once they’re all on the boat, there is no sign of the shark. The second day is even quieter still, until the baited lines are snapped clean. The shark breaches near the boat, and the men try to harpoon it to no avail.

The following day, Hooper brings a steel cage to the marina. At sea, they locate the shark and toss the empty cage into the water. The shark ignores the cage, and Hooper dives right in. The shark then attacks the cage head-on. The shark mangles the cage, squeezes his head inside, and kills Hooper with one vicious bite.

On the third day, Brody and Quint take to the sea by themselves and are immediately attacked by the shark. Quint manages to lodge two harpoons in the shark and tries to run the ropes through a winch in order to drag the shark. Instead, the shark launches itself onto the back of the boat. The boat begins to sink, and as the shark slips back into the water, the rope from the harpoons gets tangled around Quint and drags him down to his death.

The bow of the boat is almost vertical, and Brody grabs a cushion to keep himself afloat. As the boat sinks, the shark heads straight for Brody. Just as the shark is about to attack, the harpoons lodged in its massive body take their toll and the shark dies, mere feet away from Brody.

Brody plunges his head underwater, opens his eyes, and sees that the shark is kept from sinking by the barrels, and Quint’s body, still tethered to it, floats just above the shark. Satisfied that the shark is dead, Brody paddles for shore.

Johnny Smith didn’t know he had acquired the ability to see the future when he hit his head on a frozen lake in the winter of 1953. And when he and his girlfriend, Sarah Bracknell, take in the carnival in the fall of 1970, he didn’t know he was seeing the future then, either, but he was. With his power, strange and uncontrollable, he wins over five hundred dollars on roulette that night at the carnival. It’s cause for celebration, except Sarah notices that something isn’t right with Johnny and it makes her ill. She blames it on a bad hot dog but needs to go home. Johnny, riding home alone in a cab, gets into a horrific wreck with a pair of drag racers and spends the next four and a half years in a coma.

During that time, his mother develops an unhealthy obsession with Christian fanaticism, Sarah marries another man, Walt Hazlett, and bears his child, and the Castle Rock Strangler (a serial killer) continues to add victims to his growing toll.

As soon as Johnny awakens, his power is fully evident. By touching people, he can see into their future. He warns a nurse that her house is on fire and tells a doctor that his mother, who he presumed was dead, is actually living in California. Stories leak out about Johnny’s paranormal powers, and soon the national media arrives.

His mother watches a live interview with her son and is so shocked, she suffers a stroke. Before she dies, she insists that his power is a gift from God and he must, above all else, “heed the voice when it calls.”

When it does call, it’s in the form of Sheriff George Bannerman from Castle Rock. He and his detectives have exhausted all options, and even though he doesn’t completely believe Johnny’s brand of hokum, he’s willing to try anything to locate the Strangler. And they do, if a bit late.

By the time Johnny and Bannerman locate him, Frank Dodd, trusted officer on the force, is already dead of an apparent suicide—a note tacked around his neck that reads, “I confess.”

Soon after, Johnny moves in with Roger Chatsworth, a successful businessman, to tutor his athlete son, Chuck. Johnny enjoys his anonymity, and as a hobby, he begins attending political rallies throughout New Hampshire. Johnny makes it a point to shake hands with each candidate to sneak a glimpse behind the political veneer. But all that changes when he encounters Greg Stillson, a dangerous megalomaniac running for the House of Representatives. When Johnny shakes his hand, he sees visions of a nuclear holocaust.

Johnny feels he has no choice in the matter. He writes two letters, one to his father and one to Sarah, explaining his actions, and sets out to assassinate Greg Stillson. Johnny fails, but in the ensuing chaos, Stillson grabs a small child to use as a human shield. An eyewitness snaps a picture of this outrageous act, effectively crushing any hopes Stillson had of a career in politics. Johnny is shot and killed, but before he dies, he reaches out and touches Stillson’s ankle and sees that the world is safe.

It is 1984, the height of the cold war, and Captain First Rank Marko Ramius sets sail from a Soviet submarine station deep in the Arctic. In his charge is the
Red October
, Russia’s newest top-secret nuclear submarine. His orders are to perform a two-week training exercise in which the Soviet fleet will attempt to locate him while he avoids detection using the sub’s experimental new propulsion system.

Soon after leaving the base, Ramius murders a political officer in his wardroom and replaces the official orders with a set of forged documents. Ramius informs the crew of the horrible “accident” that claimed the
zampolit
’s life and delivers the bogus orders to the crew. Their mission, Ramius explains, is to head to Cuba, the home of their socialist brothers, and avoid detection by American and British ships alike, thereby establishing the dominance of the Russian navy. The crew rallies around this objective, while one crewman, a cook, feels something is amiss with the commander’s orders.

Meanwhile, Jack Ryan, an author of naval histories and part-time information analyst, arrives at CIA headquarters with photographs (taken by British agents) of the
Red October
. Ryan requests permission to show these images to an old friend and mentor in order to figure out what the new features on the sub are capable of.

Skip Tyler, Ryan’s former teacher at the U.S. Naval Academy, figures the Russians have developed a silent propulsion system similar to a version the United States fumbled with in the 1960s. Ryan relates this information to the CIA and outlines a disastrous scenario where the Russians could use this
propulsion system to sneak as close as the continental shelf and attack without warning.

Back in Moscow, a high-ranking political official receives a letter from his nephew Ramius detailing his intentions for the
Red October
. Within a few hours, the Russian navy is ordered to locate the
Red October
and sink it.

Unbeknownst to Ramius, the sonar man for the USS
Dallas
, Sonar Technician Second Class Ronald Jones, has picked up his frequency. Soon after, Jones hears a number of Russian subs speed up in unison, signaling the beginning of a major operation.

The CIA is aware of the activity at sea but is unsure why it is taking place. Ryan deduces that the
Red October
is about to defect. He explains his theory and then advises that the United States welcome her with open arms and that they should keep the
Red October
. There is some dissension among the ranks, but there is also an interest in the possibility of obtaining the experimental submarine.

One of the
Red October
’s chief officers (also involved in the conspiracy) provides the sub’s doctor with a series of contaminated radiation badges. The officers immediately begin to check for leaks and determine that most of the systems are working properly.

Meanwhile, Yuri Padorin, a high-ranking Soviet official, faces the members of Moscow’s Politburo, the Russian parliament. Padorin assures them that the agent embedded on the
Red October
has strict orders to sink the sub himself should anything go awry.

The USS
Dallas
finally makes contact with the
Red October
and informs the Soviet commander of the plans to help him defect. The
Red October
continues to suffer from a series
of “malfunctions,” and Ramius announces to his crew that the work of a saboteur is now evident.

Ramius tells his crew that it is much too dangerous to continue to operate the
Red October
and that they must abandon ship. Together with his high-ranking officers, he will scuttle the sub once the crew has been safely transferred.

Meanwhile, as the plan to help the officers of the
Red October
is under way, the helicopter carrying the agents charged with completing the ruse suffers a malfunction and crashes into the sea, leaving no survivors. As a result, Jack Ryan, now aboard a British carrier, is ordered by the president to make direct contact with the
Red October
himself. Ryan boards the
Red October
and begins removing the crew, not realizing that one crew member has suddenly disappeared.