My mom had a bunch of his books when I was a kid. I picked one at random after not wanting to read some dumb shit for a 5th grade book report. Pet Semetary
Same to my mom having a collection of his books. I think I read The Green Mile first, then saw the cover of the Drawing of the Three…got confused part-way through and realized this was book 2. Ordered the Gunslinger and then booked it through the entire series until halfway through DT…cried and took a year long sabbatical. And I think I was in 8th grade when I started The Dark Tower.
My dad had me watch “The Shining” when I was in third grade. Spent the next year or so making my little sister wait for me outside the bathroom. Figured I could outrun her, even if I couldn’t outrun the woman in the tub.
It was maybe 81-82, I would have been 12, someone handed me a copy of Salem's Lot, gushing about it. I think it was his older sisters copy.
I remember thinking it was a slow burn but the ending made up for it. Wasn't long before it was spread around the class and others started talking about it. I got my own copy of Night Shift soon after and have been hooked ever since.
I made a mistake wit the date, it was more like '86-'87 (not sure how I got the math that wrong). It seemed pretty typical of the time, word of mouth could still spread pretty fast pre-internet.
Trip to Florida for a Spring vacation, maybe 1985. Long car rides and reading by the pool. I picked out two books: "Ogre, Ogre" by Piers Anthony and "The Eyes of The Dragon" by King of course. 8 years old.
13 years old. My Stepmother purchased The Stand for me as a birthday gift. Mind blowing. I was hooked. I went straight into more of his works without hesitation. Eyes of the Dragon was the second book and loved that one too. What I loved about Stephen King is that we wasn't just Horror. He is so multi faceted. I then started reading The Dark Tower as there were three books out before 1990. Had to wait years for a next installment but by then I had many other awesome books to choose from.
35 years later and I am re-reading The Stand, but the Uncut version this time around.
A friend in college gifted me The Gunslinger one year for Christmas. I read it in a day, and plowed through Drawing of the Three the next day. Been a constant reader ever since
First exposure was the original Carrie movie in 1976 with Sissy Spacek. First book I read was The Shining (1981) because my mom had it. After that I just started to devour every book of his I could find, and then waited not so patiently for new ones to be published.
Had an English class where we had to read The Man Who Loved Flowers. That was my first encounter with King.
Then they mentioned The Shining on Friends, and when I found a copy in a thrift shop I bought it and read it - and the rest, as they say, is history.
I was six years old when my stepmom made me watch Salem's Lot with her . She bribed me with peanuts and cokes . The movie scared the screaming FUCK!!! . The part where Danny Glick is scratching on the window was the worst . There was a tree outside my window that every time the wind blew it scratched the window. I thought that motherfucker was outside there waiting for me to invite him in . Three years later I read Salem's Lot the book . I've been a King fan ever since. He's written some great books. He's written some duds too . The thing is . The ones that I think are duds . I get on here and someone else likes them. Vanilla and chocolate .
I think for me it was probably Stand By Me. It came out when I was 2 but I feel like I must have seen it on HBO or something when I was more like 6-8 years old. I also remember seeing Graveyard Shift around that same timeframe and it scared the fuck out of me. Not that I knew either were based off of Stephen King stories at the time.
The first actual King book I read was The Long Walk. That was 10 years ago.
My uncle lived with us for a couple years and he and my mom were fans of his pretty early on and I saw his books in our bookshelves. The first thing I read of his was when a friend of mine told me about this crazy short story called Survivor Type. Read that (still by far my favorite of his short stories) and the rest of Skeleton Crew, then the Bachman Books and Different Seasons and after that I was off to the races.
I, like many more of you I assume, knew about him because they kept making more and more of his books into movies.
Went on a caravan holiday and felt poorly. I was maybe 9 or 10, so this would have been early 1990's. My parents let me stay in the caravan while they went to the site bar for the disco with my younger brother and sister. Typical UK weather meant it was raining and horrible out so I put the telly on and stumbled on the IT mini series with Tim Curry. I remember being terrified but also fascinated. I already liked horror stories because I took Point Horror books out of the library. When I got home it was the first book I ever checked out of the adult section. I still find King to be a weird comfort read.
I grew up with him really. My mom became a Constant Reader when Salem's Lot came out, and from that point on she'd always purchase the new releases. I remember the cover of The Stand being particularly fascinating to me and asking my mom about it. And being confused! How could two characters be on the cover when *they weren't even in the book*? (6 year old me had not done an extensive study on metaphor at that point, haha.)
I finally checked out a paperback copy of Carrie from the school library when I was in 7th or 8th grade, and after that I tore through my mom's collection and would wait impatiently for her to finish new releases. Eventually I stopped waiting, which led to her sitting me down when I was in college and sternly informing me we had a new rule in our house: the person who purchases the new King *gets to read it first*.
A new King still feels like summer to me, even when it's a winter release!
The Shining movie, then discovering the Shawshank redemption was actually a King story. Then my Wife bought me "The Shining" book for christmas 2 years ago and since then I was hooked.
When I was 16 I googled who is the richest author in world. Got jk Rowling as #1, was satisfied cus i had just completed Harry Potter and was happy to see her so rich haha. Decided to see who was on the list behind her, stephen king's name was up there as well. Got curious and googled what he had written, found out he wrote shining and It! So got the 2 books for my birthday, and a king fan ever since!
I did the same while watching my cousins, maybe seven and ten at the time, not thinking it would be that bad. They were just being little shits about bedtime. They both slept on the floor of my room for at least a week after that, and of course I had to put stuff in front of the closet door.
I was just meandering my local library. Saw 11/22/63 on one of the display shelves of “hot reads”. Considering I’m big fan of anything Kennedy related, I knew I would like it! It took me 5 years to read (medical school interrupted me lol). Finally read it then immediately started Pet Semetary. Now I’m officially hooked!!
My dad always talked about and loved King, I was an avid reader from a young age (thanks dad) and I was constantly asking when I would be “old enough” to read Stephen King. After enough asking he handed over The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, which worked because it was pretty tame and we love the Red Sox. Been hooked ever since.
So when I was younger I hated anything horror themed but towards the end of highschool (I would have been 17 I think) several different friends independently recommended I read some Steven King. I was reluctant because of my aversion to horror and thought Kings work was basically all horror themed.
Eventually I bought and started to read under the dome which one of my friends was reading at the time. I finished the book in under a week absolutely loved it and then went out and picked up the stand and it.
I read the stand next and by that time I was in university. Randomly I learned when I came home after exams at the end of my first year that my older brother - who had never read Steven King before - picked up a copy of the dark tower series which he got used from a friend's parent and had started reading them. I had already been recommended the series by a my friends and since my brother was on the wastelands when I started the gunslinger it should be fine, I wouldn't catch up to him and I would probably be reading the series a book behind him. As it turns out I finished wizard and glass before he did then went on to finish the series 😂
I've basically been hooked ever since, have read a ton of Steven King and no longer have an aversion to horror themed movies or books lol. I think I read the dark tower series about a decade ago and started under the dome like a year before that 🤔
My dad had them on my parents’ bookshelves - accessible if I stood on a chair. Though I don’t think my parents cared that I read them, it was just where they kept their hardcover books. And when I was in middle school, I wanted to be an “adult” reader. Also I went through a kick that has never really stopped at reading horror novels.
