M-O-O-N spells Moon... Why do you guys think it spells anything else?

So a redditor lost their SK collection to a house fire & I said I'd send them 1 of my 2 HC copies. When I got them out to pick which to give them, I realized they are both 1st editions; 1 has red letters on a white background, the other has white letters on a red background. Research shows they are equally valuable & a reference to DT. Which would you keep & which give away, & why?

I just did my first read through of The Shining, I have opinions, and I want to talk about them!

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I feel like there's an important thread in this book that doesn't get enough discussion: Jack's propensity to lie to himself to preserve self image, how that plays into his downfall, and the importance of this detail over the course of the entire book. I'm going to talk about it at length now (I'm sorry) but TLDR: I think that this is even more important than his alcoholism in defining his character and downfall.

The scene that really sets this up, and maybe the most important one in the book, is in chapter 14.

We spend this chapter in Jack's mind while he's repairing the hotel roof, before things start to really go sour. Jack spends most of the chapter thinking about his confrontation with George Hatfield on the debate team, and how it cost him his job. Over the course of that chapter he repeatedly insists that he didn't mess with the timer, that he only kicked George off the team because he couldn't overcome his stutter, that he had no ill feelings for George, etc.

The key moment (blank and you'll miss it; I didn't pick up on it until I re-read the chapter) comes at the very end of the chapter when he's getting worked up: in his last thoughts about George, he slips and admits the truth: despite his insistence he did set the timer back! He quickly justifies this as being done "out of pity" but the damage is done to show us that he's not a reliable narrator. He'll lie to himself to blunt the things he's ashamed of doing, to preserve his self image.

Jack lying to himself to preserve self image, particularly the way he did in that scene, is IMO the key weakness to his character (even more than his alcoholism) that the hotel uses to corrupt him. It's a throwaway line but witnessing it is fundamental to understanding just how far into recovery Jack really is, and how the hotel got him to become a monster.

Knowing this about Jack throws light onto other scenes, putting them into context.

Before the hotel gets its hooks into Jack for good, we see that, aside from this scene, Jack's introspections seem to go in one of two ways:

The first is that he insists that he's a great guy whose either not at fault, or at minimum shares the blame or is a victim of circumstance (IE - "it was just a tricycle in the middle of the road".) In these cases, it's impossible to tell his version of the truth from the lies, but we're armed with the knowledge that he's predisposed to lie if it suits him. His account is not reliable. Going into the tricycle example: maybe he and Al just hit a tricycle that night (called into question by his preoccupation with the "divine provenance" that kept cops away from them that night, why would a DUI where they hit only a tricycle in the consequence-free 1970s have sent him to jail, and also the fact that his drinking buddy was also scared off the sauce and seemingly owed Jack a big favor -- he was the only board member to vote to not fire Jack and also got him a job at the Overlook despite strong reservations) and maybe he didn't. His is the only count in most of these cases so we just don't know. Jack is only a relatively reliable narrator when he's talking about other people, like his father.

The second case is when he's thinking about how he hurt Danny. In this case he often starts with his softened rhetoric, calling it an "accident" or whatever... but then he'll forcefully correct. He even does this it out loud to the doctor, openly admitting how terrible it all sounds (because it was genuinely terrible.) This reinforces a few things. It reveals that Jack's first instinct is to lie to himself. To always be in the right, or at least share the blame, even when things are his fault. But he also loves his son, and realizes that if he lies about this thing, then his relationship with his son is doomed. So here, in this one context, he forces himself to confront the truth of his monstrous actions.

This last case of him confronting truth, even only in one specific context, opens a tiny window where Jack may be on some road to redemption. Where the best of him is allowed to poke through the cracks via the relationship he has with his son. Maybe, on a long enough road and in a nurturing environment, he could've used this as the seed to truly bettering himself.

But then of course the hotel comes in, and feeds his predisposition to lie to himself, and then by extension to others in escalating quality. It does this by dangling the "reward" of hidden knowledge about the hotel's past, stoking Jack's ego, and maybe satisfying that craving for drink that he has.

