13 Stephen King Books for Every Kind of Reader

For the history buff

English teacher Jake Epping’s life changes forever the day his friend Al tells him that the storeroom in Al’s diner is a portal back to 1958. He enlists Jake in his mission to travel back in time and prevent the JFK assassination. Soon Jake finds himself living in the ‘50s under an assumed name, placing himself into the world of troubled loner Lee Harvey Oswald in this gripping historical thriller.

Read a full review of 11/22/63.

For the YA reader

One of my very favorite novels, this tender coming-of-age story follows college student Devin Jones, who takes a summer job at the Joyland carnival hoping to forget the girl who broke his heart, but he winds up facing the legacy of a murder, the fate of a dying child, and revelations about life that will change his world forever.

For the memoir lover

In this inspiring combination memoir and master class on writing, King shares advice on craft and offers a glimpse into the life experiences that have made him the writer he is today, from his childhood and early career to how writing helped him recover from a near-fatal car accident.

Read a full review of ON WRITING.

If you find yourself binge watching cop shows, you’ll love this pulse-pounding thriller. Bill Hodges is a depressed retired cop who is still haunted by the mass murderer he never caught—a man who drove a stolen Mercedes into a crowd. Then Hodges gets a letter from the Mercedes killer, threatening to strike again, and he knows he must stop the killer himself.

Nine-year-old Trisha McFarland gets tired of the drama on her family hiking trip, so she wanders off into the woods and gets lost. As night falls, Trisha turns to her radio for comfort, listening to broadcasts of Boston Red Sox games featuring her hero, relief pitcher Tom Gordon. As the radio signal fades, Trisha starts to imagine Tom Gordon is there with her, protecting her from what lurks in the woods.

In near-future dystopian America, Ben Richards desperately needs money, so he signs up for The Running Man, an ultraviolent reality show where he must struggle to stay alive as an elite strike force attempts to hunt him down and kill him for a TV audience. If Ben can survive for 30 days, he’ll win a billion dollars. But no one has ever lasted more than eight.

Four years after the death of his wife, novelist Mike Noonan is plagued by grief, writer’s block, and vivid nightmares set in his Maine summerhouse. He reluctantly returns to the house and is drawn into a fierce custody battle between a local millionaire and a young mother as well as the mystery of the lake house, now the site of ghostly visitations and escalating terrors.

For the lover of Westerns

The basis for the recent film adaption, the first book in King’s epic Dark Tower series is a genre-busting fantasy Western about Roland Deschain, the last gunslinger, on a journey to save his decaying home, Mid-World, by reaching the fabled Dark Tower, despite the efforts of The Man in Black to prevent him from completing his quest.

Read a full review of the Dark Tower series.

For the reader who can’t get enough of vampires

Ben Mears has returned to Jerusalem’s Lot in the hopes that living in an old mansion will help him cast out his own demons and provide inspiration for his new book. But when two young boys venture into the woods and only one comes out alive, Mears begins to realize that his hometown is under siege by forces of darkness far beyond his control.

In this intense, claustrophobic thriller, novelist Paul Sheldon is severely injured in a car accident and rescued by his #1 fan, nurse Annie Wilkes. But when Annie finds out that Paul has killed off her favorite character, she is willing to use any means necessary to keep Paul prisoner until he writes a new novel that is to her liking.

I openly cried on the subway, reading the end of “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption,” a moving story about Andy Dufresne, a banker who is falsely convicted of murdering his wife and her lover and sent to Shawshank State Penitentiary. There he meets Red, a prisoner who smuggles in items from the outside world. Andy’s requests for a rock hammer and a Rita Hayworth poster are all a part of his shocking plan.

Hear me out on this one—LISEY’S STORY is a touching portrait of a marriage and the bonds of love that can outlive death. Lisey lost her husband, celebrated novelist Scott, after a 25-year marriage of profound intimacy. Lisey knows that there was a place Scott visited—a place that both terrified and healed him, where he went for inspiration. Now, as she begins to go through her husband’s papers, Lisey embarks on a dangerous journey into that dark place.

Read a full review of LISEY’S STORY.

For the fan of The Walking Dead

After a super-flu wipes out 99 percent of the world’s population, those who remain are scared and in need of a leader. Two emerge—Mother Abagail, the benevolent 108-year-old woman who urges them to build a peaceful community, and Randall Flagg, who delights in chaos and violence. As the two leaders gather power, the survivors will have to choose between them—and ultimately decide the fate of all humanity.