International bestselling author Stephen King is in terrifying top form with his first collection of short stories in almost a decade. In this spine-chilling compilation, King takes readers down a road less traveled (for good reason) in the blockbuster e-Book "Riding the Bullet," bad table service turns bloody when you stop in for "Lunch at the Gotham Café," and terror becomes déjàvu all over again when you get "That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French" -- along with eleven more stories that will keep you awake until daybreak. Enter a nightmarish mindscape of unrelenting horror and shocking revelations that could only come from the imagination of the greatest storyteller of our time.
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Amazon.com Review
In his introduction to Everything's Eventual, horror author extraordinaire Stephen King describes how he used a deck of playing cards to select the order in which these 14 tales of the macabre would appear. Judging by the impact of these stories, from the first words of the darkly fascinating "Autopsy Room Four" to the haunting final pages of "Luckey Quarter," one can almost believe King truly is guided by forces from beyond.
His first collection of short stories since the release of Nightmares & Dreamscapes in 1993, Everything's Eventual represents King at his most undiluted. The short story format showcases King's ability to spook readers using the most mundane settings (a yard sale) and comfortable memories (a boyhood fishing excursion). The dark tales collected here are some of King's finest, including an O. Henry Prize winner and "Riding the Bullet," published originally as an e-book and at one time expected by some to be the death knell of the physical publishing world. True to form, each of these stories draws the reader into King's slightly off-center world from the first page, developing characters and atmosphere more fully in the span of 50 pages than many authors can in a full novel.
For most rabid King fans, chief among the tales in this volume will be "The Little Sisters of Eluria," a novella that first appeared in the fantasy collection Legends, set in King's ever-expanding Dark Tower universe. In this story, set prior to the first Dark Tower volume, the reader finds Gunslinger Roland of Gilead wounded and under the care of nurses with very dubious intentions. Also included in this collection are "That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French," the story of a woman's personal hell; "1408," in which a writer of haunted tour guides finally encounters the real thing; "Everything's Eventual," the title story, about a boy with a dream job that turns out to be more of a nightmare; and "L.T.'s Theory of Pets," a story of divorce with a bloody surprise ending.
King also includes an introductory essay on the lost art of short fiction and brief explanatory notes that give the reader background on his intentions and inspirations for each story. As with any occasion when King directly addresses his dear Constant Readers, his tone is that of a camp counselor who's almost apologetic for the scare his fireside tales are about to throw into his charges, yet unwilling to soften the blow. And any campers gathered around this author's fire would be wise to heed his warnings, for when King goes bump in the night, it's never just a branch on the window. --Benjamin Reese --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
From Publishers Weekly
Eyebrows arched in literary circles when, in 1995, the New Yorker published Stephen King's "The Man in the Black Suit," a scorchingly atmospheric tale of a boy's encounter with the Devil in backwoods Maine. The story went on to win the 1996 O. Henry Award for Best Short Story, confirming what King fans have known for years that the author is not only immensely popular but immensely talented, a modern-day counterpart to Twain, Hawthorne, Dickens. "The Man in the Black Suit" appears in this hefty collection, King's first since Nightmares and Dreamscapes (1993), along with three other extraordinary New Yorker tales: "All That You Love Will Be Carried Away," an intensely moving story of a suicidal traveling salesman who collects graffiti; "The Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is in French," about a woman caught in a fatal loop of deja vu; and "The Death of Jack Hamilton," a gritty, witty tale of Dillinger's gang on the lam. Together, they make up what King, in one of many author asides, calls his "literary stories," which he contrasts to the "all-out screamers" though most of the stories here seem a mix of the two, with the distinction as real as a line on a map. "Autopsy Room Four," a black-humor horror about a man who wakes up paralyzed in a morgue and about to be autopsied, displays a mastery of craft, and "1408," a haunted hotel-room story that first surfaced on the audio book Blood and Smoke, engenders a sense of profound unease, of dread, as surely as do the elegant work of Blackwood or Machen or, if one prefers, Baudelaire or Sartre. King's talent doesn't always burn at peak, of course, and there are lesser tales here, too, but none that most writers wouldn't be proud to claim, like the slight but affecting "Luckey," about a poor cleaning woman given a "luckey" coin as a tip, or "L.T.'s Theory of Pets," which King cites as his favorite of the collection, but whose shift from humor to horror comes off as arbitrary, at least on the page (the story first appeared in audiobook form).Then there's "Riding the Bullet," the novella that put King on the cover of Time and rattled the publishing community not for its content a suspenseful encounter with the dead but for its mode of delivery, as an e-book, and "The Little Sisters of Eleuria," another resonant entry in King's self-proclaimed "magnus opus" about Roland the Gunslinger (Roland will return, King lets on, in a now-finished 900-page Dark Tower novel, Wolves of the Calla). Fourteen stories, most of them gems, featuring an array of literary approaches, plus an opinionated intro from King about the "(Almost) Lost Art" of the short story: this will be the biggest selling story collection of the year, and why not? No one does it better.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.
