arrie
Rating:
Summary: A girl who can move objects with her mind gets revenge against the people who humiliated her at the high school prom.
Review: A classic story. Carrie White is the perfect sympathetic character and weapon of destruction.
Adaptations: Carrie (movie), Carrie (Brodway Musical), The Rage: Carrie 2 (Movie)
'SALEM'S
LOT
Rating:
Summary: A small town becomes infested with vampires.
Review: A good vampire story, but tends to be a little long winded.
Movie Adaptations: Salem's Lot (TV Miniseries)
The Shining
Rating:
Summary: A family become trapped inside an empty haunted hotel. The alcoholic father becomes insane and goes on a rampage to kill his wife and his young telepathic son.
Review: My favorite novel. While all the characters are great, the Overlook Hotel becomes a presence of itself. One of the greatest ghost stories of all time.
Movie Adaptations: The Shining (Movie)The Shining (TV Miniseries)
Night Shift
Rating: 1/2
Summary: King's first and most popular short story collection.
Review: While not all these stories are great, there are quite a few stand outs such as The Mangler, Children of The Corn, The Ledge, and Sometimes They Come Back. Ironically, the worst story is The Lawnmower Man, which is almost unrecognizable to its movie adaptation.
Movie Adaptations: Nightshift Collection (Woman in the Room/The Boogeyman), Cat's Eye (Quitter's Inc./The Ledge), Children of the Corn (1-7), Maximum Overdrive (Trucks), Trucks (TV), The Mangler (1&2), Sometimes They Come Back (TV 1-3), The Lawnmower Man (1&2), Graveyard Shift, The Last Rung on the Ladder
Stories in Night Shift:
Jerusalem's Lot
Graveyard Shift
Night Surf
I am the Doorway
The Mangler
The Boogeyman
Gray Matter
Battleground
Trucks
Sometimes They Come Back
Strawberry Spring
The Ledge
The Lawnmower Man
Quitters, Inc.
I Know What You Need
Children of the Corn
The Last Rung on the Ladder
The Man Who Loved Flowers
One For the Road
The Woman in the Room
THE
STAND
Rating:
Summary:The Earth's population is wiped out by a superflu. The 'evil' survivors gather at Las Vegas and prepare for a war with the 'good' survivors in Boulder, Colorado. Just before the demonic Randall Flagg can send his followers to attack, four 'good' men prepare to stand against him to thwart his plans.
Review:
While The Shining is my favorite, The Stand is another King classic. The 1,000+ pages might scare away some readers, but they'll be missing a good story. This also sets up the story of King's Dark Tower books much like Tolkien's The Hobbit to Lord of The Rings.
Movie Adaptations: The Stand (TV Miniseries)
THE
DEAD
ZONE
Rating:1/2
Summary:After four years in a coma, a teacher awakens to discover he has psychic abilities. He uses gift to solve a murder case and becomes a hero. Yet, when he discovers that a well-liked local politician will start World War III, he must put his life and reputation into jepordy.
Review:
Quite as interesting story. It also raises a controversial question. "Is an assassin a villain or a hero."
Adaptations: The Dead Zone (Movie), The Dead Zone (TV Series)
FIRE-
STARTER
Rating:1/2
Summary:An eight year-old girl who has the power set fires with her mind is constantly on the run with her telepathic father in order to escape a shady government organization. When they are captured, they try to use her power as a weapon for destruction.
Review:
I expected this to be a rehash of Carrie, but thankfully it was a totally original story.
Adaptations: Firestarter (Movie), Firestarter: Rekindled (TV movie)
Cujo
Rating:
Summary:A rabid St. Bernard terrorizes a woman and her young son in their broken-down car.
Review:This is by far King's most suspenseful work of fiction. The scariest thing is that is really could happen.
Movie Adaptations: Cujo (Movie)
Danse Macabre
Rating:
Summary:Stephen King's analysis of horror novels and movies.
Review:This is not a novel, it's a non-fiction book. It's interesting on its look at horror pop culture, but it's a little boring since it's more like reading am envyclopedia instead of his usual suspense novels.
CREePSHOW
Rating:
Summary:King pays homage to the old horror comics of the 1950s.
Review:Though it's not a novel the comic book stories are pretty cool.
Movie Adaptations: Creepshow (1&2) (Movies) STORIES IN CREEPSHOW:
A murdered father seeks revenge from beyond the grave.
THE LONESOME DEATH OF JORDY VERRILL
A hermit meets his end when he discovers something out of this world.
Something appears to be alive inside a crate that was hidden under the stairs.