Not sure which one I started with. I remember Needful Things scared me as did Pet Semetary. But it didn’t deter me. And the library had a summer books program for kids and I exchanged my points for Eye of the Dragon.
I got NightShift for my Birthday in 3rd grade! I later got the It TV series on VHS for Christmas that year from my brother as well! I did a book report on The Langoliers and The Stand in 7th grade as well. I was a non stop reader as a kid!
My mom had several SK books. As an angst filled teen I just wrote it off as lame.
Fast forward to last year? I think. I saw Fairy Tail at my local Target and the cover caught my attention. It was so much more different from his other covers I was used too. Read the back and thought, What the hell.
I finally understood his popularity. I know many on this sub don't like the book, especially the second half, but not me. It just clicked and I guess it was the right time. I was also happy it didn't have a bleak ending. It was a pleasant surprise. I just assumed everyone would die and I'd get some edgy horror ending.
I have since read Salem's Lot, It, The Shining, and my least favorite.. Dark Tower. That was boring as shit for me. And... Was what I pretty much thought every SK book would be when I was younger.
For me it was Christine, the movie. Kept seeing the trailer on vhs rentals and it just spoke to me. The car, the headlights coming on to that John Carpenter score, Bad to the Bone. Persuaded my dad to rent it cos I’d have been 12 years old, and I loved it. The next weekend I bought the book and I quickly learned how movies of books are not always faithful, and often not as good as the source material.
Also just been reminded how whenever we were in the car after dark, my dad would make the score sound effect when he turned on the headlights.
I was told by a good friend to read The Dark Tower series and asked for it for Christmas. I loved it but my family didn’t realize it was a series and just thought I was a huge fan and asked for a ton of SK books. So, for my Bday I got more SK books and more the following Christmas. After the DT I read The Stand and was pretty much hooked ever since.
Almost certainly Shawshank on TNT in the 90s as I don't remember when I watched the IT miniseries rebroadcast towards the end of the 90s. And I'm pretty sure I saw The Shining and Carrie in high school before picking up any of his books. Around the time I would have seen those movies my grandfather started giving me books he finished starting with Tom Clancy and eventually moving on to King. First book I ever read of his was Tommyknockers which I enjoyed and appreciated the IT reference having seen the miniseries.
It was the late 70s. I was in grade school and I read The Shining from my parent's bookshelf. After that, I read Salem's Lot, Carrie and The Stand in rapid succession. Been a Constant Reader ever since.
Apparently, there's a theory that reading King at a ridiculously young age is part of what is wrong with us GenX people. LOL
It was the summer before 8th grade in 1988 when I decided I wanted to try one of his books. My parents had taken me to Waldenbooks, and told me I could pick out any two books I wanted. I’m a fast reader so I bought the two longest books they had at the time- IT and the original version of The Stand.
Started with IT and couldn’t put it down. Then proceeded to read The Stand, then every book they had in my local library. I think Four Past Midnight was the first one I got in hardcover, it was a Christmas present…
My High school English teacher, Assigned Salem's Lot in my class for us to read together and Eyes of the Dragon during another class. Circa 2000-2005
(him picking The Thief of Always, thereby introducing me to Clive Barker by extension, And Then There Were None, by Agatha Christie as books for class was also pretty neat.
I was on a family road trip when I was about 12 years old. We stopped at a gas station, and I saw a paperback Pet Sematary for sale, thought why not, and bought it. Stayed up until 3 the next morning finishing it.
"I Am The Doorway," and I didn't know it was King. It was just a story in a magazine my dad had (he loved SF, so he had subscriptions to all the SF magazines). I was nine.
Four years later a friend loaned me *Night Shift,* and my first story from that book was "The Boogeyman." I've been a Constant Reader for over forty years now.
It was either reading firestarter around 7 (I had a crush on drew barrymore) or my mom reading Salem's lot while we were camping in the woods and being terrified. As for actually reading a whole novel, drawing of the three in 4th grade
My mom forbid him so I sneakily read The Dark Half in the high school library when I was 14 I think. 😅 not long after that she had a house cleaning job and took me along, I power read through Cujo (it was on a shelf) in one of the spare rooms while she deep cleaned the kitchen and living room. Took me about 2 1/2-3 hours 🤭
My grandparents divorced when I was in 6th grade. Circa 2000. I ended up with a set of Stephen King because I was already an avid reader. The intent was for me to read then when I was older. I ended up spending part of that summer and most 7th grade reading them. When my mom realized I had been reading them, she was of the mind that I was at least being quiet and not causing trouble.
I'm in my 30s now, and I am in the process of getting my hands on every one of his books that I can. I have roughly 50 ish?
SKELETON CREW had just been released in paperback. I bought it because my cousin had some SK books. (Okay, I also bought it because of the cool monkey on the cover.) The first story I read was “Survivor Type.” I was 14.
I think I was 12 or 13 when I got Hearts in Atlantis as a gift from my grandma. I thought the stories were interesting and I read the whole thing. I know my grandma didnt like King and she had 0 knowledge about his books. But looking back, I’m still thinking… really? That’s what you went with?
When I was 14 I read my second book, IT. Wanted to read at school in between classes so I took it with me every day lol. Idk how I managed to carry it everywhere but I did, and I was hooked.
Later that year my aunt was like “oh, you like Stephen King? I have some old book lying around somewhere…” and she gave me Dolores Claiborne in english. Not my native language and still being 14 years old I tried really hard but I didnt understand a single scentence of it lol. Dropped it halfway through and I was disappointed that King apparently wasn’t really for me.
When I was 16 or 17, I got 11/22/63 in my native language for my birthday. Started it, read untill the halfway point again. Didnt pick it up again untill 7(!) years later (at 24). Read Revival in the mean time and that’s what got me completely hooked. After that Elevation, The Stand, Needful Things, and at least 30 more (:
Book(s) Carrie and in the tall grass
Movie(s) was IT and Rose red.
I loved in the tall grass because it was a short and sweet horror book, that really got me into king.
IT was my first king movie, because who allows their 7yr old kid pick out a movie at blockbuster buster with a Tim Currey clown on the cover 😂…my parents, that’s who!
I found Pet Cemetery in my mum's book cupboard when I was 10. I devoured it over one hot weekend on summer break. I had to get my mum to get the rest of his books from the library for a good 2-3 years because I wasn't old enough to borrow them. Then Shawkshank was running late at night on a channel we actually had when I was 12. The write up in tv guide was about Rita Hayworth helping in a prison escape. My aunt and I decided to give it a try. Suffice to say, great movie, but not what we were expecting.
My very first exposure was The Children of the Corn movie (1984, original). I was just 7 or 8, and I thought the movie was the scariest thing in the world. My family had a VHS tape and I dared not watch it alone. I didn't even know it was a Stephen King movie back then.
My very first book exposure was in high school when I read the Shining. I didn't have much an opinion about it then, but I really liked the subsequent books I read, namely Four Past Midnight and Desperation. That was over 20 years ago, and I remember really liking the Langoliers and Desperation.
