Creepshow was the first screenplay Stephen King wrote, if I recall correctly. Directed by George Romero, it consists of three short stories and a framework. Stephen King's son, author Joe Hill stars in the framing story while King himself plays the main character in one of the shorts.
Joe Hill is the little boy with the voodoo doll, and King is the one you can see in the thumbnail, behind the doctor. While we're looking at Stephen and Joe, here's Tabitha at around the same time.
And a 2103 interview with Owen King and Joe Hill on being the children of authors and their own new novels. And Joe's children, which I didn't realise he had, because I'm a reader, not a stalker.
My favourite extract from the interview;
How did you decide to spend your life writing fiction?
OK: I hope Joe has a good answer, because it was never like I read a book and said, “That’s what I wanna do.” It was more like I loved to read, I liked to tell stories, I practiced; eventually, it started to seem viable.
JH: I don’t think there was exactly one aha moment. But you’d come home from school and Mom would be in her room clattering away on this tomato-colored typewriter and my dad would be up in his office working on a word processor with the glowing green letters on the black screen, and they’d both be making stuff up. So for myself, by the time I was 11, 12, I’d kind of absorbed the idea that you should spend a little time each afternoon making stuff up and eventually you’d be paid really well for it.
Back to Creepshow. It's pretty silly. Creepy at times, very eighties, very camp. There's also a comic book, but it's ridiculously expensive.
Now for Different Seasons.
Some people like Apt Pupil. Some like The Body - or Stand By Me, as they called the movie. And some just love Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption. But me, I like The Breathing Method and Sandra Stansfield the best.
Sandra is a woman in the mould of Irene Adler. Not Sherlock's lover Irene, but someone closer to the original. A determined, intelligent, strong woman who runs rings around the men in her life. And, like Irene's appearance in A Scandel in Bohemia, we see her through the eyes of a man watching the man who admires her. Not loves in a romantic way, but admires. Looks up to.
It's Different Seasons that contains the anecdote where King's editor worries about him being typecast. It's when they decide to publish 'salem's Lot after Carrie. Well King is typecast, but he doesn't seem to mind. I get the idea that you can sum up his philosophy of writing with the idea 'you take what you've got and you do what you can. And if you can pay the bills with it, so much the better'. He writes the kinds of books he likes. In the epilogue of Different Seasons, he acknowledges that he isn't a great literary writer, but also that he doesn't make a habit of reading great literature. Which sounds fair enough to me.
As we all know, Shawshank became a very successful movie. Apt Pupil was also filmed, with Sir Ian McKellen as Kurt Dussander.
James Smythe agrees with my feelings on The Breathing Method. He skipped Creepshow, also fair.
Now for another checkpoint, just because. I last updated this list on the 17th of August. The ones in red I have read previously, while the ones in blue were new to me. I've also included the first published novels of Stephen King's wife, two sons, and daughter-in-law. I have not forgotten about Naomi King, but since she isn't a public figure in any sense it'd be kind of weird to go and look stuff up about her.
Owen King did contribute to a collection of baseball stories in 2003, but I've decided not to count that. Because I don't like baseball.
Carrie - 1974 - June 15th 2013It's Different Seasons that contains the anecdote where King's editor worries about him being typecast. It's when they decide to publish 'salem's Lot after Carrie. Well King is typecast, but he doesn't seem to mind. I get the idea that you can sum up his philosophy of writing with the idea 'you take what you've got and you do what you can. And if you can pay the bills with it, so much the better'. He writes the kinds of books he likes. In the epilogue of Different Seasons, he acknowledges that he isn't a great literary writer, but also that he doesn't make a habit of reading great literature. Which sounds fair enough to me.
As we all know, Shawshank became a very successful movie. Apt Pupil was also filmed, with Sir Ian McKellen as Kurt Dussander.
James Smythe agrees with my feelings on The Breathing Method. He skipped Creepshow, also fair.
Now for another checkpoint, just because. I last updated this list on the 17th of August. The ones in red I have read previously, while the ones in blue were new to me. I've also included the first published novels of Stephen King's wife, two sons, and daughter-in-law. I have not forgotten about Naomi King, but since she isn't a public figure in any sense it'd be kind of weird to go and look stuff up about her.