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More About the Author
Stephen King is the author of more than fifty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. Among his most recent are the Dark Tower novels, Cell, From a Buick 8, Everything's Eventual, Hearts in Atlantis, The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, and Bag of Bones. His acclaimed nonfiction book, On Writing, was also a bestseller. He is the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
189 of 199 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
King's first collection of short stories since 1993 ("Nightmares and Dreamscapes") shows the horror master still at the top of his game. There isn't a dud in the bunch. King chose the order of the stories by shuffling all the spades in a deck of cards plus the joker; and the serendipitous result, he says, created a nice balance between "the literary stories and the all-out screamers." But these stories are already a nice balance in themselves: eerie and spare, chilling and vivid, full of strong voices and real characters getting a jolt of terror out of an ordinary day.
Like the horror writer in "The Road Virus Heads North," who stops off at a yard sale on his way home. Or the divorcing couple who get the true measure of one another in a bloody encounter with a maitre d' in "Lunch at the Gotham Café." Or the woman in the acidulous marriage whose sense of déjà vu keeps getting sickeningly stronger on her second honeymoon in "That Feeling, You Can Only Say What It Is In French."
An O.Henry prize winner (and one of King's least favorite stories), first published in "The New Yorker," reveals the roots of an old man's fear in a boyhood encounter with the devil on an idyllic stretch of trout stream in rural Maine. Another "New Yorker" story, "All That You Love Will Be Carried Away," is a poignant, haunting tale of a lonely traveling salesman whose graffiti collection engenders a life or death dilemma.
The story King says is his favorite, because of its unexpected shift from humor to horror, "L.T.'s Theory of Pets," turns on a gruesome twist at the end, which didn't stick with me half so much as the chilling aftermath of a choice forced on a college kid during his hitchhiking encounter with Death in "Riding the Bullet," first made famous as an e-book.
In a Dark Tower story, "The Little Sisters of Eluria," prequel to King's seven-volume (book five, now completed, is 900 pages) "magnum opus," Roland is attacked by green mutants and wakes in a gleaming hospital tent staffed by "nurses of death instead of life." Teeming with romance, adventure, horror and heroics, this story has a literally creepy ending.
The title story, "Everything's Eventual" features a naďve young high school drop-out with a certain talent but no clear ambition, who discovers his dream job is a nightmare. Though the stories are in a randomly chosen order, "Autopsy Room Four" is the ideal opener, a pitch-perfect blend of black humor and visceral horror told by a golfer who wakes up on an autopsy table. Inspired by a "Twilight Zone" episode, King gives it a thoroughly up-to-date twist. The poignantly low-key "Luckey," about a motel chambermaid who receives a "luckey" quarter as a tip, is an appropriate closer too. Gritty, but plaintive too, the story holds a hopeful note.
Most stories are told in the first person and King's narrators - young, old or middle-aged - seem to speak right into your ear, so immediate and expressive are their voices. They are, mostly, ordinary people whose ordinary lives take a heart-stopping turn. There are also a couple of successful horror writers and a few motel rooms, including the haunted one, room "1408."
King accompanies each story with a short note about its inspiration and development, and sometimes a few words about how the writing went and what he thinks of the story now. An introduction laments the lack of outlets for the short story form and shares a few of his marketing ventures.
Short stories, says King, do not come easy. His are pared down and cut close to plot, character and setting, with each of these elements honed and none of the manic digressions you sometimes find in his novels. A terrific collection, imagination harnessed.
94 of 105 people found the following review helpful
By sweetmolly
Format:Hardcover
Stephen King just gets better and better. His fourteen short stories highlight his mastery of a difficult form of writing. I particularly liked his down home remarks at the beginning or end of each story explaining a little about how he happened to write it and what he was trying to achieve. King has the uncanny ability to talk directly to the reader, one-on-one as if you are the only person in the world.
The stories have been previously published (I had read the four that first appeared in "The New Yorker"), but I was delighted to have them in book form and reread them with great pleasure. For all you Dark Tower fans, there is an excellent addition, "The Little Sisters of Eluria."
Not one of the fourteen stories disappointed me; they were varied: humorous, reflective, and scary. If you think the Old Master might have lost his touch at scaring you sideways, try "The Road Virus Heads North." Some particular favorites: the title piece "Everything's Eventual" told by an oh-so-believable teenaged boy made this sinister tale poignant as well as inevitable. King saw a handsome couple arguing in a fancy New York restaurant and somehow came up with "Lunch at the Gotham Café" (see cover of book for illustration. Be sure to check the back cover as well!). I'll let SK tell you about the whys of "In the Deathroom."
