Author | Stephen King (as Richard Bachman) |
---|---|
Language | English |
Genre | Crime novel, ghost story |
Publisher | Scribner |
Publication date | June 12, 2007 |
Publication place | United States |
Media type | Print (hardcover) |
Pages | 304 |
ISBN | 978-1-4165-5484-4 |
Blaze is a novel by American writer Stephen King, published under the pseudonym of Richard Bachman. King announced on his website that he "found it" in an attic. As stated in the afterword of Different Seasons, it was written before Carrie. King offered the original draft of the novel to his Doubleday publishers at the same time as 'Salem's Lot ; the latter was chosen to be his second novel and Blaze became a "trunk novel." King rewrote the manuscript, editing out much of what he perceived as over-sentimentality in the original text, and offered the book for publication in 2007. The book also has an annex containing "Memory", a short story that was first published in 2006 and which King has since worked into Duma Key .
The story concerns Clayton Blaisdell Jr. (known as "Blaze" for short, thus the title), a mentally disabled small-time con artist who kidnaps a wealthy gentleman's baby son, in the hopes of fulfilling the dreams of George Thomas Rackley, Blaze's deceased best friend and partner in crime and who continues to help him.
On King's website, the following was posted in the "Future Works" section on November 28, 2006:
Many of you have been asking for more information about publication of Blaze following Steve's mention of it on his recent Lisey's Story book tour. This is another Bachman novel which he recently rediscovered. The original manuscript of Blaze was 173 pages long and was written in 1973. He has rewritten the first 100 pages. A lot of it needed editing to make it more timely since the 1973 references no longer worked. He's hoping to get it done by the end of the year. No publication deal has been signed, but he's sure there will be one. [1]
In an interview with Lilja of Lilja's Library (posted January 16, 2007), King said:
I have been thinking about [Blaze] off and on for a while and every time I would think about it... you know I did the early books as Richard Bachman books and this is going to be a Bachman because it came from the same time. It was written right before Carrie and finally I thought to myself... the reason I've never done it was because, in my memory at least, it was a tearjerker of a book, you know it was kind of sentimental and just kind of... every now and then I think of what Oscar Wilde said about The Little Match Girl . He said that it's impossible to read about the little match girl without weeping tears of laughter and... you know something that is so sad it's actually funny. [2]
(Wilde's actual quote was about Charles Dickens's novel The Old Curiosity Shop : "One must have a heart of stone to read the death of Little Nell without laughing." [3] )
Oscar Fingal O'Fflahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish poet and playwright. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of the most popular playwrights in London in the early 1890s. He is best remembered for his epigrams and plays, his novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, and his criminal conviction for gross indecency for homosexual acts.
Richard Bachman is a pen name of American horror fiction author Stephen King, adopted in 1977 for the novel Rage. King hid the link between himself and Bachman, until allowing for his identification in 1985. He collected the first four Bachman novels into The Bachman Books. Rage became controversial for being about a school shooting and was allowed to go out of print after the 1997 Heath High School shooting. Three more novels were published under the Bachman name.
Stephen Edwin King is an American author. Widely known for his horror novels, he has been crowned the "King of Horror". He has also explored other genres, among them suspense, crime, science-fiction, fantasy and mystery. Though known primarily for his novels, he has written approximately 200 short stories, most of which have been published in collections.
Night Shift is Stephen King's first collection of short stories, first published in 1978. In 1980, Night Shift won the Balrog Award for Best Collection, and in 1979 it was nominated as best collection for the Locus Award and the World Fantasy Award.
Carrie is a 1974 horror novel, the first by American author Stephen King. Set in Chamberlain, Maine, the plot revolves around Carrie White, a friendless, bullied high-school girl from an abusive religious household who discovers she has telekinetic powers. Remorseful for picking on Carrie, Sue Snell insists that she go to prom with Sue's boyfriend Tommy Ross, though a revenge prank pulled by one of Carrie's bullies on prom night humiliates Carrie, leading her to destroy the town with her powers out of revenge. An eponymous epistolary novel, Carrie deals with themes of ostracization and revenge, with the opening shower scene and the destruction of Chamberlain being pivotal scenes.
Rage is a psychological thriller novel by American writer Stephen King, the first he published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman. It was published in 1977 and was collected in the 1985 hardcover omnibus The Bachman Books. The novel describes a school shooting, and has been associated with actual high school shooting incidents in the 1980s and 1990s. In response, King allowed the novel to fall out of print. In 2013, King published the anti-firearms violence essay "Guns".
The Bachman Books is a collection of short novels by Stephen King published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman between 1977 and 1982. It made The New York Times Best Seller list upon its release in 1985.
