Of all those, I've only read "The Shawshank Redemption" and I agree, it is marvelous. Just the perfect length for the outstanding movie...

Except for the Gunslinger series I have read almost all of this books. So many see him as a horror story writer.

Not. He spins a great tale of good vs. evil. Try the Talisman...a slow start...skip if you need to. I did at first. However, I have read it many times.

Glad you are back!

I am feeling OK, not great. Still very tired and low energy. I see my doc Monday and we'll see what he has to say.

Thanks for asking, sweetie!

The Stand, awesome. It, scared the shit outta me when I read it, I was 12. The Dark Tower series, probably the best series of books I've read. Loved The Mist as well.

all the symptoms... scared the heck out of me too!

X

last book in the series when _____ got killed.


I liked The Dome. Books that deal with human nature under stress always intrigue me. Oh, and I enjoyed 11/22/63 too.

Read most of 11/22/63...however it was a spead read at my library...7 days only. I need to go back and finish it.

One of the most horrifying reads I've ever experienced. The Stand is probably my favorite post-apocalyptic novel and its my favorite genre. Shawshank is totally gripping and The Talisman was excellent.

Our tastes, as least concerning King, are amazingly similar.

book for years. On the Beach is so heartbreaking. Also really loved Lucifer's Hammer, Swan Song (though its highly derivative of the Stand) and really enjoyed Cormac McCarthy's The Road.

Thanks for the heads up. I'll hit the library for One Second After tomorrow morning!

here is to our tastes in books.

I have read one book by his wife, Tabitha. I do not rememder the title.

His son is writing under the name of Joe Hill. He wrote, Horns and The Heart Shaped Box. Good reads. He writes like his dad.

finished the book. I was so impressed, I checked out Hill on wikipedia and was stunned to discover he was Kings son. Then read Horns and some of his short stories and they're exceptional too.

Read Tabitha's work years ago and liked it but not as much.

I've been remiss of late as I haven't read as much of his most recent offerings.

In addition to the great classics already mentioned I loved Misery, The Dark Half and The Regulators/Desperation. The Dark tower Series, It and the Stand are probably my faves though.

oh yeah - I did read Duma Key. Since I live in Florida I loved reading about places I have been. And it was a good story too.

It's half auto-biography and half a "how to be a writer" book.

of The Stand.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Stand_(comics)

http://www.amazon.com/s?ie=UTF8&keywords=The%20Stand&page=1&rh=n%3A4366%2Ck%3AThe%20Stand

It was 31 issues total (around 768 pages).

I'd add It to the list, and Salem's Lot, because it was my first, read as a teenager one lonely August night in a camp on Sango Pond in Bethel, ME.

and also "Cell."

He got kind of hohummy there, with "Rose Madder" and "The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon."

I absolutely adore all of his short story collections.

Also "The Green Mile"

If you have insomnia, that book would put you right to sleep.

However, what a great idea, you have. I think I will read it again just to get some sleep. I have had Insomnia for months now!

Thanks, RebelOne. You may prove to be a real lifesaver!

I read it around 1999 or so, and thought it was okay, a let down of sorts because most people I knew would rave about King. Fast forward to fall of 2003 my girlfriend(later on my wife) got me to read Dreamcatcher, which I thought was the worst piece of crap movie that ever was adapted from Kings novels. Dreamcatcher was great and was nothing like the movie, and after I devoured that book I was pushed into the Dark Tower series which I enjoyed greatly, and in reading through the Dark Tower series it became apparent in storyline and what not that Insomnia plays a huge part in the DT series. So unless you were a fan/read the DT series you wouldn't appreciate Insomnia much.

Personally Kings worst book was Tommyknockers, it took me forever to read it. I would get about 50 pages in, give up months later I'd start reading again and get to page 50 and rinse/repeat. My wife got Tommyknockers the movie, so I decided to plow through Tommyknockers, which is what I did...I wouldn't recommend Tommyknockers to anyone

Mooon spells The Stand
11/22/63 was fun to read because I could visualize Lisbon Falls so well. I live near by & drive by the Kennebec Fruit Co. all the time.
Loved Bag of Bones & the Dome, also.