Something To Tide You Over
A murderous rich man has a visit from two of his victims.
They're Creeping Up On You
An eccentric lives his worst nightmare.
THE DARK TOWER
THE GUNSLINGER
Rating:
Summary:The first part of King's epic The Dark Tower. A Gunsliger pursues a Man in Black across a world that has "moved on".
Review:
The most simplistic and best of the DT novels.
Movie Adaptations: None
DIFFERENT SEASONS
STORIES IN DIFFERENT SEASONS
RITA HAYWORTH AND SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION
An unjustly imprisoned convict seeks a strange and startling revenge.
A teenager becomes both the puppet and the puppet master of evil.
Four rambunctious young boys plunge through the facade of a small town and come face-to-face with life, death, and the intimations of their own mortality.
A disgraced woman is determined to triumph over death to give birth.
She was born in Detroit. . .on an automobile assembly line. But she is no ordinary automobile. Deep within her chassis lives an unholy presence. She is Christine - a red and white 1958 Plymouth Fury whose unique standard equipment includes an evil, indestructible vengeance that will destroy anyone in her way. She seduces 17-year-old Arnie Cunningham, who becomes consumed with passion for her sleek, rounded, chrome-laden body. She demands his complete and unquestionable devotions and when outsiders seek to interfere, they become the victims of Christine's wrath.
The Creeds. An ideal family. Physician father, beautiful wife, charming little daughter, adorable infant son. Close, loving, wonderfully alive. When they found the old house and the enchanting grounds in rural Maine, it seemed too good to be true. It was. For the truth was bloodchilling -- something more horrifying than death itself, and hideously more powerful.
CYCLE
OF THE
WEREWOLF
The first scream came from the snowbound railwayman who felt the fangs ripping at his throat. The next mouth there was a scream of ecstatic agony from the woman attacked in her snug bedroom.
Now scenes of unbelieving horror come each time the full moon shines on the isolated Maine town of Tarker Mills. No one knows who will be attacked next. But one thing is sure.
When the moon grows fat, a paralyzing fear sweeps through Tarker Mills. For snarls that sound like human words can be heard whining through the wind. And all around are the footprints of a monster whose hunger cannot be sated. . .
THE
TALISMAN
PUBLISHED 1984
CO-WRITTEN W/ PETER STRAUB
You are about to take a journey . . .a terrifying trip across a nightmare America filled with monsters beyond anything ever imagined before . . .a journey into the dark heart of horror. . . .
THE BACHMAN BOOKS
PUBLISHED 1984 (As Richard Bachman)
STORIES IN The Bachman Books:
A high school show-and-tell session explodes into a nightmare of evil. . .
Only death can keep you from the finish line -- in the ultimate competition of the all-too-near future. . .
What happens when one good-and-angry man fights back is murder -- and then some. . .
In the year 2025, the best men don't run for president, they run for their lives . . .
THINNER
PUBLISHED 1984 (As Richard Bachman)
Bill Halleck, good husband, loving father, is both beneficiary and victim of the American Good Life: he has an expensive home, a nice family, and a rewarding career as a lawyer . . .but he is also fifty pounds overweight and, as doctor keeps reminding him, edging into heart attack country.
Then, in a moment of carelessness, Billy sideswipes an old gypsy woman as she is crossing the street -- and her ancient father passes a bizarre and terrible judgment on him.
"Thinner," the old gypsy man whispers, and caresses his cheek, live a lover. Just one word. . . But six weeks later and ninety-three pounds lighter, Billy Halleck is more than worried. He's terrified. And desperate enough for one last gamble. . . That will lead him to a nightmare showdown with the forces of evil melting his flesh away. And away. And away. .
SKELETON
CREW
Welcome to the world of terror! Where a macabre mist traps humanity in its swirling horror. . .where a beautiful young girl offers satanic seduction. . .where a child's toy becomes the ultimate instrument of evil. . .where a man is given a devilish machine that grants him godlike powers. . .where nothing is what it seems and nowhere is safe. . . .
Stories is Skeleton Crew:
The Mist
Here There Be Tygers
The Monkey
Cain Rose Up
Mrs. Todd's Shortcut
The Jaunt
The Wedding Gig
Paranoid: A Chant
The Raft
Word Processor of the Gods
The Man Who Would Not Shake Hands
Beachworld
The Reaper's Image
Nona
Survivor Type
Uncle Otto's Truck
Morning Deliveries (Milkman # 1)
Big Wheels: Tale of the Laundry Game(Milkman #2)
Gramma
The Ballad of the Flexible Bullet
The Reach
Carrie
