15 Best Stephen King Books

Teacher Jake Epping enters a portal to 1958 and undertakes a plan to prevent John F. Kennedy's assassination. Building a life in the past and falling in love complicate his mission as history resists his attempts to change it.

An escaped laboratory virus devastates the population, leaving scattered survivors to rebuild. Drawn toward either Mother Abagail in Boulder or Randall Flagg in Las Vegas, they form rival communities preparing for a conflict with consequences beyond mere survival.

King combines memories of childhood, early publication, and personal setbacks with practical advice about storytelling and revision. He considers the tools and habits of a writer's work, including the role writing played in recovering from his near-fatal accident.

Childhood friends return to Derry after new murders awaken memories of the creature they once confronted. Moving between their youth and adulthood, the story follows their effort to honor a promise and face the town's recurring evil.

Louis Creed moves his family to rural Maine, where a busy road threatens their pets. Beyond a children's animal cemetery lies another burial ground with disturbing powers, offering temptations that draw him toward dangerous questions about loss and death.

Writer Ben Mears returns to his hometown to confront childhood memories and work on a book about an unsettling house. As residents fall prey to vampires, he gathers a small group willing to challenge the growing threat.

Johnny Smith wakes from a long coma able to glimpse people's pasts and futures through touch. When contact with an ambitious politician reveals a terrifying possibility, he must decide what responsibility comes with knowing what others cannot foresee.

Death-row superintendent Paul Edgecomb recalls a condemned prisoner unlike any he has guarded before. John Coffey's gentleness and extraordinary healing ability challenge the assumptions surrounding his conviction and place the prison staff between duty, compassion, and the threat of execution.

Jack Torrance takes a winter caretaker job at the isolated Overlook Hotel, hoping to rebuild his life with Wendy and Danny. The hotel's violent supernatural forces exploit his weaknesses while seeking the extraordinary psychic gifts of his young son.

Bullied teenager Carrie White discovers that she can move objects with her mind. With a domineering religious mother restricting her life at home, her attempt to belong at school leads toward a dangerous confrontation at the senior prom.

Novelist Paul Sheldon survives a car accident thanks to former nurse Annie Wilkes, an obsessive fan of his romances. When she learns he has killed her favorite character, she holds him captive and demands a novel restoring Misery's life.

Bullied teenager Arnie Cunningham buys a battered Plymouth Fury and becomes obsessed with restoring it. As his personality changes, his best friend and girlfriend suspect the car possesses a jealous, deadly will that threatens anyone who comes between them.

Four novellas follow journeys through imprisonment, obsession, childhood and the struggle to give birth. An inmate seeks justice, a student probes an older man’s violent past, and boys searching for a body confront the realities of death and growing up.

Leland Gaunt's new shop offers Castle Rock residents the objects they most desire in exchange for money and small favors. Those favors ignite old resentments, drawing Sheriff Alan Pangborn into an investigation as pranks escalate toward violence.

The last gunslinger crosses a desert in pursuit of the mysterious Man in Black, seeking a tower at the center of existence. Along the way, Roland encounters Alice and young Jake, whose friendship complicates his relentless purpose.