The Dark Tower is a series of eight novels, one novella, and a children's book written by American author Stephen King. Incorporating themes from multiple genres, including dark fantasy, science fantasy, horror, and Western, it describes a "gunslinger" and his quest toward a tower, the nature of which is both physical and metaphorical. The series, and its use of the Dark Tower, expands upon Stephen King's multiverse and in doing so, links together many of his other novels.
Frank Árpád Darabont is an American screenwriter, director and producer.
Philip Craig Russell is an American comics artist, writer, and illustrator. His work has won multiple Harvey and Eisner Awards. Russell was the fourth mainstream comic book creator to come out as openly gay, following Andy Mangels in 1988, Craig Hamilton in 1989, and Eric Shanower in 1990.
Thinner is a horror novel by American author Stephen King, published in 1984 by NAL under King's pseudonym Richard Bachman. The story centers on morbidly obese lawyer Billy Halleck, who, driving carelessly, kills an old Romani woman while she is crossing the street. He escapes legal punishment due to his connections, but the woman's 106-year-old father then curses Halleck to physically waste away, and the lawyer must find a way to undo the curse. King, who was overweight at the time of the novel's writing, created the novel’s outline following an annual medical examination.
The Dollar Baby was an arrangement in which American author Stephen King would grant permission to students and aspiring filmmakers or theater producers to adapt one of his short stories for $1. King retains the rights to his work, but as he began to experience commercial success, he decided to use the Dollar Baby to help the next generation of creatives. The term may be used to refer to both the adaptation itself and the person adapting it; for example, "The Sun Dog" was made as a Dollar Baby and filmmaker Matt Flesher became a Dollar Baby upon adapting it.
Carrie is a 1976 American supernatural horror film directed by Brian De Palma from a screenplay written by Lawrence D. Cohen, adapted from Stephen King's 1974 epistolary novel of the same name. The film stars Sissy Spacek as Carrie White, a shy teenage girl who is constantly mocked and bullied at her school. She later develops the power of telekinesis and uses it to wreak vengeance on her tormentors. The film also features Piper Laurie, Amy Irving, Nancy Allen, William Katt, P. J. Soles, Betty Buckley, and John Travolta in supporting roles. It is the first film in the Carrie franchise.
The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born is a seven-issue comic book limited series published by Marvel Comics. It is the first comic book miniseries based on Stephen King's The Dark Tower series of novels. It is plotted by Robin Furth, scripted by Peter David, and illustrated by Jae Lee and Richard Isanove. Stephen King serves as Creative and Executive Director of the project. The first issue was published on February 7, 2007.
This is a bibliography of works by Oscar Wilde (1854–1900), a late-Victorian Irish writer. Chiefly remembered today as a playwright, especially for The Importance of Being Earnest, and as the author of The Picture of Dorian Gray; Wilde's oeuvre includes criticism, poetry, children's fiction, and a large selection of reviews, lectures and journalism. His private correspondence has also been published.
De Profundis is a letter written by Oscar Wilde during his imprisonment in Reading Gaol, to his friend and lover Lord Alfred "Bosie" Douglas.
Peter Ackroyd is an English biographer, novelist and critic with a specialist interest in the history and culture of London. For his novels about English history and culture and his biographies of, among others, William Blake, Charles Dickens, T. S. Eliot, Charlie Chaplin and Sir Thomas More, he won the Somerset Maugham Award and two Whitbread Awards. He is noted for the volume of work he has produced, the range of styles therein, his skill at assuming different voices, and the depth of his research.
The Running Man is a dystopian thriller novel by American writer Stephen King, first published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman in 1982 as a paperback original. It was collected in 1985 in the omnibus The Bachman Books. The novel is set in a dystopian United States during the year 2025, in which the nation's economy is in ruins and world violence is rising. The story follows protagonist Ben Richards as he participates in the reality show The Running Man, in which contestants win money by evading a team of hitmen sent to kill them.
Joyland is a novel by American writer Stephen King, published in 2013 by Hard Case Crime. It is King's second book for the imprint, following The Colorado Kid (2005). The first edition was released only in paperback, with cover art created by Robert McGinnis and Glen Orbik. A limited hardcover edition followed a week later. The novel was nominated for the 2014 Edgar Award for Best Paperback Original.
The Bazaar of Bad Dreams is a short fiction collection by Stephen King, published on November 3, 2015. This is King's sixth collection of short stories and his tenth collection overall. One of the stories, "Obits", won the 2016 Edgar Award for best short story, and the collection itself won the 2015 Shirley Jackson Award for best collection. The paperback edition, released on October 18, 2016, includes a bonus short story, "Cookie Jar", which was published in 2016 in VQR.