The Bazaar of Bad Dreams: Stories - Softcover

King, Stephen

3.92

61,140 ratings by Goodreads

9781501127878: The Bazaar of Bad Dreams: Stories

Softcover

ISBN 10: 150112787X ISBN 13: 9781501127878

Publisher: Pocket Books, 2016

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Includes the story "Premium Harmony"--set in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine

The masterful #1 New York Times bestselling story collection from O. Henry Prize winner Stephen King that includes twenty-one iconic stories with accompanying autobiographical comments on when, why and how he came to write (or rewrite) each one.

For more than thirty-five years, Stephen King has dazzled readers with his genius as a writer of short fiction. In this new collection he introduces each story with a passage about its origins or his motivations for writing it.

As Entertainment Weekly said about this collection: "Bazaar of Bad Dreams is bursting with classic King terror, but what we love most are the thoughtful introductions he gives to each tale that explain what was going on in his life as he wrote it."

There are thrilling connections between stories; themes of morality, the afterlife, guilt, what we would do differently if we could see into the future or correct the mistakes of the past. In "Afterlife," a man who died of colon cancer keeps reliving the same life, repeating his mistakes over and over again. Several stories feature characters at the end of life, revisiting their crimes and misdemeanors. Others address what happens when someone discovers that he has supernatural powers--the columnist who kills people by writing their obituaries in "Obits;" the old judge in "The Dune" who, as a boy, canoed to a deserted island and saw names written in the sand, people who then died in freak accidents. In "Morality," King looks at how a marriage and two lives fall apart after the wife and husband enter into what seems, at first, a devil's pact they can win.

"I made these stories especially for you," says King. "Feel free to examine them, but please be careful. The best of them have teeth."

Stories include:
-Mile 81
-Premium Harmony
-Batman and Robin Have an Altercation
-The Dune
-Bad Little Kid
-A Death
-The Bone Church
-Morality
-Afterlife
-Ur
-Herman Wouk Is Still Alive
-Under the Weather
-Blockade Billy
-Mister Yummy
-Tommy
-The Little Green God of Agony
-Cookie Jar
-That Bus Is Another World
-Obits
-Drunken Fireworks
-Summer Thunder

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

Review:

He seduces you with an intimate author's note introducing each tale, then proceeds to chill you to the bone. Do not read before bed (Daily Mail)

The Bazaar of Bad Dreams is the title it more than lives up to, but just as interesting as the stories themselves are their prefaces, in which he reveals what inspired each one. Who besides King would conjure a flesh-eating station wagon from a drive to see his college sweetheart? (Observer)

This collection of short works... reveals King's mastery of the novella (Guardian)

A tense inventory of stories... King manages to portray a remarkable depth of character within the swiftness of a short story and manoeuvres a vast range of plots...There are treasures to be found in The Bazaar of Bad Dreams and those who love King... will find much to savour (Independent)

King is a laureate of small towns; his ear for dialogue is unerring ... He is also one of those rare authors who can write well about childhood. Most potently, King can sketch a full-blooded character in just a few pen strokes. This gift comes to the fore in his short stories, where every syllable counts (Sunday Telegraph)

A more versatile writer than you might imagine (Sunday Times)

Some of King's strongest work in recent years brought together to form an excellent collection (Sci-Fi Bulletin)

Short stories have a famous place in the King oeuvre, with the likes of The Body and Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption finding second lives on the big screen as Stand By Me and Shawshank Redemption... Like all the greats, though, his ability to grip the reader's mind, body and soul with his prose makes it all look easy (USA Today)

A meaty collection with interesting insights into the creative process of a writer who caused many sleepless nights (Washington Post)

One of the best aspects of his new collection of short stories, The Bazaar of Bad Dreams, is the commentary that prefaces each one, describing the creative process through which it travelled from brain to page (GQ)

Book Description:

The master storyteller at his best delivers a generous, thrilling new collection of stories featuring revelatory autobiographical comments on when, why and how he came to write each story.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.