Top 10 Stephen King Books
Thoughts of a Constant Reader
Stephen King is my favourite writer. He is the author with the largest cultural footprint in recent times. The Charles Dickens of our age, if you will. If you haven’t read his books, you will have seen movies based on his work. Most people interested in cinema or literature will know who he is. It is incredible how he has managed to stay relevant in this ever changing world. I believe it’s because he continues to tap into our most common and entrenched fears. Those ones that we don’t want to speak out loud, but instead keep locked away in the hope they never escape to tear apart our fragile reality. And, in You Like it Darker, there is proof he is still the best in the business at doing just that. Hopefully the numerous sniffy critics who have always dismissed his work as inferior and his constant readers as somehow illiterate, have long ago learned the error of their ways. Somehow I doubt it though. We’ll leave them to their ignorance. As King writes in his infamous chapter from The Stand, “No great loss.”
I’ve probably been carrying this list in my head for decades. Don’t get me wrong, this is not, in any way, set in stone, and a few books have come out relatively recently (Mr Mercedes, Revival, and the aforementioned, You Like it Darker) that could have made it onto here, but most of these are never going to change. That’s probably got a lot to do with who I was when I read these stories, but also due to the fact that they’re all just stone cold classics.
A special thanks to Ray Van Horn, Jr. who inspired me with his own list to finally put pen to paper : -
Right, let’s get into it then.
IT (1986) - “Or so Bill Denbrough sometimes thinks on those early mornings after dreaming, when he almost remembers his childhood, and the friends with whom he shared it.”
My favourite book of all time. An incredible novel from which I want passages read at my funeral. The story about a group of friends coming together to fight a powerful, cosmic monster lands differently at 15 than it does at 55, but at whatever age you read it, this legendary tale still contains that timeless magic of love and belonging that we all seek in life. A true masterpiece and one I will never tire of reading.
Pet Sematary (1983) - “Death is a mystery, and burial is a secret.”
Louis Creed and his family move to a house in Maine that sits on the edge of a busy highway. In the land behind is a cemetery for all the pets that have been killed on the road. But there’s something else up there. Something much darker that can bring things back from the dead.
From camaraderie and companionship to grief and loss. My two favourite King novels could not be more diametrically opposed to one another. And yet the connective tissue is probably stronger than you’d think. A higher power influencing the actions of our protagonists, make for a story where what is set in motion is often just on the whim of an ancient malignant force.
However unlike IT, there are no happy endings here. Or even any form of closure. Just despair and death. But, as King shows us, even that is preferable to messing with the natural order. No surprise that he hid this story away in a drawer for years. With one of the all time great endings this is a truly horrific read that only gets more powerful the older you get.
The Talisman (1984) - “Right here and now.”
It’s almost hard to comprehend the quality of this run of books. Pet Sematary, The Talisman and then IT, with the short story collection, Skeleton Crew from 1985 thrown in for good measure. Amazing.
This novel, written with Peter Straub, about an 11 year old Jack Sawyer travelling to a parallel world called The Territories to find a magical talisman that could save his mother from dying of cancer is true boys own adventure stuff, clearly influenced by Mark Twain, with added Uzi wielding werewolves.
In Wolf, King and Straub created an all time great character. A companion who is good hearted all the way through, but can turn into a savage monster when the need takes him. His chapters set in the Sunlight Home with Reverend Gardener are just outstanding. Obviously the sequel, Black House, suffered from his loss but I’m still looking forward to the completion of the trilogy with Other Worlds Than These. A brilliant tale in its own right, but also a fantastic stepping stone from fantasy to horror.
Wizard and Glass (1997) - “Sometimes the past is all we have left to hold onto.”
This is the fourth, and easily best, book in Stephen King’s sprawling series about the gunslinger Roland Deschain and his seemingly endless quest to the find the mystical Dark Tower. These books are often described as a cross between Lord of the Rings and a Sergio Leone western, yet whilst there’s a whole lot more to them than that, it’s an apt shorthand to describe this linchpin of King’s creative universe.
Wizard and Glass is a brilliant tale of action and romance that concerns Roland, and two other gunslingers, Alain and Cuthbert, and how they were sent on a quest as teenagers into the badlands of Mid World to gather information on an uprising led by the criminal, John Farson. However, at its heart, this is really a love story between our hero and a girl he meets called Susan Delgado whilst also being a contemplation of how the ghosts of our pasts will forever haunt us. A novel that too often gets forgotten in the maelstrom of King’s great writings, this is a book to be cherished again and again.
Salem’s Lot (1975) - “At three in the morning the blood runs slow and thick, and slumber is heavy.”
