The Dark Half Complaints

I finished reading the Dark Half the other night.  What started out for me as a full speed Stephen King horror thrill ride turned into tiresome suspended reality.  Frankly, I didn't like the second half; at all. 

I think the Dark Half would serve better as a novella.  The idea was not only fleshed out, it was obese.  Soon, as one idea built on another, characters began to behave in a way far removed from reality.  That's because the plot itself left any grounding in the real world to chase an idea. 

At the core, I have to simply ask: Did the ending work?  And my answer is a strong: No.  It was neither natural to the movement of the story, logical or even innovative.  The truth is, when the end finally came, I was just glad to leave these characters.  The unanswered questions pile up when you start to fact check the central themes of the Dark Half. 

In trying to tie it all together, by giving us plot line after plot line, King actually undid his own premise.  The book becomes overthought.  It's not a fun adventure at the end, because there is no doubt at all who is going to win.  But may I suggest, if King would have let the bad guy win in this one, it would have been a delight! 

The idea that a twin, killed in the womb, is actually a ghost with a voice of his own in his twin brothers head is great.  But there's no way, no plot line, that could actually allow him to steal the show and win.  So the story is empty of tension.  The reader never once actually thinks George Stark is going to beat the odds; he doesn't have a chance. Not in Stephen King's Castle Rock, anyway.

May I suggest that if King's story were actually followed through, though; Stark has a great chance of beating both Alan Pangborn and Thad Baumont.  (Baumont has to be a nod to writer Charles Beaumont who wrote some of the most memorable Twilight Zone scripts.)  But simply put, King cannot allow Stark to win.  That's because the story is so far from any reality, to not put it down would throw a lot of King's other work into suspended reality.  The story is set in Ludlow and Castle Rock.  What happens if George Stark beauts the writer and the sheriff and runs loose through the town?  Well, honestly, it seems the odds are in his favor.  Stark seems to come from no where, and is headed into no where as he decays quickly.  King isn't exactly clear how Stark became flesh and blood; but whatever that flesh is -- it ain't here to stay.  Stark needs Beaumont, and in the end, kocking him out isn't much harder for Thad than Superman giving Lex a gentle kick to the face. 

The killer, that started out with seemingly unlimited strength and no conscience, ends up just crumbling and being carried away by birds.  Why?  Because he can't be allowed to exist.  The "what if" is too big.  What if we allow someone as powerful as George Stark first appears to remain on the scene?  (What if we let the Death Star terrorize galaxy?)  After creating a wonderful, terrible, mean monster in George Stark, King quickly begins to downgrade him.  By the end of the book, he's practically on hospice.  His flesh is falling on and he's not anything of the force he was at the beginning of the novel.

The Dark Half doesn't pay off because George Stark himself doesn't pay off as a villain.  There are a few chapters King even dedicates to Stark's point of view; maybe hoping to give the reader perspective.  But again, these scenes only serve to weaken Stark. 

The Dark Half

Now here's a Stephen King novel that reads like -- well, what everyone thinks a Stephen King novel should read like.  None of that Stand by Me, Shawshank Redemption, Green Mile hope and optimism here.  (I do realize two of those were prison novels.)  This is old school King, and I love it.

Here's what's striking about The Dark Half:

1. It's very violent.  This isn't like in the Dead Zone, where we come upon the bodies left behind by a serial killer.  In The Dark Half, we are taken right to the murder scenes as Stark (or Machine) do the dirty work.

2. It reminds me of The Outsider.  A man is obviously guilty of a  crime he could not commit.  He has an alibi, witnesses and more to prove he didn't do it.  In the Dark Half, there are finger prints left behind; in The Outsider it's DNA.  The early portions of both books run down very familiar paths.

3. Kings narration is crisp and to the point.  He doesn't spend a lot of time with scenes to just build the characters; he gets right to it.  He seems like a man driven here.  He wants to nail this down, almost rushing toward the meat of the story.  In fact, the book moves with such intensity, the reader can sense King himself exited to find out what happens next.

King gave us the Dark Half in the late 80's.  It' interesting again to note signs of the times.  As in Dead Zone, there is no 911 emergency system in place; people have to hunt for Law Enforcements phone number.  And phones themselves sure have changed since the days when King could describe a phone in the cradle as looking like a broken barbell.  

One thing I don't like about the Dark Half is the original cover.  There's just nothing fun about it.  Like the Tommy-knockers, which preceded it, the cover does nothing to make you want to read the book.

