"Obits" | |
---|---|
Short story by Stephen King | |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Genre(s) | Horror short story |
Publication | |
Published in | The Bazaar of Bad Dreams |
Publisher | Charles Scribner's Sons |
Media type | |
Publication date | 2015 |
"Obits" is a horror short story by American author Stephen King, which was first published in King's 2015 short-story collection, The Bazaar of Bad Dreams . [1] [2]
Michael Anderson studied journalism at the University of Rhode Island. Following a string of odd jobs after graduation, he is offered a job at a webzine, Neon Circus, on the basis of a joke obituary he wrote for an actor who died of a drug overdose. The editor of Neon Circus, Jeroma Whitfield, gives him the obituaries column.
After Whitfield denies him a raise, Michael writes her obituary as a way to vent his frustration. A colleague later calls him at home to tell him that Whitfield is dead.
He tries to rationalize it as a coincidence, but when he writes another obituary for a living person, it becomes clear that he actually has a power. The power becomes like an addiction. With each use, Michael feels a stronger compulsion to use the power again. Eventually he finds that he can kill not just specific individuals, but simultaneously anyone who shares the same name.
He leaves Neon Circus, moves to Wyoming and takes a job painting houses. He stops using computers generally, but he keeps a tablet computer to read Neon Circus occasionally. He remembers one of his professors taught that the end of any story is the end "only for now".
"Obits" won the 2016 Edgar Award for Best Short Story, [3] and was nominated for the 2016 Hugo Award for Best Novelette. [4]
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.
This is a list of short fiction works by Stephen King. This includes short stories, novelettes, and novellas, as well as poems. It is arranged chronologically by first publication. Major revisions of previously published pieces are also noted. Stephen King is sometimes credited with "nearly 400 short stories". However, all the known published pieces of short fiction are tabulated below. In all, 218 works are listed. Most of these pieces have been collected in King's seven short story collections: Night Shift (1978), Skeleton Crew (1985), Nightmares & Dreamscapes (1993), Everything's Eventual (2002), Just After Sunset (2008), The Bazaar of Bad Dreams (2015), and You Like It Darker (2024); in King's five novella collections: Different Seasons (1982), Four Past Midnight (1990), Hearts in Atlantis (1999), Full Dark, No Stars (2010), and If It Bleeds (2020); and in the compilation Secret Windows: Essays and Fiction on the Craft of Writing (2000). Some of these pieces, however, remain uncollected.
Richard Horatio Edgar Wallace was a British writer of sensational detective, gangster, adventure, and sci-fi novels, plays and stories.
Michael Joseph Connelly is an American author of detective novels and other crime fiction, notably those featuring LAPD Detective Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch and criminal defense attorney Mickey Haller. Connelly is the bestselling author of 38 novels and one work of non-fiction, with over 74 million copies of his books sold worldwide and translated into 40 languages. His first novel, The Black Echo, won the Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award for Best First Novel in 1992. In 2002, Clint Eastwood directed and starred in the movie adaptation of Connelly's 1997 novel, Blood Work. In March 2011, the movie adaptation of Connelly's novel The Lincoln Lawyer starred Matthew McConaughey as Mickey Haller. Connelly was the President of the Mystery Writers of America from 2003 to 2004.
Charles Ardai is an American businessman, and writer of crime fiction and mysteries. He is co-founder and editor of Hard Case Crime, a line of pulp-style paperback crime novels. He was also an early employee of D. E. Shaw & Co. and a managing director of the firm. He is the former chairman of Schrödinger, Inc.
Daniel Keyes was an American writer who wrote the novel Flowers for Algernon. Keyes was given the Author Emeritus honor by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2000.
Jeffrey Ford is an American writer in the fantastic genre tradition, although his works have spanned genres including fantasy, science fiction and mystery. His work is characterized by a sweeping imaginative power, humor, literary allusion, and a fascination with tales told within tales. He is a graduate of Binghamton University, where he studied with the novelist John Gardner.
I Bury the Living is a 1958 horror film directed by famed B movie director Albert Band and starring Richard Boone and Theodore Bikel. It was written by Louis A. Garfinkle and produced by Garfinkle and Band.
Douglas E. Winter is an American writer, critic and lawyer.
Edward Joseph Gorman Jr. was an American writer and short fiction anthologist. He published in almost every genre, but is best known for his work in the crime, mystery, western, and horror fields. His non-fiction work has been published in such publications as The New York Times and Redbook.
Ur is a science fantasy novella by Stephen King. It is one of King's few short stories that isn't horror. It was written exclusively for the Amazon Kindle platform, and became available for download on February 12, 2009. An audiobook edition was released on February 16, 2010 by Simon & Schuster Audio, read by Holter Graham. Ur was collected in King's 2015 collection The Bazaar of Bad Dreams, heavily revised.
Blockade Billy is a 2010 novella by Stephen King. It tells the story of William "Blockade Billy" Blakely, a fictional baseball catcher who briefly played for the New Jersey Titans during the 1957 season.
"Herman Wouk Is Still Alive" is a short story by American author Stephen King. It was originally published in the May 2011 issue of The Atlantic magazine.
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.
"Bad Little Kid" is a short horror story by Stephen King, which was originally published in German and French in an electronic version. The first paper print in English was in King's 2015 short story collection, The Bazaar of Bad Dreams.
"Batman and Robin Have an Altercation" is a short story by the American author Stephen King. It was originally published in the September 2012 issue of Harper's Magazine, and later collected in King's short fiction collection The Bazaar of Bad Dreams in 2015.
"Summer Thunder" is a horror short story written by American author Stephen King. First published in Turn Down the Lights in 2013, it was collected in King's 2015 short story collection The Bazaar of Bad Dreams.
"The Little Green God of Agony" is a short story by Stephen King. It was originally published in 2011 as part of the anthology A Book of Horrors.
Danny Coughlin's Bad Dream is a novella by Stephen King, first published in 2024 as part of King's collection You Like It Darker.