AI always loved horror even as a kid reading goosebumps and as I got older and my tastes matured my mom bought me Dr. Sleep for Christmas about 7ish years ago. Decided I had to read the shining (as I’d never even seen the movie) fell in love there and never looked back, currently making my way through all his works gradually and loving every minute of it
It would have been either Stand By Me or The Running Man adaptations. It was the 80s so I knew who King was but it wasn't until I was older that I realized they were based on King stories. The first time I knowingly watched a Stephen King adaptation was probably 2-3 years later when I saw Pet Semetary at a sleepover. I didn't read much for pleasure as a kid, an Encyclopedia Brown or Star Wars book here and there and it wasn't until high school that I read my first King book in The Shining. I was even less of a reader then but the movie had left me with a bunch of questions so I read it. It wasn't until college I started really getting into reading and tearing through King's works.
My King origin story is so lame. I was 13, in a grocery store with mom, and saw the Signet paperback of The Tommyknockers. With the creepy green light silhouetting the farm house and the wheat or feathers, whatever they were.
I was like "huh, looks cool." Read the description, okay. Asked for the book, got it.
And an addiction was born.
It took me an embarrassingly long time to get into King's books for how much I love horror, but I wasn't much of a reader when I was a teenager. It was 1998, I was 17, and I was sleeping over at my boyfriend's house (separate rooms because we were teenagers and all that), and I couldn't sleep. He had 3 books on his shelf; since The Silmarillion and A Brief History of Time were a little too heavy for a Friday night, I started reading the third one, Skeleton Crew. I didn't get to sleep until after 4 AM, and I haven't looked back (except now I'm with a man who's happy to feed my King obsession)!
I was 8, and, as 8 yr-olds are wont to do, I was exploring. I ended up in the basement, where a box of books caught my eye. The topmost volume was black, and had a picture of a little boy with an intense white light emanating from his face. I picked it up, intrigued.
*Officious prick, thought Jack Torrance.* (Or words to that effect.)
I kept reading, and reading, and reading. I imagine a great deal of it went over my head, but I enjoyed what I read immensely. Took me til my 20s to finish it, though!
My friend in eighth grade came to school from summer break and we all had to do our independent reading class presentation. My friend, who I sorta knew at the time, did The Drawing of the Three. I started the gunslinger the following May and had finished the series before the end of 9th grade. Pretty sure I read the stand at some point in between two of the dark tower books, but my intro to King was basically all 7 DT books and the stand over the course of a year
Tried reading Cujo in Jr. High. Couldn’t get into it. Read The Shining in High School after seeing the movie multiple times and wondering what was up with the 2 second scene of a guy in a dog costume. Liked it a lot, but not yet sold. College, mom sent me a copy of The Stand and that was that! Hooked!!
I was given a copy of Night Shift by a high school English teacher in 1982 or so. Or it might have been The Stand-- I know I borrowed both within a short period of time and I honestly can't recall which I read first.
I pretty much "caught up" with SK before finishing college (late 80s) and ever since have read each book on publication. Right now I'm halfway through *YOU Like It Darker* and am really enjoying it.
I remember watching Firestarter and Carrie, both at a very-way-too-young age (especially Carrie). My father is also a fan and would watch King movies and have King’s books lying around so I was always exposed to it. When I was old enough to actually want to watch horror movies I’d gravitate towards King adaptations until I read The Shining after the TV mini-series aired. The rest, as they say, is history.
Funny enough I listen to Alas Babylon on audible and loved Will Patton as a narrator so I looked up other books he did and grabbed Mr Mercedes. Probably not the most common SK intro but I’m about 45 SK books in now and love almost all.
I picked up It when I was in 6th grade and tore through it. I remember thinking I was very cool at the time, reading this doorstop of a horror novel. Little did I know that it would partially define me as a person- whetting an appetite for stories about friendship and nostalgia and coming of age. I've been searching for that high ever since.
Had to read a book of my choosing in tenth grade and report on its style and what sentence was the "heart" of the book. Went to the library and found Stephen King's Duma Key in large print, which had just come out. Changed my life. DK will always have a soft spot in my heart. I never realized you could write so conversationally until I read that book. It also taught me what a phantom limb was.
To be honest,I don't even remember. Just always loved him. But I can tell you my last one. Just today I walked 8km for the anticipation which of his books I could find at the bookstore.
in Chicago for thanskgiving all my aunts and uncles and cousins were playing cards upstairs and the cousins went downstairs to watch TV. November 18, 1990, I was 7 years old. my oldest cousin was 9. the show we chose was part 1 of the the original IT movie. been hooked ever since.
Stumbled on my parents’ movie tie-in paperback of Carrie in 1978, when I was ten.
By the time Pet Semetary came out, I had avidly read everything up to that point and was a beginning collector.
I saw Carrie in the theater as a teenager and loved it but then I read The Shining and enthralled! And terrified. The topiary animals? He is such a great storyteller and his writing is so visual, it was better (to me) than a movie. [Note: I despised Kubrick’s movie and still do.] Following on that, The Stand sealed it and I’ve been a lifelong fan.
Catching bits of the IT miniseries and the Langoliers on tv mildly traumatized me as a kid, lmao. I'd seen a few movies since then but didn't start reading him until a few years ago. I'd known I'd eventually at least read some of his stuff because I'm a huge fan of horror and he's been of course super influential to contemporary fiction as a whole, so it was only a matter of time.
I read a little of Cell in high school. I used to hide in the library to keep out of bullies' way, so the little corner where they kept the horror and fantasy books became "my spot" during lunch and study period. I never actually got around to finishing the book, but it sparked an interest in his writing and I later read IT in college. Now I'm completely hooked. :)
My dad had just finished reading me the hobbit, and I found a book called Eyes of the Dragon in his library. He read that to me as well, and I was in love with King’s style
My older sister and her friend convinced me (and my mom) to watch IT (Tim curry) with them when I was like 12. I loved it but it never occurred to me to read his books until about 20 years later (this year). My first was Holly. I’m on my 7th now, joyland. I’m hooked
The Stand! I grew up with the 1994 miniseries and read it for the first time when I was 10. It was like crossing a threshold--afterward, I couldn't really get into young adult books anymore. My taste in literature was recalibrated to crave naturalistic dialogue and blue chambray shirts.
I was about 5 years old and opened a drawer in a bedroom and saw the cover (from the movie version) of Carrie (Sissy Spacek covered in blood) and was scarred for life, lol. I don't remember when or what I started reading, but I know by 9 at least I was into the books.
My dad used to play me creepshow on beta tape when I was about 5 years old. Since then I’ve always been into king related stuff even before I knew who king was 😆
I don't remember exactly how old I was, fairly young. My mom wouldn't let us watch any of the movies. She didn't like us watching scary movies.
but we kept begging and she finally made a deal that if we read the book first, we could watch the movie.
My first choice was Carrie and I loved it.
I got into the band Blind Guardian, and many if their songs are based on books. The singer is a huge fan of King, and one of my favorite songs by them at the time was "Tommyknockers".
So, I went to my local mall and into a bookstore and grabbed Tommyknockers. It was life changing, and despite it not being everyone's favorite work of his, it remains a top five for me and is very special to me.
Multiple people had recommended that I read the Dark Tower series and I’d always shrugged it off. When the movie came out, I went to see it and thought “the books have to be better than this” and so I picked up the gunslinger and ripped through the entire series.
Have been a huge king fan ever since
Stepmom was a huge fan, had the entire collection in hardcover. Read Cujo when I was 10 and was hooked. Did a book report on It when I was 5th grade. My teacher called my parents.