The Dark Half serves as a prequel to Needful Things, introducing the reader to the Sheriff and several of the towns people.  While Dark Half focuses on a much smaller cast in a horrible situation, Needful Things would bring the entire town to life and then rip it apart.

Stephen King Video Games

Doesn't it seem like there should be more games based on Stephen King books?  I'm still waiting for someone to give me an edition of THE  STAND Civ 5.  Really, no one has wanted to drive Christine?  Think about it -- it would be a lot more fun than Pole Position.  Actually, a lot of things were better than that game.

Here is a list of video games based on King's work.  I am not including Discordia.  If you know of others, tell me in the comments section (or email me).

1985: THE MIST:

Was a text adventure game.  Remember Zork?

1989: THE RUNNINGMAN

The Running man was released as a Commodore 64 game.  It also inspired a game called "Smash TV."

1992: THE DARK HALF:

www.giantbomb.com gives us this review of The Dark Half video game:

The Dark Half is a point and click story based adventure game based on the Stephen King novel of the same name. It was released in 1992 by Capstone and even though many consider it to be a terrible game, it is highly sought after and considered a cult hit.

The Dark Half was developed by Symtus and published in 1992 by Capstone. It is a ScummVM-esque point and click adventure game that is based on the Stephen King novel of the same name. Although the mechanics of the game are very similar to many adventure games released around the same time from LucasArts, it is possible to die / be arrested in the game, bringing your adventure to an eary finish. 

The game itself is a poor reflection of the novel and is riddled with plot holes and inconsistencies. Even with these inherent flaws, The Dark Half remains a cult classic, a title that is still highly sought after even this long after it's debut. The ease of getting a "Game Over" screen is such that it's vital to save often and in different files, which is a turn off for many gamers with games such as Monkey Island setting the benchmark of a "deathless" game.

1994: The Lawnmowerman 

This was a Sega Genesis game. I never got to play it because we were Atari people.  Then Commodore.  

For more, check out David Finniss article at voices.yahoo.com.

Finnis' article covers all of the above games,and also a wallpaper program called F13: "The only thing that I was able to find on my own was a program called F13. It wasn't so much a game as a program that gave you wallpapers for your desktop. There were some mini-games as well as an electronic copy of Everything's Eventual. It received a mixed review at best."

10 King Novels That Should Be Video Games:

I liked this article by Clayton Ofbricks: 10 Stephen King Novels That Should Be Video Games.  He gives a nice outline of how each game would be played out.

1) The Shawshank Redemption: 3rd Person Stealth Action 

2) The Stand: Post Turn Based Strategy 

3) The Green Mile: Construction and Management Simulation 

4) Misery: Tower Defense 

5) The Dark Tower: Action RPG 

6) Christine: Extreme Driving Sim 

7) Rose Red: Survival Horror 

8) Pet Sematary: FPS 

9) Salem’s Lot: Sandbox 

10) Cujo: Trivia

Or. . . you could just play The Sims 3 Supernatural!  Or, Naughty Bear.

Richard Laymon Treat

King Connection:

I'd like to introduce you to George Stark. . . his name is Richard Laymon. Seriously, if anyone writes with the nasty evil I imagined Stark from the Dark Half writing, it's Laymon.

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Plastered all over Richard Laymon's paperback novels is a single quote from Stephen King: "If you've missed Laymon, you've missed a treat." He's been called: "Stephen King without a conscience."

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Dead Men Do Tell Tales

Laymon was seriosly messed up - or he was -- he's dead now. The quote from King is pretty short, so I would be interested in what else he had to say about Laymon. His website notes, "Richard Laymon died on February 14, 2001. Many readers are not aware of this fact - especially new Laymon readers. Since 2001, new releases have been sold by Ann Laymon, Richard's wife, and consist of previously unpublished manuscripts that Richard left behind at his death. These previously unpublished manuscripts are: To Wake The Dead, The Lake, Glory Bus."

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Does that remind any of you of this storyline -- "In 1994, while preparing to move to a new house, the widow Bachman discovered a cardboard carton filled with manuscripts in the cellar. The carton contained a number of novels and stories, in varying degrees of completion." http://www.squidoo.com/RichardBachman

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I notice a lot of people really like Laymon -- none of them women. Or, to be more fair, I simply have not seen evidence of female fans. He's gotten popular in America only after his death. He was a real hit in Europe; England mostly. Turned out his American publishers really botched the editing of his second novel, The woods Are Dark, and the results were lasting and negative.

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Since his passing, Leasure books has been serious about putting him out there in the U.S. And by the looks of it, quite successfully. Too bad Richard isn't around to see his success with his home country.

