The Dark Half

Author: Stephen King
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501144197
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 528

Book Description
Set in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine A "wondrously frightening" (Publishers Weekly) tale of terror and #1 national bestseller about a writer's pseudonym that comes alive and destroys everyone on the path that leads to the man who created him. Thad Beaumont is a writer, and for a dozen years he has secretly published violent bestsellers under the name of George Stark. But Thad is a healthier and happier man now, the father of infant twins, and starting to write as himself again. He no longer needs George Stark and so, with nationwide publicity, the pseudonym is retired. But George Stark won't go willingly. And now Thad would like to say he is innocent. He'd like to say he has nothing to do with the twisted imagination that produced his bestselling novels. He'd like to say he has nothing to do with the series of monstrous murders that keep coming closer to his home. But how can Thad deny the ultimate embodiment of evil that goes by the name he gave it--and signs its crimes with Thad's bloody fingerprints? The Dark Half is "a chiller" (The New York Times Book Review), so real and fascinating that you'll find yourself squirming in Stephen King's heart-stopping, blood-curdling grip--and loving every minute of it.

The Dark Half

Author: Stephen King
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501141147
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 528

Book Description
“A chiller” (The New York Times Book Review) and #1 New York Times bestseller about a writer’s horrific and haunting pseudonym that destroys everyone on the path leading to the man who created him. After thirteen years of international bestseller stardom with his works of violent crime fiction, author George Stark is officially declared dead—revealed by a national magazine to have been killed at the hands of the man who created him: the once well-regarded but now obscure writer Thad Beaumont. Thad’s even gone so far as to stage a mock burial of his wildly successful pseudonym, complete with tombstone and the epitaph “Not a Very Nice Guy.” Although on the surface, it seems that Thad can finally concentrate on his own novels, there’s a certain unease at the prospect of leaving George Stark behind. But that’s nothing compared to the horror about to descend upon Thad’s new life. There are the vicious, out-of-control nightmares, for starters. And how is he able to explain the fact that everyone connected to George Stark’s untimely demise is now meeting a brutal end of their own in a pattern of homicidal savagery…and why each blood-soaked crime scene has Thad’s fingerprints all over it? Thad Beaumont may have once believed that George Stark was running out of things to say, but he’s going to find out just how wrong he is…

Different Seasons

Author: Stephen King
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501141171
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 608

Book Description
Includes the stories “The Body” and “Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption”—set in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine A “hypnotic” (The New York Times Book Review) collection of four novellas—including the inspirations behind the films Stand By Me and The Shawshank Redemption—from Stephen King, bound together by the changing of seasons, each taking on the theme of a journey with strikingly different tones and characters. This gripping collection begins with “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption,” in which an unjustly imprisoned convict seeks a strange and startling revenge—the basis for the Best Picture Academy Award-nominee The Shawshank Redemption. Next is “Apt Pupil,” the inspiration for the film of the same name about top high school student Todd Bowden and his obsession with the dark and deadly past of an older man in town. In “The Body,” four rambunctious young boys plunge through the façade of a small town and come face-to-face with life, death, and intimations of their own mortality. This novella became the movie Stand By Me. Finally, a disgraced woman is determined to triumph over death in “The Breathing Method.” “The wondrous readability of his work, as well as the instant sense of communication with his characters, are what make Stephen King the consummate storyteller that he is,” hailed the Houston Chronicle about Different Seasons.

The Tommyknockers

Author: Stephen King
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501143840
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 992

Book Description
Master storyteller Stephen King presents the classic, terrifying #1 New York Times bestseller about a terrifying otherworldly discovery and the effects it has a on a small town. “Late last night and the night before, Tommyknockers, Tommyknockers, knocking at the door…” On a beautiful June day, while walking deep in the woods on her property in Haven, Maine, Bobbi Anderson quite literally stumbles over her own destiny and that of the entire town. For the dull gray metal protrusion she discovers in the ground is part of a mysterious and massive metal object, one that may have been buried there for millennia. Bobbi can’t help but become obsessed and try to dig it out…the consequences of which will affect and transmute every citizen of Haven, young and old. It means unleashing extraordinary powers beyond those of mere mortals—and certain death for any and all outsiders. An alien hell has now invaded this small New England town…an aggressive and violent malignancy devoid of any mercy or sanity…

Thinner

Author: Stephen King
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1501144529
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 352

Book Description
"The 'extraordinary' (Booklist) novel of one man's quest to find the source of his nightmare and to reverse it before he becomes...nothing at all. This #1 national bestseller from Stephen King, writing as Richard Bachman, "pulsates with evil...it will have you on the edge of your seat" (Publishers Weekly)"--

The Shadow Box

Author: Luanne Rice
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
ISBN: 9781542009553
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 368

Book Description
Preparing for an exhibit that includes a piece about the domestic violence she once endured at the hands of her gubernatorial candidate husband, an artist survives a home invasion only to find herself pitted against dangerous corrupt forces.