"This is a slightly Kafkaesque story about an interrogation room in the South American version of Hell. In such stories, the fellow being interrogated usually ends up spilling everything and then being killed (or losing his mind). I wanted to write one with a happier ending, however unreal that might be. And here it is."
But we know in our hearts that it isn't going to be that "happy," don't we?
"Everything's Eventual" is an unqualified blue ribbon group of short stories. I predict new King fans on the horizon
14 of 14 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In this collection of 14 short stories by everyone's favorite boogeyman Stephen King, there is a one particular story in here called "1408" that is in my honest opinion, the scariest short story that King has published to date. It deals with a haunted hotel room and I'm not telling you anymore than that. What I will say is that I've read this one story at least ten times and it never fails to make the hairs on my neck stand straight up.
If you, dear Amazon shopper, like the feeling of being terrified this is what I suggest:
Get your hands on a copy of this book. When you've done that, make sure you save "1408" for a night that you're alone. Try to read this one when you're nice and relaxed and really try to let yourself get immersed in King's masterful storytelling. I guarantee that at least nine out of ten of you that follow my suggestions will get spooked something awful.
As for the rest of the book, it really is a return to form for King as far as his short story collections go ("Nightmares and Dreamscapes", the book and not the TNT series, wasn't all that great save for a couple). Most of the stories here are hits rather than misses and "1408" isn't the only story here that will give you the chills. "The Man in the Black Suit" is pretty intense (not to mention King won an O. Henry Award for that one). "Riding the Bullet", the famed e-book from a few years back is here also, as well as a nice little side tale from the Dark Tower series titled "The Little Sisters of Eleuria".
I recommend this book to the fans and the non-fans alike as this is a great collection. Plus, "1408" is calling.
If you, dear Amazon shopper, like the feeling of being terrified this is what I suggest:
Get your hands on a copy of this book. When you've done that, make sure you save "1408" for a night that you're alone. Try to read this one when you're nice and relaxed and really try to let yourself get immersed in King's masterful storytelling. I guarantee that at least nine out of ten of you that follow my suggestions will get spooked something awful.
As for the rest of the book, it really is a return to form for King as far as his short story collections go ("Nightmares and Dreamscapes", the book and not the TNT series, wasn't all that great save for a couple). Most of the stories here are hits rather than misses and "1408" isn't the only story here that will give you the chills. "The Man in the Black Suit" is pretty intense (not to mention King won an O. Henry Award for that one). "Riding the Bullet", the famed e-book from a few years back is here also, as well as a nice little side tale from the Dark Tower series titled "The Little Sisters of Eleuria".
I recommend this book to the fans and the non-fans alike as this is a great collection. Plus, "1408" is calling.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
arresting, as usual
some of these tales are fantastic (like 1409!!), i believe a few have been published elsewhere, vintage KING, as expected
Published 14 days ago by lisa thompson
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great!
Can never have enough of Stephen King. This is definitely one of the best books, and the quality of the copy I received was great! Read more
Published 24 days ago by Alyse
5.0 out of 5 stars
An excellent way to get back into reading!
Everything's Eventual will draw you in very quickly, and because they are short stories, they move fast and hold interest. Read more
Published 28 days ago by Peter
5.0 out of 5 stars
A pleasant surprise. This is top! One of the best!!
I bought this book because one of the best movies I've ever seen in my life is 1408, so I wanted to read it written as a short story. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Andreia1974Brazil
5.0 out of 5 stars
As always...
King has written so many novels that sometimes you forget that the short stories are very entertaining in their own right.
Published 2 months ago by C.J.T.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great Stories!
I love his short stories! I can't seem to ever get enough of them. I wish he would just publish everything he writes but I'm sure he won't because its way too much.
Published 3 months ago by john wesley
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good read, interesting stories
Good book, quick read. 14 stories, not all scary per say, but all very interesting. This work shows King's versatile side.
Published 4 months ago by E Smith
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thanks!
These books are part of my Stephen King collection. Haven't read it yet, but I am sure I will enjoy it as I have the rest of my collection.
Published 4 months ago by Allison
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great
This book is another great one by Stephen King .He never fails to write something you wont want to put down.The book was in great condition and came on time!
Published 5 months ago by Amy Ott
4.0 out of 5 stars
short stories !
Among the 15 stories in this book,The Man In The Black Suit and The Death Of Jack Hamilton are outstanding to me.
Published 7 months ago by JPV
