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The Bazaar of Bad Dreams
King's next short story collection will be out in November 2015.
Comments
Introduction
1. Mile 81 – Scribner e.
2. Premium Harmony – 2009 New Yorker
3. Batman and Robin Have an Altercation – Harpers 2012
4. The Dune – Granta 2011
5. Bad Little Kid – New; Serial
6. A Death
7. The Bone Church – poem
8. Morality – Esquire 2009
9. Afterlife – Tin House 2013
10. Ur – 2009 Amazon e.
11. Herman Wouk is Still Alive – The Atlantic 2011
12. Under the Weather – Mass Market FDNS
13. Blockade Billy – Scribner e.
14. Mister Yummy – New; Serial
15. Tommy – Playboy poetry
16. The Little Green God of Agony – A Book of Horrors 2011
17. That Bus is Another World - Esquire
18. Obits – New; Serial
19. Drunken Fireworks
20. Summer Thunder – Cemetery Dance 2013
Publishers Weekly
Renowned
[Page ]. Copyright 2015 PWxyz LLCauthor King's impressive latest collection (after 2010's Full Dark, No
Stars) wraps 20 stories and poems in fascinating commentary. Each work's
preface explains what inspired it and gives readers insight into King's
writing methods, with occasional tidbits of his daily life. The stories
themselves are meditations on mortality, destiny, and regret, all of
which showcase King's talent for exploring the human condition.
Realistic and supernatural elements sit side by side. The tragic "Herman
Wouk Is Still Alive" contrasts the charmed lives of two world-famous
poets enjoying a roadside picnic with the grim existence of two single
mothers who are taking one last road trip. "Under the Weather" tells of a
man's fierce love for his wife and the terrifying power of denial.
"Summer Thunder," a story about a man and his dog at the end of the
world, is a heart-wrenching study of inevitability and the enduring
power of love. Other standouts include "Ur," about a Kindle that links
to other worlds, and "Bad Little Kid," about a terrifying murderous
child (complete with propeller hat). This introspective collection, like
many of King's most powerful works, draws on the deepest emotions:
love, grief, fear, and hope. Agent: Chuck Verrill, Darhansoff and
Verrill. (Nov.)
Booklist
Booklist Reviews 2015 September #2For
thousands of readers, few things are more comfortable than hunkering
down with a Stephen King short story—an odd fact, considering how
uncomfortable some of those stories make us. With this, his more-or-less
tenth collection, King offers an arsenic sugaring to his poison pies:
brief intros describing the hows, wheres, and whys behind each tale,
from working out personal demons to instants of dumbstruck inspiration.
The faithful might have already read or heard a few—"Ur," "Blockade
Billy"—but King's batting average is just as strong with the unfamiliar
tales as with the familiar ones. The van strike that almost killed the
author in 1999 haunts the book; vehicular accidents crop up everywhere,
perhaps most disturbingly in "Herman Wouk Is Still Alive," a nihilistic
shocker about a dual suicide by car, and, most entertainingly, with "The
Little Green God of Agony," which King confesses is directly inspired
by his rehabilitation. Here, an exorcist of sorts extracts "pain" from a
sufferer in the shape of a globular green beastie. Though the stories
swing from sad to wistful to grim, it's this cackling sense of play that
makes Uncle Stevie so much fun to have around.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY:
Why not order a few copies? This King kid, he might be going places.
Copyright 2014 Booklist Reviews.
A gathering of short stories by an ascended master of the form.
