11/22/63 by Stephen King (2011)

The prospects of reading 11/22/63 for our Siblings’ Book Club this year excited me. The 1960s have always fascinate me, time travel is a thrilling literary device, and Stephen King (while not my favorite author) has written some memorable fiction.

This novel did not disappoint.

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Quick Summary of 11/22/63

The story is the first-person account of Jake Epping, a divorced high school teacher from 2011 who’s been entrusted with an incredible secret—in the pantry of Al’s burger joint is a portal, a rabbit hole that allows a person to go back in time, back to a specific minute in the Fall of 1958. Following Al’s many visits to buy cheap beef, he realized that he could actually use it to change history for the better. Cancer has stopped him, however, so he tasks Jake with the mission of living 5 years in the past to stop Lee Harvey Oswald from killing JKF, an act which should preserve America, stop the Vietnam War, and save tens of thousands of lives.

Jake tests Al’s theory a few times before going all-in. He prevents one brutal murder affecting a co-worker from school, he rescues a young lady from getting paralyzed, and he returns to see their effects. Throughout this process, however, he learns from Al that “Every time is the first time,” meaning that every time he enters the Rabbit Hole, all their previous efforts reset. Thus Jake realizes he needs a perfect 5-year run in order to make it all work out according to his own design. But, as he finds out time and again, “the past is obdurate”—stubbornly persistent and almost antagonistic to Jake’s desires to mold it to his liking.

A Surprising Genre with King’s Standard Dirt

Along the way in Jake’s five-year adventure to stop JFK’s assassination, he falls in love. I’ll admit that these many chapters felt like filler to me and useless, but they eventually have a point. I didn’t expect a romance novel from Stephen King, but that’s exactly what we get. In fact, I’d call 11/22/63 a romance with sci-fi elements more than its vice-versa.

I’ll be honest about this, too. In years past, I’ve stopped reading several Stephen King novels due to his infatuation with penises. I mean that. He’s a like a high school boy, always adding them to scenes where they have no place.

In this novel, though, many chapters had passed before we got to the penis scenes. In my notes, I had actually written: “No penises in Chapter 1, which is a hurdle I was worried about.” He hits on this theme briefly, once Jake falls in love with Sadie, but by then I was so into the story, I let it slide.

Beyond that, I’ll note that this is not a clean novel, and of course I didn’t expect it to be. Language abounds, though it took many pages into Chapter 1 before we read the first “naughty” words. They continued throughout, but not with the persistence that made me shut the book. I suppose that’s evidence of my own calloused eyes, and I’ll blame X for my lack of sensitivity.

A Fantastic Novel Slightly Tainted by King’s Politics

I think we all know by now that Stephen King suffers from a nasty case of TDS. It’s my contention that, had he written this book in 2026 instead of 2011, he’d have Jake Epping go back in time to help any of Trump’s would-be assassins to find their mark or escape the authorities. You know, to “save democracy.”

I’ll avoid spoilers, but one climactic event in the final 20% of the book shows just what King thinks of Republican rule. It’s sickening, deranged, and almost worth dropping the book, but of course, it’s fiction. Stephen King can do whatever the heck he wants in his imagination—something we all know is a far cry from reality anyways.

Al’s own diatribes against Conservative leaders in the early chapters help prepare me for this being a political book as much as it was sci-fi—and as much as it was romance. All it takes for me to get back head back into reality, though, is that nice refresher from Ted Cruz. Democrats are professionals at rewriting history, denying reality, and shifting blame. Progressivism will kill America, if the rest of us stop paying attention and learning from history.

I Love Me Some Time Travel

Time travel and time bending are such fascinating concepts in sci-fi, and I’ve enjoyed exploring it in books like:

• Looking Backward to 2000 to 1887 by Edward Bellamy (1887)
• A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle (1962)
• All You Need Is KILL by Hiroshi Sakurazaka (2004)
• Time Hackers by Gary Paulson (2005)
• The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu (2006)

Among others, not to mention short stories by Philip K. Dick and Arthur C. Clarke. And who doesn’t like that epic film, Interstellar? Manipulation of time is one of our greatest fantasies, because it’s so far beyond out reach.

Conclusion

God alone owns time and exists beyond it, for He created it. He could manipulate it as He pleases, but instead of tweaking it and turning it back to resolve the Fall in the Garden, He ordained before time even existed (a concept we can’t even fathom) to enter it Himself, to become a human being, to live and die and rise again for our sake as a human being in Time and Space—and though He ascended from this world to stand at His Father’s throne, He is coming again to take us to Himself, and so shall we ever be with the Lord. And to that I say with John, “Even so come, Lord Jesus!”

King ends this book with a solid and informative Afterword, which answered questions and tied up loose ends. I think it will be hard for him to top his best novel, The Shining, but this book certainly comes close. It’s worth a read, if you can handle its length and the things noted above.

©2026 E.T.

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