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Personal:

Laymon was married and had a daughter. His daughter rewrote his second novel, The Woods Are Dark, reporting to have restored the novel to Laymon's original intent. To accomplish this she used several manuscripts, churning out a real labor of love and one good book.

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Laymon was a native of my home state, California. As a result, he often writes about places I've been. I've actually been to some pretty bad parts of Los Angeles late at night; but I think I was mroe scared reading about a midnight trip through LA in Laymon's book Body Rides. Beast House is in San Fransisco. Beast House is a place where terrible murders took place, later turned into a museum. (Sadly, closest I ever got to anything like that in SF was the Wax Museum.)

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Laymon was friends with Dean Koontz, whose introductions appear in some of Laymon's books.

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Characters:

I read one person who said, "I love Laymon because I always remember his characters." I can't say that! All of Laymon's characters are, in my opinion, pretty shallow. He is creating bodies to be stabbed or chopped or shot or beaten or mutilated in some other way.

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Gore

The gore factor is definitely worth noting. Laymon loves gore! He dishes it out liberally. Sprinkled in with that gore is subjects that make me a little uncomfortable. Rape's are frequent in some of his books. There is sex -- lots of it. Bondage and a mixture of sex and the creepy. You know what Laymon reminds me of? Old detective novels. I don't mean Sherlock Holmes, either. Anyway, suffice to say: There is lots of gore and lots of sex. Often sex and violence mix together.
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Books By Laymon:
Laymon was extremely prolific (like anyone else you know?). He not only wrote a pile of novels, but short stories, books of short stories, and his own biography. Here's a list of his novels (from wikipedia). It is interesting that none of his books have been made into movies.
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The Cellar (1980) (First book in the Beast House Chronicles series)
Your Secret Admirer (1980) (writing as Carl Laymon)
The Woods Are Dark (1981)
Nightmare Lake (1983) (writing as Carl Laymon)
Night Show (1984)
All Hallow's Eve (1985)
Beware (1985)
The Beast House (1986) (Second book in the Beast House Chronicles series)
Tread Softly (1987) - aka Dark Mountain (writing as Richard Kelly)
Flesh (1987)
Midnight's Lair (1988) (writing as Richard Kelly)
Resurrection Dreams (1988)
Funland (1989)
The Stake (1990)
One Rainy Night (1991)
Island (1991)
Darkness, Tell Us (1991)
Blood Games (1992)
Alarums (1992)
Dark Mountain (1992)
Endless Night (1993)
Savage: From Whitechapel to the Wild West on the Track of Jack the Ripper (1993)
In the Dark (1994)
Quake (1995)
Bite (1996)
Body Rides (1996)
After Midnight (1997)
The Wilds (1998)
The Midnight Tour (1998) (Third book in the Beast House Chronicles series)
Cuts (1999)
Among the Missing (1999)
Come Out Tonight (1999)
Once Upon A Halloween (2000)
The Traveling Vampire Show (2000)
Friday Night in the Beast House (2001) (Fourth book in the Beast House Chronicles series)
Night in the Lonesome October (2001)
The Halloween Mouse (2001) - children's book
No Sanctuary (2001)
Amara (2002) aka To Wake the Dead
The Lake (2004)
The Glory Bus (2005) aka Into the Fire
The Woods are Dark Restored and Uncut (2008)
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Words
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Reading Laymon made me say (possibly out loud), "Ah! I've always wanted to write like that! I just didn't know you could." The way Laymon structures sentences is striking. Generally his sentences are short. They are descriptive; especially if they involve murder or sex. His chapters, likewise, are short. Laymon usually chooses dialogue to carry the story over narration.
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Favorites:
From reading interviews with Laymon, it appears one of hsi favorite novels to write was Island. Since it was a journal, Laymon liked the idea of the narrator not knowing what would happen next.
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My favorite novels: So far my favorite novels have been: Resurrection Dreams, Beware and Body Rides.
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So tell me, what do you think of Richard Laymon?
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Here's a couple of fun links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ku1ABLqgEDw&feature=related
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Laymon
Richard Laymon Kills: http://www.ains.net.au/~gerlach/rlaymon2.htm

Charnell House Review: The Dark Half

Chris Quigley (author of Wetware) has a new review posted at his website, charnelhouse. Quigley's reviews are always dead on -- and very very therough. This most rescent posting is King's 1989 novel, The Dark Half.