Best known for mega-bestselling horror yarns, King (Finders Keepers, 2015, etc.) has been writing short stories for a very long time, moving among genres and honing his craft. This gathering of 20 stories, about half previously published and half new, speaks to King’s considerable abilities as a writer of genre fiction who manages to expand and improve the genre as he works; certainly no one has invested ordinary reality and ordinary objects with as much creepiness as King, mostly things that move (cars, kid’s scooters, Ferris wheels). Some stories would not have been out of place in the pulp magazines of the 1940s and ’50s, with allowances for modern references (“Somewhere far off, a helicopter beats at the sky over the Gulf. The DEA looking for drug runners, the Judge supposes”). Pulpy though some stories are, the published pieces have noble pedigrees, having appeared in places such as Granta and The New Yorker. Many inhabit the same literary universe as Raymond Carver, whom King even name-checks in an extraordinarily clever tale of the multiple realities hidden in a simple Kindle device: “What else is there by Raymond Carver in the worlds of Ur? Is there one—or a dozen, or a thousand—where he quit smoking, lived to be 70, and wrote another half a dozen books?” Like Carver, King often populates his stories with blue-collar people who drink too much, worry about money, and mistrust everything and everyone: “Every time you see bright stuff, somebody turns on the rain machine. The bright stuff is never colorfast.” Best of all, lifting the curtain, King prefaces the stories with notes about how they came about (“This one had to be told, because I knew exactly what kind of language I wanted to use”). Those notes alone make this a must for aspiring writers.
Readers seeking a tale well told will take pleasure in King’s sometimes-scary, sometimes merely gloomy pages.
John
LJ Reviews 2015 October #1
This collection begins with an introduction by King on why he writes short stories. To the reader's delight, he also provides a backstory for each tale, enticing the reader with a memory or scenario that prompted that particular selection's birth. Some of the pieces have been previously published. Some have been polished and revised—"Ur" was originally written as a "Kindle Single" for Amazon. Veering from the short story format, King published "Tommy" as a poem in Playboy in 2010. For baseball fans, watch out for the unexpected ending in "Blockade Billy." With "The Little Green God of Agony," King hints at how his life experience shapes his works. VERDICT The stories collected here are riveting and sometimes haunting, as is the author's style. Surprise endings abound. King is in a class all by himself. Be prepared to read voraciously. [See Prepub Alert, 6/1/15.]—Susan Carr, Edwardsville P.L., IL
"This is the coolest audiobook ever, with a brilliant cast," says King. "I was amazed and delighted."
THE BAZAAR OF BAD DREAMS draws together 20 incredible stories, many of them brand-new to audio. Introductions written and read by King himself precede each tale, offering a unique behind-the-scenes look at the story's origins or what inspired him to write it. Whether recounting his many hours spent on I-95 driving in a beat up station wagon to see his girlfriend (Mile 81) or wrestling with the right and wrong of his college practice of supplementing his income by writing papers for less talented students (Morality), these introductions give a rare glimpse into the complex mind of a master storyteller.
Thrilling connections run between all of the stories in THE BAZAAR OF BAD DREAMS: themes of morality, the afterlife, guilt, and what we would do differently if we could see into the future or correct the mistakes of the past. The new stories, sure to captivate and dazzle listeners, include: The Little Green God Of Agony read by Hope Davis (God of Carnage); Batman And Robin Have An Altercation read by Santino Fontana (Frozen); Premium Harmony and Summer Thunder read by Will Patton (Falling Skies); Bad Little Kid and Afterlife read by Dylan Baker (The Good Wife); A Death and The Bone Church read by Cotter Smith (Next Fall); Herman Wouk Is Still Alive read by Brooke Bloom (Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close) and Kathleen Chalfant (The Affair); Under The Weather and Mister Yummy read by Peter Friedman (Ragtime); Obits and ThatBus Is Another World read by Fred Weller (In Plain Sight).
King once again takes up the role of narrator for his previously published poem Tommy, and listeners will be familiar with other fan-favorites like Morality read by award-winning actress Mare Winningham (Amber Waves); The Dune read by Edward Herrmann (Gilmore Girls); the recently published Drunken Fireworks read by Maine humorist Tim Sample; and three longer classics including Blockade Billy read by Craig Wasson (Nightmare on Elm Street 3); UR read by Holter Graham (Hairspray); and Mile 81 read by Thomas Sadoksi (The Newsroom).
Magnificent, eerie, utterly compelling, the stories in THE BAZAAR OF BAD DREAMS comprise one of King's finest gifts to his Constant Listener—"I made them especially for you," says King. "Feel free to examine them, but please be careful. The best of them have teeth."
Be sure to check back every Wednesday and Friday after 12pm EST for a new clip.
To kick things off, an excerpt from "Premium Harmony" with an audio introduction read by Stephen himself.