Stephen King: 9 Must-Reads From 'Flashlight Worthy' (PHOTOS)

Stephen King has a new book of four novellas out today -- Full Dark, No Stars -- and I'm happy to say they're quite good.

For the thorough King readers out there, the slideshow below includes every book of short stories and novellas he's ever written. For those who just want the highlights, I strongly recommend Night Shift as his best collection of "pure Stephen King" short stories, The first novella in Different Seasons as his best non-horror writing ever, and his most recent -- Just After Sunset -- for a welcome return to the classic Stephen King of old.

Finally, Flashlight Worthy Book Recommendations has over 400 lists of excellent books that will keep you up past your bedtime... if you dare stay up into the wee hours after reading Stephen King.

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"Night Shift"

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The first collection of King's short stories, Night Shift is an instant classic due to stories like The Mangler and Quitter's Inc.

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The first collection of King's short stories, Night Shift is an instant classic due to stories like The Mangler and Quitter's Inc.

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Comments

[metacide]

03:10 AM on 11/14/2010

nightmares and dreamscapes stories about the knuckles coming out of the sink and the one about the toy soldiers were some of my favorites.

[Joey Simon]

04:30 PM on 11/10/2010

King has written books that are so much better than the ones on this list.

[DiGil]

03:35 PM on 11/10/2010

Hearts in Atlantis has my vote for the best King collection, hands down.

[metacide]

03:06 AM on 11/14/2010

i havent read the book but the movie was awful. id say that was his worst movie.

[casaloma]

12:01 PM on 11/14/2010

Completely agree. The movie was disappointing to say the least.

[Agent Cooper]

02:17 PM on 11/10/2010

"Crouch End" was the stand out for me in Nightmares and Dreamscapes.

[Janice Rawlins]

02:33 PM on 11/09/2010

You have to read Doonie the rainbow dog and all his neat pictures that were done by a talented man." No Doonie is not gay and what if he was would it really matter. I know I am off the subject here but had to get a punch in about the book called Doonie the rainbow dog who some people around me call it Gay." A gay dog book." It is about a dog who loves everyone and everything and treats no one different." Doonie changes to pretty colors when ever he helps a friend or someone who needs help." He is caring and in book two he can talk and he is educational and wants to help other animals learn colors, numbers and etc, and life lessons about being nice, no bullying. He will not lie down and sleep this dog will carry the torch for all dogs-they are just like family. Stop animal abuse." I love dogs and cats and all animals." Sorry Mr. King for getting side tracked but at least you did have write a book about animals having a graveyard." I did not like the part where they came back alive and they were mean it gives animals a bad name." Now you read about dogs getting out of prison and being in gangs- Joe the boxer, we have to stop all this non-sense and love our pets."Side tracked sorry.lol

[jcop815]

11:54 AM on 11/09/2010

His most successful novella collection has to be "Different Seasons" strictly because "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption" and "The Body" is included -- and turned into great movies. Otherwise, "Nightmare & Dreamscapes" is great too.

[DamonIcke]

10:23 AM on 11/09/2010

His short stories are the best. His most gruesome in my opinion is The Survivor Type. It's kind of like that new James franco movie, but more gruesome and the amputations are motivated by hunger.

[Agent Cooper]

02:18 PM on 11/10/2010

Yeah that one's great!

[Tracy Kelley Moser]

10:44 AM on 11/19/2010

That one gave me nightmares. It's been 15 years since I read it and just thinking about it still creeps me out.

[dmsdzinr]

09:59 AM on 11/09/2010

King's work has become Self Parody. When he stays in the Horror Genre using solid characters and psychological horror, he is fine, but his foray into aliens just leaves me FLAT. There are many other authors who write aliens much better than King.

[PJsThreeDogLife]

10:46 AM on 11/09/2010

Totally agree. I've said that I liked his work better when he was drinking.

[eighthchord]

11:04 AM on 11/09/2010

Yeah, I got about halfway through Insomnia and didn't get where he was going with it. I'm assuming the above list is only mentioning his short stories and not his novels.

[Agent Cooper]

02:19 PM on 11/10/2010

Yeah Insomnia was ... weird ...kind of related to the Dark Tower towards the end.

[metacide]

03:08 AM on 11/14/2010

ive read about 20-30 of his books and insomnia was the worst one in my opinion

[cloudmaker]

09:02 AM on 11/09/2010

Stephen King's books read like he just grinds them out. I wonder why?

[ValdaDeDieu]

11:35 AM on 11/09/2010

That's not true for all his books. Often when an author succeeds, she/he continues the type of books/style/plot most popular with their fan base. However he has a few stand-outs, and one I find exemplary.

Have you read Rose Madder?

[Merle Borja]

12:29 PM on 11/09/2010

I sure have, and it totally blew me away. I was surprised to find that King himself found it overworked -- believe his expression was "I tried too hard" or something like that. I disagree. Every bit of work he dedicated to that novel, every brilliant turn of phrase, was well worth the effort, IMO.

[imayes]

03:22 PM on 11/09/2010

Your photo looks like someone I know. Would your initials be T.R. by any chance (don't want to put the full name on blast).