I couldn't believe that I had never come across this short story collection of Stephen King's before. Obviously, it's Stephen King, so that's a shocker right there. Plus, in the bibliography of Stephen King, I always look forward to his short stories because they allow him to stretch his writerly wings. So often people like to pigeon-hole him into the prototypical Horror Writer and while that's true, the guy has game in all sorts of writing styles. You can always count on his short story collections to have a few nonfiction or nonhorror stories to highlight the fact.
This was the fifth selection of my chronological Stephen King bibliography reading project and the first short story collection. The book contains quite a few well-known stories, most notably "Children of the Corn," made into a cadre of horror films. I'd never read the story and haven't seen any of the films so I enjoyed discovering it. (For the equally unwashed, the story follows a bickering couple on the brink of divorce as they road-trip across the country. In the middle of Nebraska, surrounded by cornfields, they come across a deserted town that has been taken over by the town's children. Turns out the children worship a god/monster who lives in the corn and has them sacrifice anyone over the age of 19. Kids!) "The Lawnmower Man" was also part of the collection, but was not at all the same story as the movie that steals its name (a source of court-settled annoyance for King).
It also had a prequel and sequel to 'Salem's Lot - the former a series of letters from the haunted house's new owner in the 1800s as he discovers and then falls victim to its history; the latter showing the danger of the town even after it's been deserted and burned to the ground - as well as a story about a group of young people that survive a superflu that kills a majority of the population, kind of a precursor to The Stand.
As is the case with any short story collection, there are as many duds as there are superstars. There was one stretch when it seemed like every story was about someone or something normal turning into a big bad monster, be it an industrial folding machine, the town drunk, a former astronaut's own hands, factory rats, all the trucks of the world. Not that all of them were bad - I rather enjoyed "Trucks," in particular. But still, it was getting kind of old. But then the rest of the stories arrived. My personal favorites (in addition to the 'Salem's Lot collection and "Children of the Corn") were "Sometimes They Come Back," about a young man haunted by the ghosts of hooligans who murdered his brother years ago; "Strawberry Spring," about a guy who may or may not turn into a serial killer every few years when a strawberry spring arrives; and "Quitters, Inc.," about a company that goes to extreme lengths to get its clients to quit smoking.
And as I had suspected, there were a couple of nonhorror stories to show King's writing chops, a pair of heartwrenching tales that dealt with the death of loved ones. "The Last Rung on the Ladder" is about a brother dealing with his estranged sister's death, while "The Woman in the Room" focuses on an adult son internally debating whether he should mercy-kill his mother while she suffers on her deathbed (a situation King had experience with in his personal life).
In all, it didn't disappoint, as King's short story collections rarely do. And after Rage, it was nice to get back on the pro-King bandwagon.
Up next (for the King collection): my personal favorite, The Stand.
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