Owen King did contribute to a collection of baseball stories in 2003, but I've decided not to count that. Because I don't like baseball.
'Salem's Lot - 1975 - June 30th 2013
The Shining - 1977 - July 28th 2013
Rage - 1977 - July 31st 2013
Night Shift - 1978 - August 28th 2013
The Stand - 1978 - March 20th 2014
The Long Walk - 1979 - March 23rd 2014
The Dead Zone - 1979 - June 2014
Firestarter - 1980 - August 16th 2014
- 06/13 to 17/8/14 - 9
Roadwork - 1981 - 23rd August 2014
Danse Macabre - 1981 - 7th September 2014
- BONUS: Small World (Tabitha King) - 10th September 2014
Cujo - 1981 - 20th September 2014
The Running Man - 1982- 22nd September 2014
The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger - 1982 - 30th September 2014
Creepshow - 1982 - 1st October 2014
Different Seasons - 1982 - 24th October 2014
- 17/8/14 to 25/10/14 - 7 (16)
Christine - 1983
Pet Sematary - 1983
Cycle of the Werewolf - 1983
The Talisman - 1984
Thinner - 1984
Skeleton Crew - 1985
It - 1986
The Eyes of the Dragon - 1987
The Dark Tower II: The Drawing of the Three - 1987
Misery - 1987
The Tommyknockers - 1987
Nightmares in the Sky - 1988
The Dark Half - 1989
Four Past Midnight - 1990
The Dark Tower III: The Waste Lands - 1991
Needful Things - 1991
Gerald's Game - 1992
Dolores Claiborne - 1992
Nightmares & Dreamscapes - 1993
Insomnia - 1994
Rose Madder - 1995
The Green Mile - 1996
Desperation - 1996
The Regulators - 1996
Six Stories - 1997
The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass - 1997
Bag of Bones - 1998
Storm of the Century - 1999
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon - 1999
The New Lieutenant's Rap - 1999
Hearts in Atlantis - 1999
Blood and Smoke - 1999
"Riding the Bullet" - 2000
On Writing - 2000
Secret Windows - 2000
The Plant - 2000
Dreamcatcher - 2001
Black House (with Peter Straub) -2001
Everything's Eventual - 2002
From a Buick 8 - 2002
The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla - 2003
The Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah - 2004
The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower - 2004
Faithful - 2004
- BONUS: 20th Century Ghosts (Joe Hill) - Jan 2005
- BONUS: Josie & Jack (Kelly Braffet) - Feb 2005
- BONUS: We're All in This Together (Owen King) - 2005
The Colorado Kid - 2005
Cell - 2006
Lisey's Story - 2006
Blaze - 2007
Duma Key - 2008
Just After Sunset - 2008
Stephen King Goes to the Movies - 2009
Ur - 2009
Under the Dome - 2009
Blockade Billy - 2010
Full Dark, No Stars - 2010
Mile 81 - 2011
11/22/63 - 2011
American Vampire (with Scott Snyder) - 2011
"Throttle" (with Joe Hill) - 2012
The Dark Tower: The Wind Through the Keyhole - 2012
A Face in the Crowd (with Stewart O'Nan) - 2012
"In the Tall Grass" (with Joe Hill) - 2012
"GUNS" - 2013
Ghost Brothers of Darkland County - 2013
Joyland - 2013
The Dark Man: An Illustrated Poem - 2013
Doctor Sleep - 2013
Mr. Mercedes - 2014
Revival - November 2014
Finders Keepers - 2015
I've now read 16 out of 86 books, which is a big jump from the 9 I'd read last time. It's 18.6%, which feels a lot more respectable. It's helped that I made a rule about reading at least 25 pages a day, and once I'd hit that, I'd often carry on for quite a bit longer.
There's a lot of rereads coming up. Christine and Pet Semetary, neither of which I remember particularly enjoying. Especially not Christine, which I've described as 300 pages worth of plot in a 700+ page novel. I'm going to see if the library has it; don't feel like buying a copy.
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