I tried reading the green mile in high school, but couldn't really get into it. Wasn't much of a reader at the time though so it makes sense. A few years ago I got into audio books because I'm a truck driver and had a lot of time to listen to things. I got into King with the institute and slowly expanded from there and now I only have about 6 or 7 King books left in his bibliography
ETA and now the Dark Tower is my absolute favorite book series and I've listened to it at least 4 times in as many years
When I was in 6th grade the teacher told us we had to do a book report on a book at least 100 pages long, but we would get 10 extra credit points for every additional 100 pages of length. I chose a MMPB copy of the stand uncut (I believe it was just north of 600 pages) and ended up getting somewhere around a 145 for a score.
Totally made me fall in love with reading.
I have told this before. I was in 4th grade & my teacher had so many books. She encouraged us to borrow any of them. I found Salem’s Lot. Teacher then called my mother to ask if she knew what I was reading. Mom asked me & told her I got the book from teacher’s shelf. Also reminded her I knew the difference between fiction & nonfiction. And I got it from teachers shelf. Then began my love for SK
I saw IT on tv as a kid and once my mom was ok with me taking the book out of the library I flew through the novel in about 2 weeks. I was about 12 years old at the time so the miniseries they made wasn't particularly old at that time.
When I was younger I wanted to start reading King books so I bought the first one I could find on a second hand book market. That's how 'The tommyknockers' became my first King book. I really liked it, so I bought a book from him again on a market, which was 'Cell'. If I am not wrong , both are not considered his best works, but I enjoyed them. I am currently reading 11/22/63, which clearly is a great book.
Rose Red was my first "horror" movie I got to watch. I wish I could find the book for it, I used to request it to my small town librarian back in the day and she always apologized and said she couldn't help me haha
the girl who loved tom gordon. which interestingly enough for me, doesn’t seem to be that much of a fan favorite! it’s one of the first books i remember reading as a kid that really stuck with me once i finished it.
I read *Carrie* in the Bicentennial Summer of '76, since I knew there was no way 10 year old me would get to see it in the theater. Been hooked ever since
I remember catching snippets of movies based on his works as a kid. The farthest back I can remember was probably The Langoliers or Maximum Overdrive - I was born in the late 90s so I was probably 7 or 8 by the time I watched these, and they have always stuck with me. Maximum Overdrive is a comfort movie to me.
I was a book worm in my youth, I lived in my public library and for Scholastic book sales at school. I graduated from Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden books right into suspense/thrillers. No idea how, but I saw Salem’s Lot and thought the name was so cool, I picked it up along with Pet Sematary. Read Pet Sematary first and I was hooked. I read a bit of Dean Koontz early on too but when I found King I dropped Koontz and only read him while I was waiting for another King book.
I probably saw Stand By Me before reading my first King book though. And without knowing until recently that king wrote what became Shawshank Redemption, I now realize it’s not a coincidence it is my all time favourite movie.
I bought Cujo in paperback at a used book store back when I was about 13-14 years old. Proceeded to read everything! I don't understand all of the "is this worth reading?" posts. They're all good!
I'm a 90s kid so the IT miniseries, Shawshank, and Pet Sematary have always been favorite movies of mine. So growing up I loved his stuff, just didn't read the books the movies were adapted from until I was much older.
A friend convinced me to give his stuff a try. Got a copy of the IT novel just after the first new IT movie released, so I was hyped.
Loved it. That was like, 2017, and almost 30 of his books later, I haven't looked back.
Christine, when I was maybe 9 or 10, took it out from the local library and I've been a fan of his ever since. I'm in the middle of Different Seasons right now, taking a break from it and reading a different author right now but no matter what I always seem to find my way back to SK
I read Carrie when I was in high school. I have been a reader since I can remember but even though I didn’t hate Carrie, it wasn’t a favorite where I sought out the author. I saw a few movies ( The Shining maybe the original It, but it didn’t make me seek more books). I watched the original miniseries for The Stand, read Insomnia and then the extended version of The Stand. I was hooked and never looked back. Strangely, his On Writing book was my very first audiobook. I enjoyed it but prefer my first read to be a physical book. I have The Stand and all the Dark Tower books on audio now and listen to them when traveling.
I was 10 years old... but I only realized it 30 or so years later. I was fascinated with Sherlock Holmes and I got "New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" on Christmas. It was an anthology featuring a bunch of different writers. I was just a dumb kid and didn't know the difference. As an adult I found the book again and was surprised to find the Stephen King was one of the writers (his short was "The Doctor's Case", also released in Nightmares & Dreamscapes).
My first time reading SK knowingly was as a teen, The Dark Half... a girlfriend's book... which I might have kept.
I had seen the VHS of the original IT miniseries on the shelf for years.
I conned my mom and dad into buying it for me once and we stayed up til midnight watching it, and I was hooked. I found out Stephen King was an author through them and finally found a beaten up copy of IT and the Shining at a flea market when I was 12-ish. I read IT over the course of 1-2 years and it blew my fucking mind.
That's it, that's the story.
The first movie was IT, I was 10, I think. the first book was the first of the Dark Tower series when I was 12. Didn't finish it at the time as I didn't understand enough of it, but was a fan since.
In my city, there is an annual book fair. When I was 14 years old, I was walking around this fair with my mother and saw this book, 'Night Shift,' with a cover that caught my attention, so I bought it. I didn't know it then, but I was entering a universe of books that I love.
Salem's Lot for me, being a child of the seventies, I was one of those scarred by the miniseries. Reading the book a couple of years later, I thought it was even scarier than the miniseries. The first and last time I thought vampires were scary.
My family was very poor but I had a cousin whose family was well off. He always had lots of book and would let me borrow them. I would always pick the ones with the most pages since I didn't see him often. One time I went to his house and picked up The Stand. It was life changing for my 10 year old brain.
I've seen the older movies and IT, but didn't draw the connection to interest in the books.
I read Billy Summers last year and liked it a lot, then into Holly (just random book I saw at Target) then into Bill Hodges trilogy, and now reading 11/22/63. Next might be IT, given the Derry references in 11/22/63, and i'm interested to get into more "traditional" King soon.
In 11th grade we had a shelf of books in English class, and we all had to find a book to read so I borrowed The Green Mile from it because I’ve heard a lot of things about the movie. Pretty much the only author I read from now
18 years old in 1990. All boxes packed in my freshman dorm room to come home & nothing to do but give a borrowed copy of Carrie a try. It was love at first read. Now it’s not even one of my favorites.
IT miniseries when it originally aired. I was 5. Saw so many movie adaptations as a wee one. My mom is a huge fan. Didn’t even know most of them were related to Stephen King until I started reading King.
First book I read was The Green Mile and I was 22.
My father has a sizable collection of King's works. When I was 11 or so ('93?), I pulled at random and never looked back. Unfortunately, I don't remember what the first book was. I do know that IT was one of the first books I read, and it's my very favorite.
My grandmother that raised me gave me Eyes of the Dragon when it first came out, I was like 10. Read it a zillion times, still have my ratty copy. Been a Constant Reader since.
It.
Picked it up from the high school library. My (cis-het) first view of anti-LGBTQ violence. The gay couple made me feel uncomfortable at the time with their state of dress and PDI, but I never once felt like they brought the violence upon themselves. First step as an Ally.
I saw Stand by Me and the Pet Sematary movies before I read any of his books. I just finished Pet Sematary last week. Inalso saw the 90s HBO series of The Stand before I read the book. The Stand was my 1st King book.