As everyone knows, this was King pondering what would happen if Dracula arrived in small town 1970’s America. It focuses as much on the townsfolk as the vampires, looking at all their gossiping, pettiness and bigotry, but there should be no doubt that this a runaway freight train of a horror novel, that starts off slowly then gradually builds up pace as it thunders towards its denouement. Forever linked in my mind to the Tobe Hooper adaptation, this is a nasty, grimy story with some brilliantly scary scenes from the Glick boys at the window to the attack on the school bus. Supposedly, according to a new book that’s just been published called Monsters in the Archives by Caroline Bicks which delves into King’s original manuscripts, he also wanted to have a little vampire baby that ended up exploding after it got staked, but decided, even back then, that was a little too much!
The Stand (1978) - “Baby, can you dig your man? He’s a righteous man. Baby, can you dig your man?”
The first 3-400 pages of this apocalyptic tale of good and evil in a plague ravaged America is probably some of King’s best writing. As Captain Tripps takes hold and civilisation falls apart, we get to see how humanity copes in the unfolding chaos. It may not be pretty but it is hugely compelling. We go on this cross country journey with Stu, Nick, Frannie and Larry amongst others and they’re great company. In fact, I would say Larry Underwood is my favourite of all of King’s characters. It loses its way once we get to Boulder and Vegas but then coalesces once more for an explosive finale. I still prefer the original version to the expanded one, but whatever way you read it, this is one of the great novels of the 20th century.
The Dead Zone (1979) - “We all do what we can, and it has to be good enough, and if it isn’t good enough, it has to do.”
A lot has been said about how King predicted the future with Greg Stillson, a slimy, populist politician who will do or say anything to get to the top. However, I prefer to focus on Johnny Smith. A character with the most ordinary name and life who, after a horrific accident, ends up with an extraordinary power. The story lets you decide if his ability to see into the future is a gift or a curse. Often described as the Stephen King book for people who don’t like Stephen King, this is a brilliant character study of one man having to do the right thing, whatever the cost.
The Dark Half (1989) - “George Stark - Not a very nice guy.”
So far, so predictable I guess. Then maybe this one will be a surprise. King dedicated this novel to Richard Bachman and the parallels with George Stark are obvious. That’s not to say this story is just one big in-joke. Far from it. It’s properly gnarly and the opening scene in the operating theatre with the eye on a young Thad Beaumont’s brain is a peach. The other reason I like this so much is I think all writers have their dark half. Maybe not to the extent of a crazed, rotting switch-blade wielding doppelgänger who is trying to murder all your friends and family, but it’s there. I have no memory of half the stories I’ve written. If you were to ask me to summarise their plot, I would struggle. I wrote them, but I’m unsure which part of me wrote them. Now, it may not be supernatural, but it’s something. Anyway, this also has a nicely bleak ending, and if you know the fate of Thad, as was confirmed in Bag of Bones, then it makes it all the grimmer.
Different Seasons (1982) -
Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption - “I hope Andy is down there. I hope I can make it across the border. I hope to see my friend and shake his hand. I hope the Pacific is as blue as it has been in my dreams. I hope.”
The Body - “I was twelve going on thirteen when I first saw a dead human being.”
Yes, I know there are four stories in Different Seasons. And, hell, Apt Pupil and The Breathing Method are pretty good too. However, the two novellas above, about the loss of childhood innocence and finding humanity in the darkest of places, are so incredible that this book had to be on the list. I mean, if I’d written them I would have just called it quits there, knowing I could never do any better. I think everyone knows these two either through this book or through the adaptations The Shawshank Redemption and Stand by Me, so I don’t need to say much. I’ll discuss them more next week when I look at the great King movies, but, yeah, these will definitely be on that list too.
The Long Walk (1979) - “The dark figure beckoned, beckoned in the rain, beckoned for him to come and walk, to come and play the game. And it was time to get started. There was still so far to walk.”
A novel that you not only have to admire for its sheer brutality and efficiency, but also for the fact that King wrote it when he was 18, which is just incredible. The story of a contest set in a dystopian future where 100 teenage boys have to walk across America at four miles an hour until only one remains, with the twist being if you stop you get shot, is as simplistic as it is horrific. Like a horrendous unfolding nightmare that you cannot look away from, the brilliantly ambiguous ending haunts you long after the final page has been turned.
There we are then. Yeah, there’s no The Shining, Carrie, Misery, Christine or Cujo, but I think it’s a strong list.
Next week I’m going to look at the various adaptations of King’s work in film and television. There is a little bit of repetition but hopefully some surprises too, as well as a controversial theory I’d like to share.
Talking of adaptations, make sure and also check out this excellent Stephen King event by Kyle Ryan and a whole host of talented folks : -
Anyway, hope you enjoyed this list of Stephen King’s best novels.
Thanks for reading. Until next time.
The Stand is my favorite! And I hate to admit it...I've never read IT.
Not through avoidance, but IT has never entered my realm the way so many other Kings have.
Such an informative read. This article has definitely made me add a few more Stephen Kings to my reading list. Some of which I had never heard of which is always great.