Too late for Valentine’s: Let’s talk killer cars and adaptation

Today’s post is a long time coming. It’s been too long since I explored a Stephen King story, I didn’t post a snarky Valentine’s Day post and it’s about time I incorporated my current university courses into my blog. This year, we’re exploring literary to film adaptation, and whilst we’re NOT doing any Stephen King or horror novels, I’m not actually complaining as I get to keep that for my own writing!

So… Christine… Christine… what happens when the biggest horror author of the 80’s meets the biggest horror director of the 80’s?

The Books of Stephen King: The Dead Zone, Or, “Wow, I’m glad I wasn’t doing The Stand because that would’ve been awkward”

After a long absence and a series of Doctor Who it’s time to bring back my past recurring blog posts, starting by picking up where we left off with the entire bibliography of Stephen King. Thankfully we don’t have to do The Stand and talk about a global pandemic sweeping the globe but instead we can talk about The Dead Zone, which raises the simple but brilliant question of “If you had the power to change the future, would you?”

Probably one of the best book covers ever, in my opinion.

The books of Stephen King Part 2: ‘Salem’s Lot- Or, any vampire related joke about this one will suck so I’m not going to bother

Vampires have always been one of the most endearing pop culture creations and to be honest, I dig them. Even before Bram Stoker’s Transylvanian count, vampires have existed in popular culture and folklore for hundreds if not thousands of years. So it only seems natural that any writer wanting to explore horror will eventually write a vampire novel. Stephen King’s contribution to the vampire mythos is his second published novel and at nearly 600 pages long is a much larger, denser and richly packed text than his first. A classic tale of good and evil, ‘Salem’s Lot is the perfect October Halloween book as King explores the self destruction of small town America through the lenses of a vampire invasion.

The books of Stephen King Part 1: Carrie- Or, this is why I’m glad prom culture isn’t a thing in England

It’s October, and for once I’m actually going to do horror related stuff across the month and not just on the 31st. Every Wednesday up till the 30th we’ll be looking at the first four Stephen King novels written under his own name. I’m not doing his collection of short stories Graveyard Shift (published in 1978) because I’m lazy and haven’t read it (plus I’m prioritising getting through The Dead Zone right now) and whilst I will discuss the Bachman books in due course let’s be honest, the first four Stephen King books written AS Stephen King are so iconic that it’ll be a shame not to go through October without discussing them. So without further ado, and considering I’ve delayed this long enough, let’s get things started with his first published novel.