When it first came out, I bought the book, and as I said I read it every year. A few years later The Stand was published again, with new parts that weren't in the first edition. When I read the new version, I knew which were the new parts.

One of the reasons I love King's novels are the characters he creates. They are fabulous! They really are!

Needful Things
The Talisman
The Stand

closely followed by The Stand.

Christine and It after that.

When my daughter was about 13, she was getting into horror movies. She loves reading and really liked the Goosebumps books. I had just finished The Stand (3rd or 4th time) and she asked me about it. After I described it to her, I handed her the paperback and told her to give it a try. She had doubts due to the size. I told her to read 50 pages and see if she wanted to continue. She blew through it in no time and then read every King book we had in the house.
I was always amused at the looks and comments she would get when people saw her reading those thick horror books in public. She has always looked younger than she is. She looked about 11 at the time.

Then Salem's Lot, Different Seasons and The Dead Zone. I'm one of the few that didn't like The Stand, largely because I felt the resolution was kind-of a letdown.

...Stephen King is one of my favorite authors.

Yes, he can turn out a book a month, but they are either well written or at least entertaining. I've been reading King since high school. As I wandered through his books I realized, the man can write more than horror. He can expose the painful side of humanity in the books you've mentioned (The Green Mile is another) without leaving us feeling hopeless.

He shares the top spot on my list with John Irving.

The movies generally suck.

His work that scared me most is another novella, "Sun Dog." Absolutely terrifying. I have enjoyed almost all of Mr. King's works. I found "The Tommyknockers" boring and "Insomnia" incomprehensible. Otherwise, I absolutely loved "The Stand," "The Shining," and "The Talisman." The Gunslinger series is deeply flawed, but I enjoyed all of the novels immensely, particularly "The Waste Lands" and "Wizard and Glass."

Nobody captures what it was like to be a kid in that era better than King. And is was perhaps the best movie adaptation of a King work, too, probably because they stayed true to the story.

Right now I'm reading "The Tommyknockers." I was a huge fan of his back in the '80s, but later, not so much, and "The Tommyknockers" is making me remember why.

However, his latest works are from the Stephen King I knew and loved back in college. HIGHLY recommend "Under The Dome" and "11/23/63."

read them, and then share them with my sister. The boys in "The Body" were exactly the same age I was in 1959 when it was set, so I understood the story perfectly. Fortunately, my childhood was not quite as traumatic as theirs.

I had a group of friends like that, kids I hung around with in the summer and had goofy discussions and did goofy things (like you, nothing traumatic) and a lot of "The Body" resonated with me on that level. I was born in '60, so I think that story does speak to us in a lot of ways.

I'm trying to remember the last line in the story: "I've never had friends like I had when I was 13. Jesus, does anyone?"

Perfect.

My first time was Salem's Lot. Like many of his works since, I read it through two or three times, wore the shine off the paperback cover doing so.

I bought a hardback copy of Firestarter with my first-ever paycheck.

I was late to a Applied Ethics final in college because I was reading It.

I searched for each serial edition of The Green Mile, devouring each like a Turkish confection laced with narcotics. A lot of people forget The Green Mile was a serial.

I was dismayed over the public conviction of Rage a selection from the The Bachman Books. If examined with the same squint used in Danse Macabre, King would be the hunchbacked monster gifted with describing the resonating crystal tone of the school shooter. The public, armed with ignorance and pitchforks, would be calling for the messenger's head and not understanding the message. Banning prose that explores the condition seems to be a all-hat-no-cattle solution. We still have shootings. We don't have understanding of the problem. Many may not agree, but it didn't stop me from reading, even though I hated Rose Madder.

I didn't enjoy Tommyknockers or Lisey's Story. No, I did not. I almost broke up with King over those indiscretions. But like some carnival coochie dancer, he's lead me back to dark side of the tent, opening the fold and making me hopeful the mattress is clean. Under the Dome is some good story telling lovin'.