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Of course, he notes that King's strength is characters. He picks up also on King's ability to change the mood of the story. Quigley writes, "With It, King used the device of a split narrative to follow two timelines that eventually merge. The Dark Half is also split, but in this case tonally instead of in terms of story. Segments focusing on the Beaumonts' domestic life are almost comforting. King's deft hand at characterization seems effortless: Thad, Liz, and their twin children William and Wendy are drawn convincingly, even gently. The intrusions of George Stark seem written by a different hand, similar in mood and intent to books King wrote under Richard Bachman's name."

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Check out the full review here: http://charnelhouse.tripod.com/darkhalf.html

Quigley's book is available here: http://www.cemeterydance.com/sh/quigley01.html

Reviews and Thoughts by Derick From Brasil

My friend Derick is from Brasil. We talk often by email about Stephen King. He's sharp, as you'll discover in his article below. I asked him to write me an article about what it's like being a King fan in Brasil. My friend is 17, very sweetly humble and a very fast reader. I hope you enjoy this as much as I did! By the way, I like the fact that Derick is honest in his opinion; he doesn't gush and he's not afriad to share honest thoughts. So, here's one constant readers take on the Stephen King universe!

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Stephen King (SK) happened to me about one year ago.

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When I first saw him I said: This guy is nuts! Mainly because he's staring in a lot of his own movies.It happened while I was still in the school. A friend of mine said: "My brother loves reading his books." So, I tried. Started with The Shining and didn't like it, although it's not a bad book. The Shining (I read it in Portuguese) I thought was a great story with such a bad ending. I really think SK cannot make a great ending at all, but, anyway, I love his stories. Then, I tried reading English versions and the first was The Eyes Of The Dragon. Horrible book, to me, by far, the worst I've read from him (I may be wrong but that was I felt when it ended), kind of fairytales.

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I had many reasons to stop reading Sk but I didn't and won't. I really thought: "He's so famous, he has to write something good." That was when I read Needful Things. And, Oh My Godness, I really loved it. The plot itself is amazing but a lot of characters. The next one I read was Bag of Bones, and I have to say: Amazing beautiful great story. Kyra almost made me cry and I really enjoied it. There are a lot I read: Desperation, The Dark Half, The Gunslinger, The Drawing of The Three, The WasteLands, Wizard and Glass, Skeleton Crew, 'Salem's Lot and The Bachman Books (not a wide list but not short neither).

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I'll talk about each book I've read:

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- Desperation: Excelent story, good for those who like action books (like me), but the ending was bad. David Carver really got my atention.

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- The Dark Half: You can read it so fast, it happened to me and no other book did this to me. Very good plot, bad ending and so many questions not answered. I loved Thad's Twins... They're awesome.

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- Skeleton Crew: I had not read all of the stories but I read a few ones. Pretty good, it depends on each tale.

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- 'Salem's Lot: Horrible Book! The ending almost made me throw this book away. Messy most of the times.

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- The Bachman Books: I read The Long Walk which was amazingly good, the splot is wonderful and I wish SK could tell us what Ray asked after winning The Long Walk. I read Rage too. Indeed, I only bought this book because of Rage and it's a book full of nothing. It was a bad book (Rage).

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- The Gunslinger: Loved that book. The best I've read from The Dark Tower. It tells us exactly what Roland is and Jake.

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- The Drawing of the Three: Good book, it shows us all characters but boring at times, it only got my atention after Detta and Odetta story, but good.

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- The Wastelands: Another action book. Nothing to say unless It's good.

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- Wizard and Glass: Excelent in the beginning, stopped reading after flashbacks. Those flashbacks spoiled the whole story.

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I really have to say SK is a genious not only for writing books but having the ability to creat so amazing stories and be able to make them to come true. I love him and his books although not all are good. David asked me to write something. I really appreciate that but I don't know if I was capable to do such a thing, I wish I would. I'm a great SK fan but not like David. I wanted to introduce myself in the ending because being Bra"s"ilian boy is not a compliment at all. Sorry if I made any mistake but my English cannot be compared to yours.

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I'm from Bra"s"il, I'm 17 years-old and live in São Paulo. Here, in Brazil, SK is not famous here (everybody asks me "Who is Stephen King" and they can only know who he is when I say: "He wrote The Green Mile", and I really liked chatting with you and exposing my thoughts, it was good. Thank you once more,Dérick.

