there's no thread yet for this esteemed gentleman! i'm quite suprised by that. I've enjoyed reading his books for years now.

I think the first one i read was Salem's lot, after seeing the film at my Dad's house one day. After that i was hooked and regularly raided my local second-hand bookshop until i'd got nearly all of his work on my shelves.

i'm always saddened when people are dismissive of his work as 'horror'

but often the exact same people will turn around and tell you that Shawshank and the Green Mile are their favourite movies ever..i do derive a certain amount of pleasure in telling them who wrote the novels..

my greatest triumph was getting my Mum to read the Green Mile, she adores the film, and she too was shocked and somewhat dubious when i told her of its origins. So i bought the book in a 3 for 2 deal and gave it to her, thinking she'd never read it. But she did! and she enjoyed it even more than the film :D

Sure his books often contain things that you wouldn't generally see in a run of the mill novel, but i think he still writes very well, particularly when the main characters are children. Plus he has a lot of empathy, some of his stories are real feel-good tales in my opinion, good triumphing over evil a lot of the time.
They're not all blood and gore, often there is none at all! He steps out of the realistic into the realm of fantasy and the supernatural, and this adds another level to the stories often enough. As he gets older the potential gore level seems to have dropped anyway, his books generally seem less scary now.

He endures for me as possibly my favourite author, these are my most frequently re-read stories..

It
Rose Madder
The Dark Tower series
The Stand
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption
Low Men in Yellow coats from Hearts in Atlantis
The Talisman and Black House with Peter Straub
The Running Man and Thinner from The Bachman Books

and the ones i don't want to read again..

Cujo ~ This is fine until the rabies really takes hold, then it's just too heart-rending and i have to put it down.
Gerald's Game ~ Creepy beyond belief, read it once, the stuff of nightmares.
Misery ~ again, a bit too creepy, mainly because, the same as Gerald's Game, it could so easily happen..

on another note, i very much like the TV series that has been adapted from The Dead Zone too :)

so share your opinions, i'm a little worried that everyone else hates his work because no thread has been started for him yet :|
hopefully i will be proved wrong..

Stephen King is probably my favorite author. Of all time. I pretty much enjoy every one of his books. My favorite books of his are his longer ones because you get so sucked in. Into the plot, into the characters, into everything. He creates his own world. "The Stand" and "It" had me literally glued to the pages the entire time.

"The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon" was especially heart wrenching for me because I love baseball as well, and it hit home. Haha. And for some reason, I really enjoyed "Hearts in Atlantis" as well. I haven't seen the movie but I've heard it isn't really like the book at all.

I dislike the movie adaptations because you can't get inside the character's heads, like Stephen King does in his writing.

Have you read his newest work, "Cell"? Because I did, and I felt it was up to par with his other books. :D

i haven't read many of his newer publications, i think the latest one i have is Dreamcatchers, which i fine by me because it means i have something new to look forward to, i have yet to get hold of the last 2 in the Dark Tower series either.

the Dark Tower is close to being my all time favourite i think, i like how he's linking it in with The Talisman too, maybe one of the reasons that i enjoyed Low Men in Yellow coats so much was the fact that Ted is part of the Dark Tower story too, even if the part he plays is not a happy one :(

I love Stephen King! "It" is by far my favorite...I even have the made for TV movie they did of it. (Not the best movie as far as acting, but plenty scary.) I also have a bunch of his short stories collections...love "The Body." My other favorites include Gerald's Game, The Regulators, Desperation, and Needful Things. There are a whole bunch I haven't been able to read...especially the newer stuff.

Stephen King is awesome. I LIVE SOMEWHAT CLOSE TO HIM!

My mum's boss used to live in Maine, and she went on a double-date with Stephen King once!
She said "He ate with his fingers and didn't talk much. He creeped me out." :D

I'm actually re-reading "The Stand" right now.
I just finished 'Wolves of the Calla' in the Dark Tower series and need to go back to my mother's house sometime to get the last two in the series, which is making me furiously mad.
Sadly, I just thought of Stephen King as a shock-horror writer until "Bag of Bones", which really seemed to be his breakthrough book. Everything after that has an incredible body and depth that just blows away all of his previous writing, in my opinion. Insomnia was... wow. Just whoa.
Thats not to say that I don't still enjoy the good old stuff... I actually reread "Gerald's Game" often, because it gives me the spooks. Both "The Talisman" and "Black House" are high on my favourites list.
I also like to pick up the short stories compilations from time to time and read bits out of them, when I want a short read.