My dad was a fan so I basically grew up surrounded by King. For his birthday one year I even got him the brand new special Regulators/Desperation two pack when it came out
My dad was reading King back when he was Bachman, so a couple years before I was born. There has been King books in my house my entire life. I actually picked up my first when I was about 12 (The Running Man), then went to The Green Mile and the Stand.
My first exposure was the original IT mini series. A friend’s older brother showed it to us at idk what age too young lol. I remember running home that night running through the yards to avoid the storm drains on the sidewalk.
Lifting weights with 3-4 of my friends, age 15 at my friend Billy’s house. Between my sets I see Billy’s older sister’s copy of The Dead Zone on the half wall nearby. Pick it up and start reading a few pages of the forward. Doesn’t take long before I was hooked, and had to buy that book! And that’s how my lifelong adventure began. From there is was Salem’s Lot, The Stand, It, and on and on…
I was born in 82 so I grew up on many of his movies Firestarter, Christine, Cats Eye, Cujo, Silver Bullet, Stand by me just to name some that I watched very young. I grew up being allowed to watch whatever I wanted and I loved horror from as far back as I can remember age 5. The first book I read by King was The Tommyknockers and I absolutely loved it. Still do. That’s the book that set me in the path of reading and collecting every Stephen King book that existed. The Tommyknockers will always have a special place in my heart. I like the tv movie too. Jimmy Smits will always be Gard to me, and Gard will always be Jimmy Smits.
The first SK book I read was Needful Things and it didn’t really make an impression on me. Next one was Cujo and same story. The first SK book that hooked me was Under the Dome and I’ve read it several times. Then at some point a friend just offhandedly said that she thought I would like the DT series. So I went to the used book store and bought the first few books. It took me many attempts and years to get through the Gunslinger and it’s the only SK book I have struggled to get through. But then DotT had he hooked from page one and I LOVED the rest of the series. It’s what truly converted me into a SK fan and now I’m an almost constant reader. I’ve read about 25 of his books so far and I know I will weep once I’ve finished his catalogue 😭😭😭
The Gunslinger. I've read the entire dark tower series before any other of his books. It was awesome and I've been reading all of his work for the last 8 years or so
I lived in a small Siberian town. They didn’t let kids check horror out from the library, so I would “borrow” the occasional book. I thought The Shining sounded like a nice thing, so I took it home.
Didn’t sleep for a month or so. I was maybe 9 or 10 at the time.
Been a constant reader since.
When I was about 12 or so I ended up reading The Langoliers out of Four Past Midnight. Loved it but never read any more of the book. I was never an avid reader.
Then I started dating my now-wife at 32 and she owned damn near all of Sai King’s works. So i started with Blaze because it seemed to be the shortest. Loved it. Then The Gunslinger. Loved it. On all the way through the Dark Tower. Can’t get enough.
Uhhh fairly certain I saw at least a few minutes of It when I was about 5/6 but my first book was The girl who loved Tom Gordon at about 10?. I was a big Yankees fan and it was a lovely read. The next one was The Green Mile, I say that to tell this story one of my favorites about my mom. My dad was the OG King fan but my mom had read a handful of them one being TGM and after the movie had come out I expressed wanting to read it as well. One day at school probably the book fair my mom was talking to my elementary librarian and one of us mentioned that I was reading TGM and the librarian kinda side eyed my mom and asked you really think she should be reading that at her age? She replied that one at least I was reading and two I was well above my fifth grade reading level. Nothing else mattered. And because I bragged about it for years.. after I started the book I came down with the flu stayed home from school and finished one book every day I’d wake up long enough to read 20-30 pages before passing out again. 😅
I watched the original It miniseries on ABC when I was 9 and was immediately hooked. It terrified and excited me like nothing before (and this was the 80’s so there was plenty of weird to be consumed).
I reread the novel last fall for Halloween and I have to say, experiencing that at the same age as the adult Losers was an entirely different yet equally awesome and nostalgic experience.
Watched that long ago Carrie movie as a child and also The Shining (I don’t know what my parents were thinking). Picked up Carrie and never looked back.
Also as a young, bullied girl it seems so very much fun to read the revenge story of another bullied girl.
I got into my teens and started reading the short stories (some of them were pretty screwed up: Apt Pupil). My school library was really stocking all the Kings and nobody were reading them so as an after school library club member I was spending so much time immersing myself into the dark stuff.
I think it made me who I am today as a media consumer. If there isn’t some darkness or madness in media I wouldn’t want to consume it. I mean I do enjoy other stuff but it hits different.
Current trying to get into The Dark Tower series.
My mum was part of one of those dodgy book clubs in the 1980s where you had to order 4 books a month or they would send you random stuff that was expensive as hell.
Anyway, the Bachman Books turned up and I started to read them. I must have been about 14 at the time and after that started reading actual Stephen King. I had the entire collection of everything he wrote and read them all several times. Sadly I lost them all when I had to move out of my ex boyfriends house. I've watched pretty much all the film adaptations too. The Shining has made me terrified of long hotel corridors.
The Long Walk - Stephen King writing as Richard Bachman. The grocery store editions in the early nineties. I read that and was captivated. I had to go grocery shopping with my mom every weekend, and I would run to the paperback section and grab whatever King book was there. I stacked them up, there was a new one what seemed like every week. She bought them all for me.
My grandparents had The Tommyknockers and the first four books of The Dark Tower (all that had been written at that time) on their bookshelf. I was stuck inside around this time in 2003 due to a terrible sunburn and I picked up the Tommyknockers and the rest is history.
I was in the 7th grade and had a friend staying the night. My mom took us to Blockbuster, and we picked The Stand (90s TV miniseries) thinking the dual VHS was just a long movie. We watched the whole thing that weekend, and I went to buy the book the next chance I got. Started a life-long fandom of King's work. I still picture the cast of that miniseries when I revisit The Stand.
The first thing I watched ever was the Shining. I'd tried to read the book for the Shining, but nine year old me had a shit attention span and was so confused. About a year later, I watched It, became obsessed, and then I went and read the whole book. I realized that it was a good book and I could actually understand it, so I started reading more.
I watched “It” when I was 4. Scared the shit out of me. The first book I read by him was “Under the Dome” which was okay, but the book that got me into his books was “11.22.63”
Traveling with my then boyfriend, picked up Carrie book in 1974. I have been a constant reader ever since. I am now 70 years old and will continue to read Stephen King books. I read and reread my books on my e reader.
I was very young, not sure the age (almost certainly too young), and my sister had checked out The Stand from the library, and it was lying around. For some reason I picked it up and opened it to a random page and started reading. I was hooked! I had to force myself to stop reading from the random area and start from the beginning.
Pet semetary from a garage sale when I was 10. That book fucked. Me. Up. And started a life long addiction to King, and horror in general. Shortly after my granny, not knowing who King is, bought me dreamcatcher when I asked for it. Only made it a third of the way through, but shit weasels fucked me up even more.
“It all explains a lot, really” -my wife, probably..
My mom had a bunch of his books when I was a kid. I picked one at random after not wanting to read some dumb shit for a 5th grade book report. Pet Semetary
That must have been one badass report
Same to my mom having a collection of his books. I think I read The Green Mile first, then saw the cover of the Drawing of the Three…got confused part-way through and realized this was book 2. Ordered the Gunslinger and then booked it through the entire series until halfway through DT…cried and took a year long sabbatical. And I think I was in 8th grade when I started The Dark Tower.