Notes On The Dark Half

I just finisehd The Dark Half. Wonderful! In fact I would suggest that it is King mastering has craft.

the sparrows are flying again

Gore Galore

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This book feels like a mix of Stephen King and Richard Bachman. It is dark -- very dark -- much like a Bachman novel. But it has elements of the supernatural, like a King book. Mix the gore and the spooks, and you have two great minds working together.

sparrows

Some have complained about the violence and gore. My suggestion to them: Don't read Stephen King. It's called "pay-off" gang! King takes his time building a story, and when it gets gory, we want to enjoy it.

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In The Dark Half, Thad Beaumont writes under the name George Stark. Unlike Thad, George doesn't use a typewriter or wordprocessor, just lots of very sharp pencils. As a child Thad had terrible headaches and passed out. It is discovered in surgery that he has in his brain . . . well, I'll let King tell you: "the assiting O.R. nurse saw it first. her scream was shrill and shocking in the operation room, where the only sounds for the last fifteen minutes had been Dr. Pritchard's murmured commands, the hiss of the bulky life support machinery, and the brief, high whine of the Negli saw."

flying

So what did she see? "thad Beaumont's brin was the color of a conch shell's outer edge -- a medim gray with jsut the slightest tinge of rose. Protruding from the smooth surface of dura was a single blind and malformed human eye. the brain was pulsing slightly. The eye pulsed with it. It looked as if it were trying to wink at them. It was this -- the look of the wink -- which had driven the assisting nurse from the O.R." That's wonderful!

the

Why is there an eye (and other things) in Thad's brain? Because in the womb, he was a twin. But he was the stronger of the two, and he absorbed his twin. But, little brother still had an eye. . . in Thad's brain! Shivers, that's good.

sparrows

When Thad is exposed as the real George Stark, he creates a mock photo shoot and "kills" ole George. But George doesn't stay dead. In fact, he goes on a killing rampage to rival his own character, Machine. It all ends with the sparrows. . .

the sprarrows are flying again
A Difficult Book To Write

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That the book was not easy for King to write is noted by Michael R. Colling's, who gives this interesting behind the scenes look at The Dark Half:
sparrows
"With The Dark Half, he continues his journey through the darkness of creativity, centering his attention on a writer whose pseudonym has recently been publicly unmasked -- very like King's experiences in 1985 with Richard Bachman, to whom the Dark Half refers in the introductory authors note, an exercise in tongue-in-cheek humor and irony. "I'm indebted to the late Richard bachman for his help and inspiration. this book could not have been written without him."
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"That writing the Dark Half was difficult for King is suggested by Stephanie Leonard's editorial comments in the November 1988 Castle Rock: The Stephen King Newsletter: It is true that Stephen has written a book by this title. But at this time he has no plans to publsih it."
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That looked a lot like the situation that had developed with Pet Sematary. Both novels are intensely personal for King, touching on his darker thoughts. Is he save to show us this "dark half" of himself?
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Not only was this a difficult book for King to write, it has been reported that it was also his wife Tabby's least favorite novel. King said in the Bachman books that The Dark Half is "a book my wife has always hated, perhaps because, for Thad Beaumont, the dream of being a writer overwhelms the reality of being a man; for thad, delusive thinking overtakes rationality completely, with horrible consequences."
the sparrows
George Beahm in King's biography says, "For King, the Dark Half could be perceived as a fictional form of closure on that matter of the Bachman revelation, putting it to rest."
the sparrows are not nice to George
Hitchcock Would Be Proud
what if Machine got a crack at the sparrows?
I previously posted a question asking what King book Hitchcock would make into a movie. I think he would have loved The Dark Half! Why? The birds, of course. But King goes further than Hitchcock did. We literally get to see poor Stark torn to bits by the sparrows.
Machine makes Stark look like a nice guy
In many ways this actually makes me think of Rod Serling gone bad!
the sparrows are flying
Who is George Stark?
he's not a very nice guy
Former Residence:
Mr. George Stark
P.O. Bo 1642
Brewer, Maine 04412
and he doesn't stay dead
Epitaph:
Geore Stark
1975-1988
Not a Very Nice Guy
it's hard to keep a good man down
George Stark is the ghost of Thad's unborn twin. Wrap your head around that plotline, huh! He's also the ghost of Rirchard Bachman. It's pretty obvious that King is having some fun with his own life story. You know, George Stark and Jack Torrance have some strange similarities. They both have trouble writing when the tension builds, and both have a very bad mean streak. Did I say very bad? We're talking, very very naughty. In the Shining, Jack becomes something of "machine" in a George Stark novel. Nothing more than a crazy killing machine.
the sparrows are flying
Sheriff Alan Pangborn reappears in Needful Things. In the novel, the Sheriff suffers from nightmares and thoughts of George Stark. In Bag Of Bones we learn that Thad Beaumont killed himself.
the sparrows
The Stephen King universe suggests that "It's quite likely that King named Thad Beaumont in honor of Charles Beaumont, an author who is best remembered or writing some of the most chilling episodes of the television classic The Twilight Zone." (164)
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Adaptations:
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The Dark Half Video Game: Yep! It's out there. However, it did not get good reviews at the time. It appears some collectors now seek it out, but I honestly don't know why -- usually games, audio recordings, video's and DVD's do not have much value to King Collectors. You can get the book and the game here: http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/595/Dark+Half,+The.html
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The Dark Half movie, starring Timothy Hutton and directed by George A. Romero (Christine). This is a great movie! Faithful to the book, it manages to hold the novels "flavor." Remember in Firestarter where the complaint was that though it was faithful to the book, something was missing? Well, The Dark Half faithfully captures the story and mood of the novel. And, Stark's end is aptly nasty. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0106664/#comment
the sprarrows are flying
The movie, and book for that matter, do not do much with the aftermath. King will clean things up in later books, but with bodies left all over, how does Pangborn get Thad off the hook? does he just explain, kindly, to the FBI that Thad's alter-ego's ghost did it? I may have missed something here.
the sparrows are flying
Oddly, because of financial issues, the movie was made in 1990, but not released until 1993. One would think that the producers would have wanted to play on the hype of a recently released book.
the sprarrows are flying
There is no audio edition of this book that I'm aware of.
the sparrows are not nice to George
See: The Complete Stephen King Encylopedia, Stephen J. Spignesi

