Stephen King, My Favorite Author

I read, a lot. Most people know that about me. When people ask me who my favorite author is, I never hesitate to give them the answer.

My favorite author is Stephen King.

Yep, that makes me feel a little cliche sometimes. As a reader of horror fiction it seems a little TOO fitting that my favorite author would be King.

I can't help it though. There is just something about his writing that pulls me in. I fall in love with his characters. Sometimes I'm sad to see a book end, because you'll never really see those people again, though they might be mentioned in another novel.

Another thing about his books is how well they all merge together. A lot of them take place in the same town, so reading a new book often feels like coming home!

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Author Photo taken from Stephen King.com's Press Biography.

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All photos (excluding images on any module links) on this lens were taken by Winona Morris or Robert Morris (her husband) unless otherwise attributed ©2013 to present.

So here is a look at my Stephen King bookshelf.

I have 3 other bookshelves with authros mixed all in together. THIS ONE is all Stephen King. Well, all King if you ignore the one JK Rowling book that got stuck up there, and the walking dead graphic novel on the bottom shelf.

And this isn't even ALL of them. A couple of them are on different shelves right now for one reason or another. I need to clean house and get it all together!

There are also magazines on the shelf with articles in them by King, and various library "freebies" that had him in it whenever he had a new book published.

There is also a little room left for me to add more books, as I always buy all of his new ones, usually as they come out.

The First King Book I Read

I don't remember what order I read all the novels in AFTER the first one, but I will always remember the first one I read.

The first time I ever read a novel by Stephen King was while I was still in school. I was going through my werewolf phase, where I wanted to read anything and everything about werewolves. So when I found Cycle of the Werewolf on the library shelf, I grabbed it up.

Cycle of the Werewolf is fully illustrated, which is an added bonus. It followed the monthly murders by a werewolf who is hunting the town of Tarker's Mills (a fictional town in Maine, as are most of King's settings).

Also, like many King novels, the protagonist is a young boy, Marty, only 11 years old.

I ran into a problem when I tried to add a copy of Cycle of the Werewolf to my own Stephen King collection. I could not find it! It had been out of print for some time. And this was BEFORE I had access to Amazon. I eventually found a copy at Best Buy, but when reading it found it was MISSING A PAGE!

Oh, the horror!

I eventually found another copy in a used book store, so now I have 2 copies of the novel that I almost never had one of.

These days Amazon has made it increasingly easy for me to find any Stephen King novels I DON'T have, and add them to my collection. If you want your own copy of Cycle of the Werewolf, you can purchase it right now instead of having to hunt it down over a matter of years.

For every Favorite Author there is a list of Favorite Books by that author.

King is a prolific writer, so it can be hard to narrow down everything he has written into a small selection of my favorites.

The 5 novels listed below are at the top of my list though. They've all been read by me multiple times, and are the ones I would recommend to people who have never read a King novel.

While I like most of his novels, I have not historically been a fan of Stephen King's movies. I understand how they must make some changes for a book to translate into film, but the films always felt lacking to me.

I particularly hate it when they change the endings.

For example....

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WARNING, SPOILERS FOR CUJO AND THE MIST BLOW.

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I remember having a debate with a non-reader about the story of "Cujo."

You know Cujo, right? The large and loveable St. Bernard dog who was happily chasing rabbits when he was bitten by a rabid bat. Then sadly this beloved family pet ends up holding mother and young son hostage in their broken down car.

Typical movie ending.....the mean doggy is defeated, mother and son are rescued, and everyone lives happily ever after.

The novel ending was much more depressing. The little boy dies.

Then there was the Mist, in which the change to the movie ending vs the novel ending are reversed.

In "The Mist" a father and son are trapped in a grocery store after a bad storm, by a strange mist that rolls up and the horrible creatures that live in it. Eventually they have to leave the grocery store and hope to find help somewhere.

In the written version there is hope. The survivors hear a radio transmission and are heading towards, hopefully, safety where it comes from.

The movie ending is horrific and morbid. The father, the son, and the other survivors, do escape the grocery store only to find themselves in a worse situation. They have one gun, a few bullets and decide suicide is the best way out. The father kills the son, his friends, but doesn't have a bullet left for himself so he offers himself to the creatures of the mist.....As the army comes to the rescue mere minutes after the deed was done.

Of course, I hated the changes to BOTH endings. So its impossible to make me happy with a happy ending or a sad one apparently.

Even though I think that ALL the books are better, there are a couple of Stephen King's movies that I didn't 100% hate.

The Latest Novel from Stephen King

Stephen King's newest novel is "Dr. Sleep."

It isn't out YET, but will be out soon. The release date is September 24, 2013.

In this one we get to revisit one of our favorite characters. Young Danny Torrance survived the horrors at the Overlook Hotel in "The Shining." He is now a middle aged man, who is trying to save a young girl (who shares his powers) from a group of people who mean her terrible harm.

This is not the first time we've gotten to revisit a child from a past book as an adult in another. It was also done in "Black House" with Peter Straub, in which the protaganist is Jack Sawyer, who was the star of "The Talisman."

Another awesome thing about Amazon is that you can PRE ORDER novels. And, if the price drops at any point between the time you preorder and the time you get the book, then you pay the LOWEST PRICE and get a refund for the rest.

It really is a win/win situation!

Are you a King fan? What is your favorite novel? Least favorite? Do you prefer novels by a different author? If so, recommend a book I might like as well!