The voice of Deloris Claiborne is probably one of his best, inho. I haven't seen the screen adaption and hope I never do. Some things are just fine the way they are.

As I've gotten older, I haven't been visiting the hoochie tent as often. Reading King's work in bed takes a little more preparation. I have to get my glasses even with the Kindle text enlarged. We still have our moments together. When the hubs has drifted off and a foot cramp isn't working up steam, I'll snuggle in.

I felt so bad for her and the people who tried to help her who she couldn't connect with.

is that two of his books made into movies, "Stand By Me" & "Misery", were both pretty good. They were also directed by the same man, Rob Reiner.

I read both versions, the edited and the unedited.

It took me a bit to get started. I got lost and bored a few times in the beginning. It took me ten days of stopping and starting to get through the first 30 pages. The next day I read a hundred. The following day I called out sick and finished the book.

come from one mind. I am forever grateful he shares with us.

My daughter, Carrie (total coincidence, I swear) watched the Mist with me because I loved the short story. She said she hated the ending. The story let us take the ending where we wanted. I will say the movie maker took me by the seat of my pants with that one. Can't say I didn't like it, but my ending would not have been so harsh.
That is what I like about King, he has us looking at the bad things even when we would be more comfortable not looking. But, look we must, because it is there. And maybe seeing it in fiction helps us for when we have to look it in the eye in real life.

particular order...


11/22/63

Hearts In Atlanta

Night Shift

The Body (which contains one of my all time favorite scenes...Lardass Hogan and the blueberry pie eating contest)

The pie eaing contest... was a great scene!

The Stand
The Shining
IT
Tommyknockers

Loved all four of them... we all float.

sP

Blaze
The Stand
Shawshank

both scared the bejesus outta me. and The Shining is significantly different from the movie (which i also love).

im an original fan, from early 80s. unfortunately, at some point he really shifted from classic horror themes (ghosts, vampires, evil) to more...scifi kinda themes. or that's not quite right, but some thing like that.

he just lost some of the 'purity' in his stories, or something. they started provoking eyerolls more than goosebumps

that being said...Under the Dome was fantastic (with the exception of the last 50 pages, but after 800+, thats a pretty good ratio, lol)

other than that, he hadnt written a really solidly good book for a couple of decades, imho

"The Body."
"Under The Dome."
"11/23/63."
"Danse Macabre."

And to this day one of my most vivid memories from college was staying up all night reading "The Stand" for an English class. I could not put it down. I can count on perhaps one hand the number of books that I can say that about. I can't say I'm much of a fan of the uncut version, but the version I read was so excellently paced with such well-defined characters that it made me a King fan for life, despite some issues I have with some of his later works.

about what would happen if you change the past.

And time travel novels can go very wrong, if the author doesn't know how to handle it. King did a masterful job.

and stopped reading him for some unknown reason. A years or so I read Hearts in Atlantis, which I liked very much, and I thought at the time, why did I ever stop reading his books? Too many other things to read, I guess. I now I plan to start reading him again in earnest.

For whatever reason, his novellas ("The Body," "Shawshank Redemption," etc.) are often better than his short stories or his full-length novels. I haven't read his latest "long story" collection ('Full Dark, No Stars') yet but I'm sure I'll get around to it.

Because an arguing couple is distracted and mows down a little Amish kid. And that is the BEST thing that happened to them that day.

were good too.

Also loved the Stand and Storm of the Century we have both on dvd and I watch the storm one every winter!

Those are probably my top four. I just recently re-read The Long Walk.

I'd have to go with

Needful Things

Dark Tower(whole series is just one story)

IT

The Stand

I just finished Different Seasons the other day, it had Shawshank, Apt Pupil, The Body, and The Breathing Method. Of the four short stories I enjoyed Apt Pupil the most, it was interesting how the kid in the story slowly turned into the monsters he studied/loved. Shawshank and the Body were about spot on with their respective film adaptations.