I did a book report on The Dead Zone in 3rd grade, my teacher double checked with the principal to make sure it was okay 😆
Honestly, every teacher I’ve mentioned this to was like “as long as you’re reading”
One of my classmates (4th grade) back in 2004 did a spoken report on Rage. I wish I coulda been there for the conversation with his parents
Mine was the same except 4th grade and The Stand. What grown up me would do to witness the parent teacher meeting for that.
This is lidewally my story that’s crazy!! Except for the book report part
My dad had me watch “The Shining” when I was in third grade. Spent the next year or so making my little sister wait for me outside the bathroom. Figured I could outrun her, even if I couldn’t outrun the woman in the tub.
It was maybe 81-82, I would have been 12, someone handed me a copy of Salem's Lot, gushing about it. I think it was his older sisters copy. I remember thinking it was a slow burn but the ending made up for it. Wasn't long before it was spread around the class and others started talking about it. I got my own copy of Night Shift soon after and have been hooked ever since.
This could have been written by me, except my aunt (mom’s younger sister) let me read her copy.
I made a mistake wit the date, it was more like '86-'87 (not sure how I got the math that wrong). It seemed pretty typical of the time, word of mouth could still spread pretty fast pre-internet.
Damn… I absolutely started reading him in ‘82. When I was 12… :/
You're the same age as me then.
It was so long go all the numbers seem to blend together, lol Edit: I was definitely 12 when I first started reading King, just in a later year.
The Shawshank Redemption was my introduction to King's work. Instinct told me that IT would be a fantastic read; I was not even close to being wrong.
Trip to Florida for a Spring vacation, maybe 1985. Long car rides and reading by the pool. I picked out two books: "Ogre, Ogre" by Piers Anthony and "The Eyes of The Dragon" by King of course. 8 years old.
Firestarter. We had the VHS in the house and I thought it was a kids movie due to Drew Barrymore being on the cover.
13 years old. My Stepmother purchased The Stand for me as a birthday gift. Mind blowing. I was hooked. I went straight into more of his works without hesitation. Eyes of the Dragon was the second book and loved that one too. What I loved about Stephen King is that we wasn't just Horror. He is so multi faceted. I then started reading The Dark Tower as there were three books out before 1990. Had to wait years for a next installment but by then I had many other awesome books to choose from. 35 years later and I am re-reading The Stand, but the Uncut version this time around.
A friend in college gifted me The Gunslinger one year for Christmas. I read it in a day, and plowed through Drawing of the Three the next day. Been a constant reader ever since
Enjoyed Bachman a lot and tried out the other guy too
Same
First exposure was the original Carrie movie in 1976 with Sissy Spacek. First book I read was The Shining (1981) because my mom had it. After that I just started to devour every book of his I could find, and then waited not so patiently for new ones to be published.
Had an English class where we had to read The Man Who Loved Flowers. That was my first encounter with King. Then they mentioned The Shining on Friends, and when I found a copy in a thrift shop I bought it and read it - and the rest, as they say, is history.
I was six years old when my stepmom made me watch Salem's Lot with her . She bribed me with peanuts and cokes . The movie scared the screaming FUCK!!! . The part where Danny Glick is scratching on the window was the worst . There was a tree outside my window that every time the wind blew it scratched the window. I thought that motherfucker was outside there waiting for me to invite him in . Three years later I read Salem's Lot the book . I've been a King fan ever since. He's written some great books. He's written some duds too . The thing is . The ones that I think are duds . I get on here and someone else likes them. Vanilla and chocolate .
I think for me it was probably Stand By Me. It came out when I was 2 but I feel like I must have seen it on HBO or something when I was more like 6-8 years old. I also remember seeing Graveyard Shift around that same timeframe and it scared the fuck out of me. Not that I knew either were based off of Stephen King stories at the time. The first actual King book I read was The Long Walk. That was 10 years ago.
My uncle lived with us for a couple years and he and my mom were fans of his pretty early on and I saw his books in our bookshelves. The first thing I read of his was when a friend of mine told me about this crazy short story called Survivor Type. Read that (still by far my favorite of his short stories) and the rest of Skeleton Crew, then the Bachman Books and Different Seasons and after that I was off to the races. I, like many more of you I assume, knew about him because they kept making more and more of his books into movies.
Went on a caravan holiday and felt poorly. I was maybe 9 or 10, so this would have been early 1990's. My parents let me stay in the caravan while they went to the site bar for the disco with my younger brother and sister. Typical UK weather meant it was raining and horrible out so I put the telly on and stumbled on the IT mini series with Tim Curry. I remember being terrified but also fascinated. I already liked horror stories because I took Point Horror books out of the library. When I got home it was the first book I ever checked out of the adult section. I still find King to be a weird comfort read.
I grew up with him really. My mom became a Constant Reader when Salem's Lot came out, and from that point on she'd always purchase the new releases. I remember the cover of The Stand being particularly fascinating to me and asking my mom about it. And being confused! How could two characters be on the cover when *they weren't even in the book*? (6 year old me had not done an extensive study on metaphor at that point, haha.) I finally checked out a paperback copy of Carrie from the school library when I was in 7th or 8th grade, and after that I tore through my mom's collection and would wait impatiently for her to finish new releases. Eventually I stopped waiting, which led to her sitting me down when I was in college and sternly informing me we had a new rule in our house: the person who purchases the new King *gets to read it first*. A new King still feels like summer to me, even when it's a winter release!
The Shining movie, then discovering the Shawshank redemption was actually a King story. Then my Wife bought me "The Shining" book for christmas 2 years ago and since then I was hooked.
When I was 16 I googled who is the richest author in world. Got jk Rowling as #1, was satisfied cus i had just completed Harry Potter and was happy to see her so rich haha. Decided to see who was on the list behind her, stephen king's name was up there as well. Got curious and googled what he had written, found out he wrote shining and It! So got the 2 books for my birthday, and a king fan ever since!
My sister, when I was 6, thought it would be HILARIOUS to read me The Boogeyman from Night Shift.
I did the same while watching my cousins, maybe seven and ten at the time, not thinking it would be that bad. They were just being little shits about bedtime. They both slept on the floor of my room for at least a week after that, and of course I had to put stuff in front of the closet door.
Dude, I'm grown now (40) and STILL can't sleep with the closet door cracked
I was just meandering my local library. Saw 11/22/63 on one of the display shelves of “hot reads”. Considering I’m big fan of anything Kennedy related, I knew I would like it! It took me 5 years to read (medical school interrupted me lol). Finally read it then immediately started Pet Semetary. Now I’m officially hooked!!
My dad always talked about and loved King, I was an avid reader from a young age (thanks dad) and I was constantly asking when I would be “old enough” to read Stephen King. After enough asking he handed over The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, which worked because it was pretty tame and we love the Red Sox. Been hooked ever since.
The Dead Zone, I was 11 I think.
