Fairy Tale
Sept 2022 · Simon and Schuster
4.7star
751 reviewsreport
eBook
608
Pages
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About this eBook
A #1 New York Times Bestseller and New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice!
Legendary storyteller Stephen King goes into the deepest well of his imagination in this spellbinding novel about a seventeen-year-old boy 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 it.
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.
Magnificent, terrifying, and “spellbinding…packed with glorious flights of imagination and characteristic tenderness about childhood, Fairy Tale is vintage King at his finest” (Esquire).
“Good, evil, a kingdom to save, monsters to slay—these are the stuff that page-turners are made from.” —Laura Miller, Slate
Legendary storyteller Stephen King goes into the deepest well of his imagination in this spellbinding novel about a seventeen-year-old boy 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 it.
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.
Magnificent, terrifying, and “spellbinding…packed with glorious flights of imagination and characteristic tenderness about childhood, Fairy Tale is vintage King at his finest” (Esquire).
“Good, evil, a kingdom to save, monsters to slay—these are the stuff that page-turners are made from.” —Laura Miller, Slate
Ratings and reviews
4.7
751 reviews
Scott H
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20 September 2022
Vintage King...or at least I thought it would be when I started King's latest. in fact, I was fearful that my old friend (not really) had run out of fresh ideas, and had started recycling. Now, at the end, I know there was no reason to worry. Not nearly as multi-verse involved, or as sprawling as The Gunslinger series, or The Talisman, this was actually a simpler, more intimate story, and one that I am glad I read. I don't do story recaps, so don't expect one. Just know that its a good, escapist read. Many reviews mention that they couldn't get past the first few chapters, but it's exactly those chapters that establish the link between old fashioned fairy tales and the very real life of Charlie...our protagonist, and subsequently, the ensuing adventure. Easy to start and stop, but given how quickly I read this 600+ page novel, you won't stop much. I was sad it was over, and that's a good thing.
MJ DJ
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22 February 2024
A fun book that, as King himself described, is designed to make you happy. A simple story that has lots of interesting details and room for imagination. An enjoyable read for any fans of altered fairy tales and anyone who wants to leave "normal life" for a little adventure.
David Blankfeld
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17 October 2022
This is a lovely story, and King even manages to write a solid ending for it! if you grew up with fairy tales and fables, this is the love letter to them you're looking for... with, of course, the trademark grotesqueness of a Stephen King story. With that being said, that grotesqueness is framed and conveyed near the same level as the original versions of those stories, so I argue this isn't a Horror novel; it's a fairy tale.
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.
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