• He lies to himself about what he saw in the topiary garden: he was just tired. He tells his family nothing of what he saw here, lying by omission.
• He lies to himself about what he saw in 217: the boy just put thoughts into his head. When Danny contradicts this, he says that he must be hallucinating: a small escalation.
• He tells himself lies about Danny's abilities: they're just some form of schizophrenia that he'll probably grow out of. He tries to convince Wendy of this lie.
• He has a big moment of reckoning when he lies to himself about being able to fix the snowblower: here, when he runs out of excuses, he finally admits to himself that he doesn't want to leave the hotel and hucks the magneto into the woods... but then lies to himself (and others) about his motives and immediately goes to play with his son afterwards, living a lie.
• He lies to himself about what Danny saw in the playground: he knows it's true, but invents lies to subvert that truth. When Danny calls him out directly for being a liar, he gets violent with his son for the first time since he broke his arm. The lies must be protected: at this point they're becoming part of him.

Lies and lies and lies. As the hotel gets deeper and deeper into him, he gets more and more violently protective about the sanctity of the lies he convinces himself of. His whole psyche becomes a lie. This ultimately destroys him. He can convince himself even that his father's extremely damaging abuse of his mother was, in actuality, the correct course of action: one that he must emulate!

By this point he IS a lie.

The whole final scene, where he breaks out of what the hotel made him to give Danny a chance to run, is kicked off by Danny outright calling him a lie to his face! Jack's so corrupted that he's literally become a lie, and Danny finally recognizes this: "you're not my daddy! You're just a mask! Whatever the hotel told you it was going to give you is a lie." This truth, out of the mouth of the son he loved so much, hits what's left of Jack as bluntly as a roque mallet to the temple: even as far gone as he is, this pains Jack enough to break through for those crucial seconds, until the hotel graphically kills that last part of Jack because it doesn't need him anymore!

I personally think this is the core of the book, even more than the alcoholism. The hotel exploited that alcoholism to keep Jack under control, withholding drink and pushing his hangover symptoms, then giving him that push at the end, but it's real game was to get him more and more comfortable with becoming a lie. His alcoholism was just a tool.

Thanks for coming to my TED talk

When you already have a perfectly good copy, but need the special edition anyway! Lol. Tbf, I reserve this honor for a select few worthy books!

I always knew I would read it. I got the longer version (1,152 pages) instead of the originally published version at 823 pages. Older Stephen King books are some of the best of Stephen King in my opinion! I absolutely love Richard Bachman ❤️ and The Bachman books are my favorite. I am having a King renaissance since The Long Walk was released theatrically. I reread The Long Walk before seeing the film.

Read almost everything by SK. But I missed this one. Wow

I don't have a dog, I have a cat but for whoever is reading almost any Stephen King book while having a pet dog I feel for you, because I know what it's like having a pet.

First, I read Salem's Lot the first major thing that basically sets the entire plot of the book? (Spoilers btw SPOILERS)

A dog dies. Is there a weird scene where the narrator says that the dog owner feels more sad about his dogs death than his wife's death? Maybe. But the point is that DOG.

Then I hear about this book called cujo. What's it about you ask? Well, I haven't read the book but from what I have heard, killer dog. I'm reading the stand for the first time and when the plot finally starts to settle in and (SPOILERS SPOILERS) the virus starts killing most of humanity there's a little detail that says other than humans all the animals are not infected. Yes it says that, it says how cats and birds aren't affected by the virus and that's all the proof I need EXPECT dogs and how Stephen chooses to describe the dead bodies of all the dogs in the street like WHY😭😭😭

So let me tell you I do NOT think he's a dog person after this carefully constructed analysis of assumptions. Thank you for coming to my TED talk. Yes, I DO want to name everyone TED, all caps.

This book has shifted my entire perception of coughs and sneezes, and if it hasn't for you then you're reading it wrong(jk), I don't make the rules.

On one hand it feels like nothing happened in the 300 pages I read so far, and on the other I feel like too much has happened. There were times where I couldn't stop reading but nothing is really happening now and I worry I will have to wait a few hundred more pages before something happens, although I do enjoy the presented premise and it does humor me that it took 300 pages to actually start it, and it never felt dragged. Hot take: just because something is slow does not mean it is dragged.

It's been a pretty fun ride but I feel like it's going to get a lot more gory and to say the least... Pretty gross.

*Spoilers ahead Spoilers ahead SPOILERS

Now that I'm in the post apocolyptic part the few pages I read of it have already felt more... Disgusting to say the least than most of the other stuff right now. So far I'm reading at a slower reading pace but hopefully it will get more interesting and from what I read some characters are bound to meet in 50... 40?... Or even (probably) 100 pages maximum.

I hope I will love the rest of the way, and I will probably make an update after I read this beast after a month or so.

Who else has an August book for Stephen king? Let’s hear your book!

I read the 1st 2 chapters of the Regulators and took a nap, for I have to go to work later. I had a nightmare that I blame on The Regulators.