I'm currently about 50 pages into Firestarter, and I think I only have around 8 more of his to read before I knock all of them out.

The only two books, or short stories, that were made into great movies, were Shawshank and The Body.However I do give The Green Mile a two thumbs up!

When you are done with the last of King's books, move on to his sons. Writing under the name Joe Hill. He wrote Horns and The Heart Shaped Box. Great reads!

Have you tried, F. Paul Wilson, The Repairman Jack series?

writers, thanks for the info. I think the best screen adaptation was the Green Mile, Shawshank/The Body were damn near perfect, but they were shorter stories, as Green Mile I believe was around 400 pages, so I give the nod to the Green Mile as the best film adaptation. The film adaptation was going good for Apt Pupil til about half way through when it was apparent Bryan Singer wasn't going to potray Todd as he was in the short story. I still think The Long Walk would make a decent film

I never heard of F. Paul Wilson, or the Repariman Jack series, I'll give them a shot.

...I have read others that are not on this list. Enjoy!

As for King's son, the publishers kept it quiet. They did not want him to be judged by his fathers books. It was leaked. I checked out the Bio. on him after I found out. Jeez, he looks just like Dad!

http://www.goodreads.com/series/40868-repairman-jack

I've enjoyed the Repairman Jack novels and never paid attention to the relationship.

Not the repairman jack novels by F. Paul Wilson.....glad you liked them though. They are great!

Sorry I wrote sons instead of son's....

I have 18 more titles of his to read before I finish his books off, and it looks like he has three titles coming out this year, per his wiki page.

The ones I haven't read:

Carrie, Rage, Roadwork, Running Man, Danse Macbre, Cujo, Christine, Storm of the Century, The Plant, Faithful, The Colorado Kid, Blaze, UR, Blockade Billy, Full Dark No Stars, Mile 81, Under the Dome, and 11/22/63.

Per his wiki page it appears he has done some ebook stories as well.

I love it!

Especially the Captain Tripps part. To see everything fall apart so quickly from the eyes of the characters was so very well done. Even the "second plague" of stupid/accidental/incidental deaths was well done (Kid getting snake bit, woman who locks herself in freezer with her dead family, woman who has an old gun blow up in her face because she is afraid everyone is a rapist, the couple that hook up with Stu and Fran when the guy gets appendicitis) was done well in that too.

I was particularly moved by Nadine's story. She did awful things, but somehow her story was compelling.

Oddly my favorite moment in the book was Dayna being interviewed by Flagg for being a spy from the Free Zone.

My favorite is probably "It" but I like them all.

Under-appreciated King (in my opinion):

Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon I put off reading this for a LONG time. It just sounded lame. When I finally did read it, I immediately turned back around and read it again. This was almost certainly not an easy story to write, and for me it was positively ghastly to read. The conclusion was perhaps his best ever.

From a Buick 8 King tells a deeper and more challenging story than most authors would attempt. It's the story of how life goes on without necessarily providing satisfying answers -- or even answers at all -- and how the real story in anyone's life is not the big things that people talk about, but the little. The car provides the backdrop, and some serious horror, but that's not what the book is about.

Bag of Bones This is a straight ghost story, but far more complex than most. King manages to hit a level of emotional depth few authors can touch.

The Talisman
Fire starter (I like books with a little political paranoia)
The entire Gunslinger series is one of my all time favorites and should be at he top of my list
And I love Lisey's story, I've never seem a mix of genres quite like that.

I like the Cell, I'm Ok with 'The Dome'

Ugh, This is hard.

Thanks for that info,Paladin.

Check out his Bio at Wiki.
It goes into depth about his accident, and decision in 2002 to stop writing. I am glad he did not stick to that.

...something he came up with in the 70's but couldn't get thought-out and moving until much later. Makes me hope he has a few other old stories stashed away, somewhere.

There's info on the TV series, on-line.....

I like it when he deals with people's psychology like needful things. Can't wait to see the movie hope they do it justice.

will have to put a hold on it at local library