I settle in my reading spot. In my hands, a hardbound in a cellophaned dust jacket, library initials stamped on its fore edge. It's a short-story collection and it's by Stephen King and it's my yield from my wife's last book-borrowing run. I vaguely recall morning dialog, Robin asking me to choose my poison from the fiction stacks. She was heading out to Reading Time for the wee one. I shrugged, distracted, multitasking with a shaver and a toothbrush (it never quite works). Dunno, pick something I'd like.

I approve of her pursuit. Library books are free. Free is an excellent price

Later, I picked through volumes she had brought. After weeding out female detectives and female sleuths, I found the book by King. So here I am.

Haven't read much from the "Master of Macabre" since I was a wee lad. I recollect a time reading one of his titles, a bestseller about zombie house pets. I had a house pet at the time*, so I could relate to the material, but I related even more when my house pet died before I finished the book. No, it wasn't ironic. Stop abusing and misusing that poor word! But it was coincidence and after it happened, I was a little less eager for his next paperback to publish.

So here I am.

King's anthologies of novellas or short stories routinely commence with conversational Introductions by Uncle Stevie**. Therein, the avuncular King confides in his Constant Reader*** the context and inspiration from whence sprung the stories you're geared to read. They're homey and conspiratorial preambles, just you and he, on the porch with a couple of cold ones.

And the intros are peppered with a writer's personal vignettes, such as the following.

In the mid-1970s, King wrote a book about a telekinetic high school pariah****, which they made into a movie, that then sold the book, and soon he was earning gazillions of dollars writing about the things that go bump in the night. But in the early 70's, King and Mrs. King were living hand-to-mouth. One day in 1972 (King confides), he came home from work to find Tabitha (Mrs. King) seated at the kitchen table on which table lay a pair of garden shears. And a credit card split into 2. Mr. King was instructed to relinquish his own credit card, which he did, because he was a good husband. Said card was summarily snipped apart. And though (he confides elsewhere) he later battled with worse demons than credit (gazillions of dollars don't always solve our problems), on this occasion, King faced the credit devil and won.

_____________

*Mine was a dog and it was a dog because I didn't know any better at the time. It's the sorest of subjects with my cats of present day. I don't know why I ever told them about it.

**What he calls himself

***What he calls his readers (or at least the faithful ones, who don't skip the Introductions)

****Carrie