- Hardcover: 320 pages
- Publisher: New Page Books,US; illustrated edition edition (30 Jun 2001)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 1564144852
- ISBN-13: 978-1564144850
- Product Dimensions: 24.9 x 18 x 2.3 cm
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,313,846 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Essential Stephen King
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Product Description
Synopsis
Working from a body of King's work numbering more than 550 individual creations, Spignesi lists all of King's writings in every genre and then determines King's top 101, a monumental list that includes novels, novellas, short stories, poems screenplays, nonfiction books and essays, unpublished works, and much more. What made the number one spot? The novel that Spignesi and many others consider King's magnum opus: It. What made the number 101 spot? A short story Stephen King wrote when he was 12 called "The Thing at the Bottom of the Well" in which King conceived the ancestral grandfather of the monster in It, 25 years before he would even begin writing his epic tomc. The Dead Zone, The Shining, Salem's Lot, Misery, The Stand, Carrie, Firestarter, Cujo, The Green Mile, Pet Sematary, Christine, Riding the Bullet, The Plant, The Dark Tower series, Insomnia - the best-selling novels are all here. But also included in the ranking are many of King's wonderful short stories and novellas - "Rita Hayworth" and "Shawshank Redemption", "The Mist", "Survivor Type", "The Last Rung on the Ladder", "Gramma", and Kings O. Henry-award-winning New Yorker story, "The Man in the Black Suit.The Essential Stephen King provides an unbiased, uncompromising review of King's work by an acknowledged King authority. As such, it is a must for all serious and casual Stephen King fans as well as all lovers of superb contemporary literature.
Inside This Book
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First Sentence
It is more than just a novel. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
It is more than just a novel. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
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11 reviews
13 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Utterly uncritical, and duller than dishwater...
23 May 2005
Format:Hardcover
The problem with the book is that it's utterly uncritical of the entirety of Stephen King's work - it's simply a basic recounting of the novel's plot, followed up with a few bits of trivia and the author's "What I Liked" section.
The problem is that the author of this book likes everything about Stephen King, even when he's talking about King's weaker material. You could write the words "I love Stephen King and everything he's ever done!" on an index card, then post it next to the Amazon search results for Stephen King and you'd have this book in a nutshell.
Plus, he refers to the Gor novels as "wildly popular". Uh, no.
-Darren MacLennan
The problem is that the author of this book likes everything about Stephen King, even when he's talking about King's weaker material. You could write the words "I love Stephen King and everything he's ever done!" on an index card, then post it next to the Amazon search results for Stephen King and you'd have this book in a nutshell.
Plus, he refers to the Gor novels as "wildly popular". Uh, no.
-Darren MacLennan
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
A Good Ranking, Even Better Writing
3 Sep 2001
Format:Hardcover
Spignesi is probably the biggest King fan out there. He knows every book, novella, short story and essay the man has written in and out. There isn't one work he isn't totally familiar with. I actually wonder if he knows more about King's writing than King does himself.
In The Essential Stephen King, Spignesi tries to rank the 101 best things king has ever written. And although every major King work is featured (all of the novels are there, so are the novellas), many of King's best short stories didn't make the cut (where are The Night Flyer and Lawnmower Man?). And I was disappointed when I saw some of my favorite King novels ranked so high up the list (Dolores Claiborne, The Dark Half, Needful Things and Storm Of the Century aren't even near the top 10!). Of course, this is a fan ranking his favourite works. No two fans will think alike.
The reason the book is so powerful is because of the author's writing skills. Spignesi writes with passion and dedication. Every sentence is like a love confession for the King of horror. And I also enjoyed the articles written by King fans/experts at the end of the book. This books makes you want to revisit King's best writings. It's a book every King fan will enjoy and will use time and time again as a reference manual.
6 of 8 people found the following review helpful
A wonderful resource for all levels of King Fans
26 Jun 2001
Format:Hardcover
Stephen J. Spignesi has been a passionate follower of Stephen King's work for a good number of years. His extraordinary (and expansive) resource - The Stephen King Encyclopedia - placed him at the forefront of King experts. With this new volume, Spignesi examines what he determines to be the prolific author's top 101 works (actually 102 including a special note for a non-fiction eulogy that King wrote following the death of John Lennon, which Spignesi places in "a class of its own"). Although the rankings are primarily Spignesi's opinions and not all of King's wide fan base will necessarily agree with the author's opinions, in the end, Spignesi makes a strong case arguing that King is an essential author of modern American literature who should not be so easily pigeonholed into the "just a horror writer" category, but whose works can (and should) be subjected to the same tedious academic scrutiny that Authors such as Steinbeck and Faulkner have undergone.
Efficiently written with energetic synopses for each of the selections as well as a qualifying explanation as to why the particular work received its ranking, The Essential Stephen King is a wonderful resource for all levels of King Fans to either learn of his exceptional works, or merely revisit them along with Spignesi.
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