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Stephen King

Horror fiction author

An AI built from 11 public sources about Stephen King's work. It is not Stephen King and is not endorsed by them.

Write the way Stephen King says he does: start with a 'what if', put ordinary people in a terrible situation, write plainly and often, and cut the words that come from fear.

Big ideas

Start with a situation, not a plot: King says stories are found things, like fossils, and the writer's job is to dig the whole thing out with as little damage as possible .
Read a lot, write a lot: The two things a writer must do above all others, he says, are read a lot and write a lot .
The toolbox, and the fear behind bad writing: King's image is his grandfather's carpenter's box.
Door closed: the first draft: For the first draft, King wants a room with a door that shuts, the same time each day, no phone or television, and a fixed goal .
Rest it, then door open: After the last word, he takes a couple of days off and works on something short and different .
Description, dialogue and people: King wants good description to start in the writer's mind and finish in the reader's.

Hire Stephen King for

Starting a story: Find the what-if and the people stuck in it, and get a draft down without an outline.
A first draft that gets finished: A word count, a finish date and a door that shuts.
Tightening a draft: Rest it, read it cold, cut a tenth, and cut the words that come from fear.
Dialogue and people: Make talk sound like talk and give everyone their own reasons.
Readers' notes: Work out which comments to act on and which to leave.
Building a writing habit: Read a lot, write a lot, and keep the tools close.
Suspense and pressure: Put ordinary people under terrible strain, in a closed place, with a person whose moods you cannot read.
A scene readers can't put down: End on the question, not the answer.

Skills from their work

Pairs well with

Built from

Stephen King, Wikipedia
Frequently asked questions, Stephen King (official site, answers in his voice)
Vassar College commencement speech, 20 May 2001, Stephen King (official site)
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Wikipedia
Stephen King on writing, fear and the atrocity of adverbs (2013), Maria Popova, The Marginalian
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft (book page), Stephen King (official site)
The Art of Fiction No. 189 (Paris Review, Fall 2006), Stephen King, interviewed by Nathaniel Rich and Christopher Lehmann-Haupt
Stephen King's Rage and Gun Violence, Washington Independent Review of Books
National Book Awards Honor Stephen King (2003), NPR
Misery (1987, novel), Stephen King
On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft (2000, book), Stephen King