My favourite Stephen King world was definitely "Kingdom Hospital". The young girl from "Silent Hill" and "Tideland" is the main character, and she adds a fantastically creepy element to the story. Even though Stephen King didn't actually write Kingdom Hospital (sorry, Scribble, its actually a remake of a Dutch series), its soaked with his brain-juices and totally worth a watch if you get a chance. :D


EDIT: You mean "The Shining"? I just won $5 because I could remember the bartender's name off the top of my head! "Things could be better, Lloyd. Things could be a whole lot better."

THE SHINING! AHH YESYES THANK YOU! =D

Oh, I live about 3 and a 1/2 hours away from Stephen! :O I iz t3h radz0rznezz.

Anyways. I've seen his house before. DO NOT GOOGLE HIS HOUSE FOR PICTURES. THOSE PICTURES SUCK, COMPARED TO THE REAL THING. His house is HUGE, and the gate around it has fake bats and spiders hanging on it, also some weird animal hanging from a tree. (fake ofcourse) It is also dimly lit in the windows of his house. I believe he writes in the topmost room.

Originally Posted by Scribble Me Orange

THE SHINING! AHH YESYES THANK YOU! =D

Oh, I live about 3 and a 1/2 hours away from Stephen! :O I iz t3h radz0rznezz.

Anyways. I've seen his house before. DO NOT GOOGLE HIS HOUSE FOR PICTURES. THOSE PICTURES SUCK, COMPARED TO THE REAL THING. His house is HUGE, and the gate around it has fake bats and spiders hanging on it, also some weird animal hanging from a tree. (fake ofcourse) It is also dimly lit in the windows of his house. I believe he writes in the topmost room.

That sounds so awesome! I want my house to look like that.

personally, i havent read any of his books. i've seen bits and pieces of a few of his movies, but, they dont really make me want to read any of his books.

don't ever judge the book by the movie made from it! :shock:

film cannot give the depth anf feeling that written word can.
I've finished reading rose Madder again, it's a really great book, the woman's triumph over her abusive husband.
She walks out of the house after 14 years of being used as a punchbag(and worse) by her husband who is the worst sort of bad cop you could ever meet. he comes after her'trolling' for her and following her to the city she fled to, 800 miles away.
Bad things happen, wouldn't be a Stephen king book without that!
But love and decency prevails after all the weirdness has stopped, it's quitye an empowering book for a girl to read actually!

I've tried reading some books by Stephen King but I can't really find one that keeps my interest, I just stop near the beginning because it gets boring in my mind for some reason. Perhaps I should start over again, try to read them again ^^ Might be fun.

I watched half of the Green Mile, because my mom wanted me to. She told me to read the book, not knowing who wrote it...

I really should borrow some of his book now.

OMG! JELLY I LOVE YOU!

I love Stephen Kings Novels, and I'm reading one right this very moment. "Dreamcatcher." I'm not too far into it yet, but it is good so far.

My aunt loves him as well, and has pretty much all of his books. I don't believe that his books are "horrer based" Sure, they can get a little gruesome and stuff, but it's no big deal. These are the books of his I have so far:

The Dark Tower VII (The Dark Tower)
The Waste Lands (The Dark Tower III)
The Talisman
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon
The Bachman Books (Consisting of: Rage, The Long Walk, Roadwork, and The Running Man)
Pet Cemetary
Four Past Midnight (Consisting of:Straight Up Midnight, The Langoliers, Secret Window, Secret Garden, The Library Policeman, and The Sun Dog)
Fire Starter
Nightmares and Dreamscapes
And lastly Bag of Bones

I did own The Green Mile at one point, and am sad to say I gave it away. I feel so stupid. >.>

There is this really cool Dutchmans Market where I got all these books from, or most of them anyways, for like, a dollar. So I was really happy. I do have yet to get the rest of the Dark tower series.

I have read The Stand, or part of it, The Green Mile, and The Drawing of the Three. :) His books are amazing, and I wanna go raid my aunts collection of his cooks! XD

handy to have an older relative who likes an author that you do too!

i wouldn't want to read some of the stuff that my Mum does :? though i'm still so proud of the fact that i actually got her to read the Green mile 8)

I've read Thinner and Salem's Lot. I liked the stories, but I really don't like his writing style.

