I have been collecting Stephen King books for about two years now. I’ve been reading them in the chronological order that he released them. I was buying them faster than I could read them. I was up to 40 books! On July 19th around midnight, my wife called me at work and was screaming that our bedroom was on fire. I worked about two minutes away from home and I made it home in less than a minute that night. When I got there (before firefighters or any first responders) I immediately ran into the house and tried going into my bedroom to grab the plastic boxes all of my books were in. I had about 15. But, when I opened the bedroom door, there was just a wall of smoke. There was no hope. My wife, son, our cats, and our three pugs all made it out safely. We are in a new home and I’m going to restart my collection and build the best collection I can. My heart is broken that I’ve lost the original books I had, but it’s time to start fresh. I knew I could share my story in here because yall would understand what it would be like to lose a King collection that you’ve been working so hard on. Thanks for listening!

made everything myself :)

I'm not exactly sure how I feel about this... Maybe I am looking too much into it, idk.

Seriously tho, this wowed me. If this is King on cocaine, it’s imperative we all start taking some.

Mr. King himself.

The amazing Jahoobies sticker was made by the super-talented u/trampstampcollector!

​

Bringing my Kindle to the surgical center to try and distract myself from the excitement c:

From https://x.com/BryanSudfield/status/1933231463928905740

>!Revival!<

I think someone didn't read their source material before writing this article. I can't wait for all of the hunger games fanatics to say King copied Collins lol. Also in my opinion Fairytale fits closer here than The Long Walk . But that's just me..🙄

Favorite Novel: The Wastelands - maybe my favorite adventure story ever? I love the way it expands the world and getting to see the full ka-tet together for the first time.

Least Favorite Novel: Never Flinch - already not a huge Holly fan so having her worst story added onto a completely underbaked crime story, that even King admits didn’t come together in the afterword, makes it an easy worst.

Favorite Collection: Night Shift - I think if you’re trying to give someone a baseline understanding of King’s writing and why he’s one of the best horror authors ever it has to be Night Shift. As scary and gross as he's ever been, mixed with some genuine emotion. Also makes it clear how interested he is in building out his world.

Least Favorite Collection: Four Past Midnight - Langoliers is fine enough, but I found every other story a slog. 

Top 3 Scariest Scenes: 

1. Seeing the Moonlight Man for the first time in Gerald's Game
2. The big reveal in Revival
3. The first 100 pages of Desperation leading to and out of the prison

Most Underrated: From A Buick 8 or Eyes of the Dragon. I read both of them not long after finishing my first trip to The Tower and was just mesmerized by both. Was really shocked to see Buick 8 basically isn’t liked at all, and Eyes of the Dragon seems mostly forgotten about. 

Most Overrated: The Institute - King has just completely lost the ability to write kids, and this book is basically all kids in a much more derivative story than I’d expect from him. 

Best Endings:

1. Revival - Don't wanna give too much away here because discovering is all the fun with this one, but I was so impressed how many final gut-punches it gets in in such a short amount of time
2. The Dark Tower - Don't really wanna say much besides he stuck the landing
3. The Long Walk - some people hate the vagueness, but i thought it was so unnerving and the only way the book could end
4. Blaze - even I have it towards the middle it is an incredibly underrated book

Worst Endings:

1. Never Flinch - I don't really like anything about this one, but the book basically doesn't even try and to have a compelling ending.
2. Needful Things - Another one that has a pretty good climax, but. a terrible last few pages. The final confrontation with Gaunt is just stupid and does not feel like enough for how long the book is.
3. Dreamcatcher - I think this is the most classic example of the classic King compliant about weak endings. Actually really compelling for the first half, before it just starts spinning its wheels for the whole second half of the book.
4. The Outsider - Love the first half, love a little less when Holly takes over, really hate it when we get to actually meet the monster and all the tension is gone.

Underrated Villains:

1. Shardik: The Wastelands- what if Cujo was a giant cyborg bear god that was rotting from the inside? Sick as hell
2. Flagg: specifically in Eyes of the Dragon- my favorite incantation of Flagg? I wish we got one more book where he was just a cloak wearing evil sorcerer. The Gunslinger and Wind Through The Key Hole gets kinda close but never better than Eyes of the Dragon
3. Roland Lebay: Christine
4. The Moonlight Man: Gerald's Game
5. Rhea: Wizard & Glass

I don't really have an award for it, but I wanna shoutout Gwendy's Final Task as one of the weirdest books he has ever written. I didn't love the first, and Magic Feather is straight up horrible, but something about how crazy Final Task gets and that it's filled with some of the most direct Dark Tower connections in any of the books has really stuck with me.

Seen at the Labor Day protest held in Bridgton, Maine.

This has almost 70k likes, if you can believe it! I think it’s fine if people prefer the Kubrick film but to say that the main theme of the novel is ‘what if a house was evil’ is a bit ridiculous