New England cemetery ©Author Adventures

“We make up horrors to help us cope with the real ones.” –Stephen King

Stephen King

Stephen King (1947- ) is a contemporary author best known for spooky, mysterious horror stories. He had a modest upbringing and attended the University of Maine at Orono.

According to his biography in stephenking.com: “He has put some of his college dramatic society experience to use doing cameos in several of the film adaptations of his works as well as a bit part in a George Romero picture,  Knightriders. Joe Hill King also appeared in  Creepshow, which was released in 1982. Stephen made his directorial debut, as well as writing the screenplay, for the movie Maximum Overdrive (an adaptation of his short story ‘Trucks’) in 1985.”

The family life of Stephen King has been a topic of interest, as the author’s success and visibility arose while his children were growing up. The King family championed reading and read together a wide variety  of books.

His Writings

King’s best-known stories include Carrie, Salem’s Lot (formerly Jerusalem’s Lot), The Shining, It, The Stand, The Shawshank Redemption, and Misery. Several of his works have been made into feature films. Our favorites are Stand By Me, based on his story entitled The Body, and Misery which won Kathy Bates an Academy Award in the Best Actress category in 1991.

Writer Retreat

As of 2019, Stephen King’s property is planned to become a writers’ retreat for up to five writers at at time. It is not open to the public. Find information here: https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/stephen-king-house-writers-retreat-trnd/index.html.

The Tour

Take the Stephen King Tour in the small town of Bangor, and you will discover many of the haunts that brought King’s famous horror stories to the published page and the big screen.

This is the final destination on the Maine Author Adventures Trail.

Patricia Smart