Bone Silence

Author: Alastair Reynolds
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 031646273X
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 640

Book Description
The thrilling finale to the Revenger Trilogy tells a desperate tale of greed, piracy, shadow governments, and ancient secrets that could unravel all of civilization The Ness sisters ran away from home to become the most fearsome pirates in the twenty thousand worlds of the Congregation. They've plundered treasures untold, taken command of their own ship, and made plenty of enemies. But now they're being hunted for crimes they didn't commit by a fleet whose crimes are worse than their own. To stay one step ahead of their pursuers and answer the questions that have plagued them, they'll have to employ every dirty, piratical trick in the book.... Read more by Alastair Reynolds! The Revenger Trilogy:RevengerShadow CaptainBone Silence

Spite

Author: Simon McCarthy-Jones
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 1541646983
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 176

Book Description
Spite angers and enrages us, but it also keeps us honest. In this provocative account, a psychologist examines how petty vengeance explains human thriving. Spite seems utterly useless. You don't gain anything by hurting yourself just so you can hurt someone else. So why hasn't evolution weeded out all the spiteful people? As psychologist Simon McCarthy-Jones argues, spite seems pointless because we're looking at it wrong. Spite isn't just what we feel when a car cuts us off or when a partner cheats. It's what we feel when we want to punish a bad act simply because it was bad. Spite is our fairness instinct, an innate resistance to exploitation, and it is one of the building blocks of human civilization. As McCarthy-Jones explains, some of history's most important developments—the rise of religions, governments, and even moral codes—were actually redirections of spiteful impulses. A provocative, engaging read, Spite shows that if you really want to understand what makes us human, you can't just look at noble ideas like altruism and cooperation. You need to understand our darker impulses as well.

Blaze

Author: Stephen King
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1416559914
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 389

Book Description
Master storyteller Stephen King (writing as Richard Bachman) presents this gripping and remarkable New York Times bestselling crime novel about a damaged young man who embarks on an ill-advised kidnapping plot—a work as taut and riveting as anything he has ever written. Once upon a time, a fellow named Richard Bachman wrote Blaze on an Olivetti typewriter, then turned the machine over to Stephen King, who used it to write Carrie. Bachman died in 1985 (“cancer of the pseudonym”), but this last gripping Bachman novel resurfaced after being hidden away for decades—an unforgettable crime story tinged with sadness and suspense. Clayton Blaisdell, Jr., was always a small-time delinquent. None too bright either, thanks to the beatings he got as a kid. Then Blaze met George Rackley, a seasoned pro with a hundred cons and one big idea. The kidnapping should go off without a hitch, with George as the brains behind their dangerous scheme. But there's only one problem: by the time the deal goes down, Blaze's partner in crime is dead. Or is he?

Dark Directions

Author: Kendall R. Phillips
Publisher: SIU Press
ISBN: 0809330970
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 232

Book Description
A Nightmare on Elm Street. Halloween. Night of the Living Dead. These films have been indelibly stamped on moviegoers’ psyches and are now considered seminal works of horror. Guiding readers along the twisted paths between audience, auteur, and cultural history, author Kendall R. Phillips reveals the macabre visions of these films’ directors in Dark Directions: Romero, Craven, Carpenter, and the Modern Horror Film. Phillips begins by analyzing the works of George Romero, focusing on how the body is used cinematically to reflect the duality between society and chaos, concluding that the unconstrained bodies of the Living Dead films act as a critical intervention into social norms. Phillips then explores the shadowy worlds of director Wes Craven. In his study of the films The Serpent and the Rainbow, Deadly Friend, Swamp Thing, Red Eye, and Shocker, Phillips reveals Craven’s vision of technology as inherently dangerous in its ability to cross the gossamer thresholds of the gothic. Finally, the volume traverses the desolate frontiers of iconic director John Carpenter. Through an exploration of such works as Halloween, The Fog, and In the Mouth of Madness, Phillips delves into the director’s representations of boundaries—and the haunting consequences for those who cross them. The first volume ever to address these three artists together, Dark Directions is a spine-tingling and thought-provoking study of the horror genre. In analyzing the individual works of Romero, Craven, and Carpenter, Phillips illuminates some of the darkest minds in horror cinema.