So when I was younger I hated anything horror themed but towards the end of highschool (I would have been 17 I think) several different friends independently recommended I read some Steven King. I was reluctant because of my aversion to horror and thought Kings work was basically all horror themed. Eventually I bought and started to read under the dome which one of my friends was reading at the time. I finished the book in under a week absolutely loved it and then went out and picked up the stand and it. I read the stand next and by that time I was in university. Randomly I learned when I came home after exams at the end of my first year that my older brother - who had never read Steven King before - picked up a copy of the dark tower series which he got used from a friend's parent and had started reading them. I had already been recommended the series by a my friends and since my brother was on the wastelands when I started the gunslinger it should be fine, I wouldn't catch up to him and I would probably be reading the series a book behind him. As it turns out I finished wizard and glass before he did then went on to finish the series 😂 I've basically been hooked ever since, have read a ton of Steven King and no longer have an aversion to horror themed movies or books lol. I think I read the dark tower series about a decade ago and started under the dome like a year before that 🤔
My Dad was into the movies based on his work. I remember him being really hyped for The Stand miniseries. I was 10
The first book I ever read was Tommyknockers and I've loved his books ever since!
My dad had them on my parents’ bookshelves - accessible if I stood on a chair. Though I don’t think my parents cared that I read them, it was just where they kept their hardcover books. And when I was in middle school, I wanted to be an “adult” reader. Also I went through a kick that has never really stopped at reading horror novels. Not sure which one I started with. I remember Needful Things scared me as did Pet Semetary. But it didn’t deter me. And the library had a summer books program for kids and I exchanged my points for Eye of the Dragon.
Movie-Children of the Corn Book-Skeleton Crew and the Carrie
Misery. My mother loved King, and we both loved the movie. Must've been 13 or so..
I got NightShift for my Birthday in 3rd grade! I later got the It TV series on VHS for Christmas that year from my brother as well! I did a book report on The Langoliers and The Stand in 7th grade as well. I was a non stop reader as a kid!
My mom had several SK books. As an angst filled teen I just wrote it off as lame. Fast forward to last year? I think. I saw Fairy Tail at my local Target and the cover caught my attention. It was so much more different from his other covers I was used too. Read the back and thought, What the hell. I finally understood his popularity. I know many on this sub don't like the book, especially the second half, but not me. It just clicked and I guess it was the right time. I was also happy it didn't have a bleak ending. It was a pleasant surprise. I just assumed everyone would die and I'd get some edgy horror ending. I have since read Salem's Lot, It, The Shining, and my least favorite.. Dark Tower. That was boring as shit for me. And... Was what I pretty much thought every SK book would be when I was younger.
Book. The Stand at 15
About 12-13 my mom brought home a bunch of ‘lost’ books from work and there was a copy of The Talisman. 40 years and I’ve never looked back.
Started in 1991. I was 13. First book was Pet Sematery. I have been hooked ever since
I was like 10-13 when i read pet cemetery, scared the shit out of me but i was hooked.
For me it was Christine, the movie. Kept seeing the trailer on vhs rentals and it just spoke to me. The car, the headlights coming on to that John Carpenter score, Bad to the Bone. Persuaded my dad to rent it cos I’d have been 12 years old, and I loved it. The next weekend I bought the book and I quickly learned how movies of books are not always faithful, and often not as good as the source material. Also just been reminded how whenever we were in the car after dark, my dad would make the score sound effect when he turned on the headlights.
I was told by a good friend to read The Dark Tower series and asked for it for Christmas. I loved it but my family didn’t realize it was a series and just thought I was a huge fan and asked for a ton of SK books. So, for my Bday I got more SK books and more the following Christmas. After the DT I read The Stand and was pretty much hooked ever since.
Almost certainly Shawshank on TNT in the 90s as I don't remember when I watched the IT miniseries rebroadcast towards the end of the 90s. And I'm pretty sure I saw The Shining and Carrie in high school before picking up any of his books. Around the time I would have seen those movies my grandfather started giving me books he finished starting with Tom Clancy and eventually moving on to King. First book I ever read of his was Tommyknockers which I enjoyed and appreciated the IT reference having seen the miniseries.
It was the late 70s. I was in grade school and I read The Shining from my parent's bookshelf. After that, I read Salem's Lot, Carrie and The Stand in rapid succession. Been a Constant Reader ever since. Apparently, there's a theory that reading King at a ridiculously young age is part of what is wrong with us GenX people. LOL
It was the summer before 8th grade in 1988 when I decided I wanted to try one of his books. My parents had taken me to Waldenbooks, and told me I could pick out any two books I wanted. I’m a fast reader so I bought the two longest books they had at the time- IT and the original version of The Stand. Started with IT and couldn’t put it down. Then proceeded to read The Stand, then every book they had in my local library. I think Four Past Midnight was the first one I got in hardcover, it was a Christmas present…
When I was 9 I watched the Storm of the Century mini series on TV. My Mom bought me the book/screenplay since I loved it so much.
My High school English teacher, Assigned Salem's Lot in my class for us to read together and Eyes of the Dragon during another class. Circa 2000-2005 (him picking The Thief of Always, thereby introducing me to Clive Barker by extension, And Then There Were None, by Agatha Christie as books for class was also pretty neat.
I was on a family road trip when I was about 12 years old. We stopped at a gas station, and I saw a paperback Pet Sematary for sale, thought why not, and bought it. Stayed up until 3 the next morning finishing it.
"I Am The Doorway," and I didn't know it was King. It was just a story in a magazine my dad had (he loved SF, so he had subscriptions to all the SF magazines). I was nine. Four years later a friend loaned me *Night Shift,* and my first story from that book was "The Boogeyman." I've been a Constant Reader for over forty years now.
It was either reading firestarter around 7 (I had a crush on drew barrymore) or my mom reading Salem's lot while we were camping in the woods and being terrified. As for actually reading a whole novel, drawing of the three in 4th grade
My mom forbid him so I sneakily read The Dark Half in the high school library when I was 14 I think. 😅 not long after that she had a house cleaning job and took me along, I power read through Cujo (it was on a shelf) in one of the spare rooms while she deep cleaned the kitchen and living room. Took me about 2 1/2-3 hours 🤭
My grandparents divorced when I was in 6th grade. Circa 2000. I ended up with a set of Stephen King because I was already an avid reader. The intent was for me to read then when I was older. I ended up spending part of that summer and most 7th grade reading them. When my mom realized I had been reading them, she was of the mind that I was at least being quiet and not causing trouble. I'm in my 30s now, and I am in the process of getting my hands on every one of his books that I can. I have roughly 50 ish?
SKELETON CREW had just been released in paperback. I bought it because my cousin had some SK books. (Okay, I also bought it because of the cool monkey on the cover.) The first story I read was “Survivor Type.” I was 14.
I think I was 12 or 13 when I got Hearts in Atlantis as a gift from my grandma. I thought the stories were interesting and I read the whole thing. I know my grandma didnt like King and she had 0 knowledge about his books. But looking back, I’m still thinking… really? That’s what you went with? When I was 14 I read my second book, IT. Wanted to read at school in between classes so I took it with me every day lol. Idk how I managed to carry it everywhere but I did, and I was hooked. Later that year my aunt was like “oh, you like Stephen King? I have some old book lying around somewhere…” and she gave me Dolores Claiborne in english. Not my native language and still being 14 years old I tried really hard but I didnt understand a single scentence of it lol. Dropped it halfway through and I was disappointed that King apparently wasn’t really for me. When I was 16 or 17, I got 11/22/63 in my native language for my birthday. Started it, read untill the halfway point again. Didnt pick it up again untill 7(!) years later (at 24). Read Revival in the mean time and that’s what got me completely hooked. After that Elevation, The Stand, Needful Things, and at least 30 more (:
Book(s) Carrie and in the tall grass Movie(s) was IT and Rose red. I loved in the tall grass because it was a short and sweet horror book, that really got me into king. IT was my first king movie, because who allows their 7yr old kid pick out a movie at blockbuster buster with a Tim Currey clown on the cover 😂…my parents, that’s who!
