Fairy Tale
Stephen King
Sep 2022 · Simon and Schuster · Narrated by Stephen King and Seth Numrich
4.8star
326 reviewsreport
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24 hr 5 min
Unabridged
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About this audiobook
Winner of the 2023 Audie Award for Best Male Narrator
Master storyteller Stephen King goes into the deepest well of his imagination in this #1 New York Times bestselling and spellbinding novel about a young man who inherits the keys to a parallel world where good and evil are at war, and the stakes could not be higher—for that world or ours.
Charlie Reade looks like a regular high school kid, great at baseball and football, a decent student. But he carries a heavy load. His mom was killed in a horrific accident when he was seven, and grief drove his dad to drink. Charlie learned how to take care of himself—and his dad. When Charlie is seventeen, he meets a dog named Radar and her aging master, Howard Bowditch, a recluse in a big house at the top of a big hill, with a locked shed in the backyard. Sometimes strange sounds emerge from that shed.
Charlie starts doing jobs for Mr. Bowditch and loses his heart to Radar. Then, when Bowditch dies, he leaves Charlie a cassette tape telling a story no one would believe. What Bowditch knows, and has kept secret all his long life, is that inside the shed is a portal to another world.
Master storyteller Stephen King goes into the deepest well of his imagination in this #1 New York Times bestselling and spellbinding novel about a young man who inherits the keys to a parallel world where good and evil are at war, and the stakes could not be higher—for that world or ours.
Charlie Reade looks like a regular high school kid, great at baseball and football, a decent student. But he carries a heavy load. His mom was killed in a horrific accident when he was seven, and grief drove his dad to drink. Charlie learned how to take care of himself—and his dad. When Charlie is seventeen, he meets a dog named Radar and her aging master, Howard Bowditch, a recluse in a big house at the top of a big hill, with a locked shed in the backyard. Sometimes strange sounds emerge from that shed.
Charlie starts doing jobs for Mr. Bowditch and loses his heart to Radar. Then, when Bowditch dies, he leaves Charlie a cassette tape telling a story no one would believe. What Bowditch knows, and has kept secret all his long life, is that inside the shed is a portal to another world.
Ratings and reviews
4.8
326 reviews
Jaymie Hayes
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January 7, 2023
Mr. King has had a marvelous job with this novel. It keeps you engaged and if you know anything about fairy tales he completely captures the good bad and ugly sides of the classics and manages to take you on a new adventure while still staying true to the fairy tales that inspire this creation! Bravo
Chris
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September 4, 2023
I was surprised at how much I liked this book. As usual, Stephen King does a great job telling a story. The narrator did an excellent job. Within the first few minutes, I was not listening to the story but watching it in my minds eye. Well worth the money.
J MC
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- Show review history
December 17, 2022
First 25% great, the rest dissapointing. I was looking forward to King going back to fantasy after about a decade of writing (mostly) hard crime. The performance was OK but Seth voices one character (Claudia) and it is the most annoying voice I have heard anybody come up with for any character in an audiobook it was like nails on a chalkboard. Some of these reviews seem really bot-like, even getting the title of the book wrong. If you are new to King, skip this, read something else instead.
About the author
Stephen King is the author of more than sixty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes Never Flinch (May 2025), the short story collection You Like It Darker (a New York Times Book Review top ten horror book of 2024), Holly (a New York Times Notable Book of 2023), Fairy Tale, Billy Summers, If It Bleeds, The Institute, Elevation, The Outsider, Sleeping Beauties (cowritten with his son Owen King), and the Bill Hodges trilogy: End of Watch, Finders Keepers, and Mr. Mercedes (an Edgar Award winner for Best Novel and a television series streaming on Peacock). His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller. His epic works The Dark Tower, It, Pet Sematary, Doctor Sleep, and Firestarter are the basis for major motion pictures, with It now the highest-grossing horror film of all time. He is the recipient of the 2020 Audio Publishers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the 2018 PEN America Literary Service Award, the 2014 National Medal of Arts, and the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.
Seth Numrich won the Evening Standard Award for Outstanding Newcomer for Sweet Bird of Youth at The Old Vic. Additional Broadway and Off-Broadway credits include: The Merchant of Venice (Broadhurst Theatre), War Horse (Vivian Beaumont), Golden Boy (Lincoln Center), Travesties (American Airlines), Orpheus Descending (Theatr Clwyd), and Fathers and Sons (Donmar Warehouse). Numrich starred in four seasons of the AMC drama Turn: Washington’s Spies and appeared opposite Daniel Radcliffe in the film Imperium.
Seth Numrich won the Evening Standard Award for Outstanding Newcomer for Sweet Bird of Youth at The Old Vic. Additional Broadway and Off-Broadway credits include: The Merchant of Venice (Broadhurst Theatre), War Horse (Vivian Beaumont), Golden Boy (Lincoln Center), Travesties (American Airlines), Orpheus Descending (Theatr Clwyd), and Fathers and Sons (Donmar Warehouse). Numrich starred in four seasons of the AMC drama Turn: Washington’s Spies and appeared opposite Daniel Radcliffe in the film Imperium.
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