My mom has read every single one of his books. Seriously. If I start to complain about a book in a series I want to come out, she'll just talk about the Dark Tower series, because she started reading those when they were first coming out.

I've read Carrie, Pet Semetary, Cell and some short stories. I loved Cell, it just...oh, man, it drove me crazy, I loved it. The others were ok - I don't know, I just don't really love his writing style, you know? It really depends on the book. I think I'd enjoy more of his books now that I'm older, though.

I love Stephen King. My favorite of his bokks is Cujo. I used to have my own copy of the book, but unfortunately lost it in a move. I still have the movie though. I also like The Shining, Misery, and The Tommyknockers.

I'm confused as to my position on Stephen King.
I loved Rose Red.
I was disappointed with The Body though and semi disappointed with Shawshank Redemption. [Loved the Shawshank movie though]
Carrie was pretty good though.

_________________

I really enjoy his writing style and ideas, but his books as a whole can be hit or miss. His plots kind of peter out sometimes, and you can tell really easily as to which books he rewrote and drafted to the ones he basically did one draft of.

Some of my favorites:

IT
The Stand
Dreamcatcher
The Shining
Dead Zone
Misery
The Dark Tower (off course)
The Langoliers
The Talisman
The Eyes of the Dragon
The Dark Half (Oh, I would kill for him to write a real Alexis Machine novel)
The Green Mile
Gerald's Game
Desperation
Insomnia
Desperation
Lisey's Story

These ones left me underwhelmed:
Pet Semetary
Cujo (by far his worst; he even admits that he was so heavily on drugs that he doesn't even remember writing it)
Christine (decent, but was really rushed and not polished enough)

The others, I either haven't read or I just found to be acceptable. I do enjoy The Body and The Shawshank Redemption, but I agree that the movie adaptations are better, mostly because two EXTREMELY talented directors that managed to take some great source material and transform it into something more.

Dear God Stephen King (SK) has to be one of my favorite authors ever, not because he is a fantastic writer (because he really isn't, look at those typos!) but he is a fantastic story teller, keeping you enthralled in some worlds that any other author could never pull off.

Also, who doesn't love the cheesy movies that those amazing novels get turned into? Did anyone else see Desperation? It? Green Mile (Probably the best one that was made into a motion picture, IMO!)

SK could Burp and get awarded a million dollars, the man is a genius! XD

'nuff said, I would camp out on his lawn and stalk him until he fell in love with me.


Eeep, forgot Shawshank, another good one!

I've read:

IT
Rose Madder (Favorite)
Bag of Bones
All of the DT books, which were my all time favorite
Bachman books
Desperation
Regulators
Firestarter
Carrie
Misery

And countless others, I really enjoy his short stories.

My ex was a confirmed SK hater.
the fact that he'd never read anything by him was beside the point!
He'd moan at me for reading that'crap' etc... :roll:

He bought me the Green Mile on DVD for my birthday, and sat there, with a stony look on his face, fully preparing to bitch all the way through it..

He loved it, and when they executed John Coffey he sat there and bawled like a baby, i don't mean the usual movie induced tears, he really cried.
That film touched him deeply and after that he did, somewhat grudgingly, admit that maybe Mr.King wasn't as crap as he'd always previously assumed!

i read a few stephen king books, rose madder was the 1st one i ever read, and it was horrible, he's not a very good writer or storyteller....but to each their own i guess :P

yes, each to their own, Rose Madder is one of my favourites.

Oh! Yes! Stephen King! *dances*

I've read a few of his books. So far, I've read:
Carrie
Salem's Lot
Depseration
The Diary of Ellen Rimbour (sp?)
Buik 8

I think I may have read more, but I can't think of them right this minute.

I've seen the movies It, Carrie, Dreamcatcher, Pet Sematery (or whatever weird spelling he gave that word), Rose Red, Desperation, The Shining, The Green Mile, and Diary of Ellen Rimbour.
Maybe more, since I just realized that The Green Mile was a Stephen King work.


My mom has been reading the Dark Tower series. I'll probably tackle it when I get over my vampire obsession. ^^;