Pencils And Sparrows

I've been reading the Dark Half, and have only two off the wall observations.

• George Stark writes with pencils. Reminds me of King's furious writing of Dreamcatcher, which he did by hand; yes, it was a pen, but still. And, I just remembered -- Charles Dicken's wrote all his work by hand. Maybe his "drood" was actually George Stark, huh! Ask Dan Simmons about that.
• When it comes to Under the Dome the sparrows are no longer flying. They're all dead! Smacked into that big invisible dome.

Aren't you glad you checked in. That's what happens when you listen to Under the Dome while reading The Dark Half.

10 Scariest Stephen King Novels

scifiwire posted "10 scariest Stephen King novels." http://scifiwire.com/2009/10/10-scariest-stephen-king.php So here it is. See if you see a problem:

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1. The Shining (1977)

2. 'Salem's Lot (1975)

3. Pet Semetary (1982)

4. Cujo (1981)

5. Misery (1987)

6. The Stand (Complete and Uncut Version) (1990)

7. The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon (1999)

8. Cell (2006)

9. Gerald's Game (1992)

10. Carrie (1974)

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Do these people read Stephen King very often? Are these the only books they've read?

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As Halloween approaches, the most frustrating thing is that everyone publishes their scary book list on Halloween. Kinda misses the "season" -- doesn't it? You aren't going to read 10, or even 1, scary book just on Halloween. And after Halloween, let's all face it, Christmas season begins. Now that's truly scary!

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First of all: Geralds Game and Cujo, while intense and well written, are not exactly scary! That was the list, right? Scary. So, let me offer my list of truly scary King books:

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1. It. Why didn't IT even make their list? A monster stalks little kids -- and scifiwire wasn't scared? Come on! I was shivering under the sheets. This book is the true face of horror.

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2. The Shining. A haunted hotel. This was great

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3. 'Salem's Lot. Dracula comes to America. True Halloween stuff

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4. Needful Things. The fight in the street, knifes and such -- wonderful. Gory. Truly scary

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5. Pet Semetary. A dead child buried in ancient Indian grounds comes back alive. . . and ready to kill mommy and daddy. Anyone not scared? It's like a haunting version of Christianity. Resurrection gone bad!

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6. The Stand. This one has scenes that are scary. The tunnel, other Abigail and the wolves, etc

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7. Desperation. A book that opens with a crucified cat should be on anyones list of most scary King novels. And Tac the Demon Sheriff deserves a little more credit for his scaryness.

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8. Cell. First King brought Vampires to America, then modern America got a cell phone call: The zombies are coming!

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9. The Dark Half. What if your alter-ego was alive and well -- killing people? I thought it was scary.

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10. Carrie. Short and to the point, I think this book is really more a novella. However, it is definately spooky. It rightly set the stage to typecast the author as the King of Horror.

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Anyone want to offer their 10 scariest King novels?

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