Stephen King
Stephen King (September 21, 1947 - ) is an American novelist, short story writer, essayist, memoirist, graphic literature writer, and singular force to be reckoned with in publishing, book selling, and popular entertainment. He is the author of 61 novels (at the present moment) and over 200 short stories. His range of style and subject is underrated by assumptions of reviewers and readers who prefer (or abhor) one “Stephen King” over another “Stephen King.” I would suggest that there are few writers, no matter what pretensions they or their readers have, who have provided a more comprehensive analysis of post-WWII America into the 21st Century. King pursues relentlessly our fears, our paranoias, our comforts, our dreams, our nightmares, our obsessions, our moments of grace. He is breathtakingly familiar with our materialistic dependencies, sometimes to a satirical extent, sometimes as a secular hymn to his love of American culture. Always, however, King is curious about people, the everyday remarkable and interesting people who live in his and our world. He sees how they act, imagines what they think, deduces what they believe — and then he tests them. And us.
I remember seeing the all-black-but-one-red-blood-drop cover of ‘Salem’s Lot in a book kiosk in Dulles International Airport when I was a kid. That hooked me. It is still one of the scariest books I know. As a bookseller I have sold King for 40 years as of 2022. He never gets old. Enjoy — if you dare.
The Dark Tower 2: The Drawing of Three
The Dark Tower 2: The Drawing of Three
After his confrontation with the man in black at the end of The Gunslinger, Roland awakes to find three doors on the beach of Mid-World's Western Sea -- each leading to New York City but at three different moments in time. Through these doors, Roland must "draw" three figures crucial to his quest for the Dark Tower. In 1987, he finds Eddie Dean, The Prisoner, a heroin addict. In 1964, he meets Odetta Holmes, the Lady of Shadows, a young African-American heiress who lost her lower legs in a subway accident and gained a second personality that rages within her. And in 1977, he encounters Jack mort, Death, a pusher responsible for cruelties beyond imagining. Has Roland found new companions to form the ka-tet of his quest? Or has he unleashed something else entirely?