Monsters in the Archives by Caroline Bicks – The Writing Secrets of Stephen King(theguardian.com)
theguardian.com
Monsters in the Archives by Caroline Bicks – The Writing Secrets of Stephen King
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2026/mar/30/monsters-in-the-archives-by-caroline-bicks-review-the-writing-secrets-of-stephen-king
4 comments
> I’m not sure what the secret sauce is, but he has a tremendous gift for making ludicrous ideas seem possible, and terrifying.
As a 52 year old from New England who has been reading King's books pretty much as long as I've been able to read, I think a lot of it comes down to the characters he creates being so realistic and relatable.
As long as the characters are grounded in reality it is a lot easier to suspend disbelief for all the crazy stuff that happens around them.
As a 52 year old from New England who has been reading King's books pretty much as long as I've been able to read, I think a lot of it comes down to the characters he creates being so realistic and relatable.
As long as the characters are grounded in reality it is a lot easier to suspend disbelief for all the crazy stuff that happens around them.
> This is the kind of close reading usually associated with academic lit crit, so it can feel odd to find it in a book aimed at King’s ardent fanbase.
This is not at all uncommon; bizarre to find it represented as an oddity by a professional reviewer.
This is not at all uncommon; bizarre to find it represented as an oddity by a professional reviewer.
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Obviously not all the secrets...
Obviously not all the secrets...
My wife has a friend that was invited once to meet Stephen King and go to dinner with him. She said he is the strangest person she’s ever met. I don’t know exactly what that means, but she feels strongly about it.