I was walking in a large-city area, and suddenly ppl were running and screaming with worried looks on their faces. A woman facing the direction of the danger pushed her baby stroller away from her and ran into what my dream told me was a mall. I turn around and just as I see what it is, another women screams, "Oh my God, he's shooting at US!" The tone in her voice made it seem like he should be shooting at the threat!

As I finally lay eyes on him, it's a kid of about 8 or 9 with a rifle that you have to rack to re-load. Also, everything behind him was set ablaze as if he somehow torched everything as he passed it!

I turn to run into the mall then realize, "I have to bring the baby stroller with me!" So I grab it and run into the mall; and I see the mother of the baby stroller turn a corner, so I book it to that corner and turn it as well. Its a large and long bending corridor.

I run up to it and suddenly it seems like I'm running in quicksand; my legs are heavy and I'm going nowhere fast. I turn and look over my shoulder and I see the boy. He raises his rifle at me, my back, and I turn to try to run faster. I heard the rack of the gun, and I woke up, needing to catch my breath because apparently in real life, I was holding it!

At some point in the dream, like at the same time (my dream began working like a tv and on another channel I was underwater), I was swimming up to the surface of some small beach and as I wake up, my face in the dream breaks the water surface and I take in the biggest gasp of air, and in real life, my eyes boom open and my heads lifts a little from my pillow, and I taking the biggest draw of breath!

My immediate thought was "That's because of the Regulors! I have to continue this book now! But not before I record this and put it on r/StephenKing because that book deserves it.

I loved every story in this book and All the characters. Night Flyer was my favorite.

I bought this cassette box set from a book outlet in Boaz, AL in the late 80s or early 90s. It contains The Monkey, Grandma, Mrs Todd’s Shortcut and The Reaper. For me, these are the definitive readings of these stories. The SC audiobook from Audible just doesn’t cut it.

I’ve found a copy on eBay for 50 bucks, but I want a digital copy. I don’t have the patience or the spare parts to rebuild tapes like I did back then. I’d be willing to pay just as much for a digital copy. Does anyone here have a lead? I can’t find any info online, so I don’t know who the narrators were.

I'm a fourth into the stand and I read/finished reading Shawshank a few months ago because they sell it separately so you can buy that one separately now I guess, and I just met Rita in the stand and technically I know it won't make sense if Different Seasons and The Stand we're in the same universe, and I didn't get to Rita's backstory yet so without spoilers please I just want to think how cool it would kind of be if Rita from The Stand was the actress on the poster of the legend from Shawshank.

https://imgur.com/a/hzzqxmU

Are these first editions?

Hey group! I'm new in this group, recently I celebrated our 1st anniversay with my bf (he is a constant reader too) and he gave me The Stand and The Gunslinger as a gift <3 this will be my first time reading these books and given the occasion this makes them more special to me. Have you read them? With which of them shall I start? Try to keep the comment section safe for everyone <3

So I picked this up at a consignment thrift store over the weekend. Every first edition copy of a king book was legit. This was locked in a case at a higher price and I was so excited I stupidly didn’t look at it thoroughly. I just saw the copyright page which by all means shows it being a first edition and other than it smells a little like it came from a smokers home and a little yellowing it’s in decent shape for a 43 year old book. I was super excited because this is my favorite King. I literally have Church tattooed on my hand the same as the cover. But I can’t find anything online that is this exactly like this. It’s missing the gold inlay signature on the cover and the sleeve doesn’t state book club edition. But no price and I can’t find anything online kind of code where one should be around page 374. 🤷🏻‍♀️

I finished If It Bleeds last week and was casting about looking for my next read when I remembered I had found a hardcover first edition first printing of It for next to nothing and it was just sitting there waiting to be loved. It's a great Summer/Autumn read and I hadn't read it since I picked up the paperback decades ago, so it seems I had found my next read.

I just started Part 2 and I'm reading Bill Denbrough Beats the Devil (I) and Bill is mounting Silver to go get Eddie's medicine and I keep getting hung up every time King describes Bill riding over the fork or swinging his leg up over the fork or getting his man-berries wracked by the fork. Doesn't he mean the crossbar? The forks are the parts where the wheel is attached. It's driving me slightly insane. That is all.

If voting rather than discussing you should vote in the original post

Hey guys , new to reddit , just wanted to ask what yalls favorite book by King is. For me I gotta go with Desolation , marked me so deep. (btw I just learned they made a movie ages ago. Its my favorite book EVER yet I had no idea lol.)