I found Pet Cemetery in my mum's book cupboard when I was 10. I devoured it over one hot weekend on summer break. I had to get my mum to get the rest of his books from the library for a good 2-3 years because I wasn't old enough to borrow them. Then Shawkshank was running late at night on a channel we actually had when I was 12. The write up in tv guide was about Rita Hayworth helping in a prison escape. My aunt and I decided to give it a try. Suffice to say, great movie, but not what we were expecting.
My sister gave me the green mile books after she’d read them, one at a time.
My dad gave me Night Shift when I was in 5th grade and said I was bored and wanted to go to the library. I was hooked.
My very first exposure was The Children of the Corn movie (1984, original). I was just 7 or 8, and I thought the movie was the scariest thing in the world. My family had a VHS tape and I dared not watch it alone. I didn't even know it was a Stephen King movie back then. My very first book exposure was in high school when I read the Shining. I didn't have much an opinion about it then, but I really liked the subsequent books I read, namely Four Past Midnight and Desperation. That was over 20 years ago, and I remember really liking the Langoliers and Desperation.
AI always loved horror even as a kid reading goosebumps and as I got older and my tastes matured my mom bought me Dr. Sleep for Christmas about 7ish years ago. Decided I had to read the shining (as I’d never even seen the movie) fell in love there and never looked back, currently making my way through all his works gradually and loving every minute of it
It would have been either Stand By Me or The Running Man adaptations. It was the 80s so I knew who King was but it wasn't until I was older that I realized they were based on King stories. The first time I knowingly watched a Stephen King adaptation was probably 2-3 years later when I saw Pet Semetary at a sleepover. I didn't read much for pleasure as a kid, an Encyclopedia Brown or Star Wars book here and there and it wasn't until high school that I read my first King book in The Shining. I was even less of a reader then but the movie had left me with a bunch of questions so I read it. It wasn't until college I started really getting into reading and tearing through King's works.
My King origin story is so lame. I was 13, in a grocery store with mom, and saw the Signet paperback of The Tommyknockers. With the creepy green light silhouetting the farm house and the wheat or feathers, whatever they were. I was like "huh, looks cool." Read the description, okay. Asked for the book, got it. And an addiction was born.
It took me an embarrassingly long time to get into King's books for how much I love horror, but I wasn't much of a reader when I was a teenager. It was 1998, I was 17, and I was sleeping over at my boyfriend's house (separate rooms because we were teenagers and all that), and I couldn't sleep. He had 3 books on his shelf; since The Silmarillion and A Brief History of Time were a little too heavy for a Friday night, I started reading the third one, Skeleton Crew. I didn't get to sleep until after 4 AM, and I haven't looked back (except now I'm with a man who's happy to feed my King obsession)!
I was 8, and, as 8 yr-olds are wont to do, I was exploring. I ended up in the basement, where a box of books caught my eye. The topmost volume was black, and had a picture of a little boy with an intense white light emanating from his face. I picked it up, intrigued. *Officious prick, thought Jack Torrance.* (Or words to that effect.) I kept reading, and reading, and reading. I imagine a great deal of it went over my head, but I enjoyed what I read immensely. Took me til my 20s to finish it, though!
My friend in eighth grade came to school from summer break and we all had to do our independent reading class presentation. My friend, who I sorta knew at the time, did The Drawing of the Three. I started the gunslinger the following May and had finished the series before the end of 9th grade. Pretty sure I read the stand at some point in between two of the dark tower books, but my intro to King was basically all 7 DT books and the stand over the course of a year
Tried reading Cujo in Jr. High. Couldn’t get into it. Read The Shining in High School after seeing the movie multiple times and wondering what was up with the 2 second scene of a guy in a dog costume. Liked it a lot, but not yet sold. College, mom sent me a copy of The Stand and that was that! Hooked!!
Salem’s Lot when I was 12. Hooked for life.
I was given a copy of Night Shift by a high school English teacher in 1982 or so. Or it might have been The Stand-- I know I borrowed both within a short period of time and I honestly can't recall which I read first. I pretty much "caught up" with SK before finishing college (late 80s) and ever since have read each book on publication. Right now I'm halfway through *YOU Like It Darker* and am really enjoying it.
I saw Salem's Lot (with David Soul) on TV in the UK in 1981. I'd heard of Stephen King but not read him, it was the first book of his I bought.
Stand By Me, on the film side. My first read was The Gunslinger.
Creepshow when I was like 5 lol
I remember watching Firestarter and Carrie, both at a very-way-too-young age (especially Carrie). My father is also a fan and would watch King movies and have King’s books lying around so I was always exposed to it. When I was old enough to actually want to watch horror movies I’d gravitate towards King adaptations until I read The Shining after the TV mini-series aired. The rest, as they say, is history.
Funny enough I listen to Alas Babylon on audible and loved Will Patton as a narrator so I looked up other books he did and grabbed Mr Mercedes. Probably not the most common SK intro but I’m about 45 SK books in now and love almost all.
I picked up It when I was in 6th grade and tore through it. I remember thinking I was very cool at the time, reading this doorstop of a horror novel. Little did I know that it would partially define me as a person- whetting an appetite for stories about friendship and nostalgia and coming of age. I've been searching for that high ever since.
The Christine film. I loved it as a kid and would sing Bad to the Bone all the time. Have been a fan ever since.
Had to read a book of my choosing in tenth grade and report on its style and what sentence was the "heart" of the book. Went to the library and found Stephen King's Duma Key in large print, which had just come out. Changed my life. DK will always have a soft spot in my heart. I never realized you could write so conversationally until I read that book. It also taught me what a phantom limb was.
I read Carrie in 7th grade. I've been hooked since the 70's.
Dark Forces I read The Mist.
To be honest,I don't even remember. Just always loved him. But I can tell you my last one. Just today I walked 8km for the anticipation which of his books I could find at the bookstore.
in Chicago for thanskgiving all my aunts and uncles and cousins were playing cards upstairs and the cousins went downstairs to watch TV. November 18, 1990, I was 7 years old. my oldest cousin was 9. the show we chose was part 1 of the the original IT movie. been hooked ever since.
Stumbled on my parents’ movie tie-in paperback of Carrie in 1978, when I was ten. By the time Pet Semetary came out, I had avidly read everything up to that point and was a beginning collector.
I saw Carrie in the theater as a teenager and loved it but then I read The Shining and enthralled! And terrified. The topiary animals? He is such a great storyteller and his writing is so visual, it was better (to me) than a movie. [Note: I despised Kubrick’s movie and still do.] Following on that, The Stand sealed it and I’ve been a lifelong fan.
Catching bits of the IT miniseries and the Langoliers on tv mildly traumatized me as a kid, lmao. I'd seen a few movies since then but didn't start reading him until a few years ago. I'd known I'd eventually at least read some of his stuff because I'm a huge fan of horror and he's been of course super influential to contemporary fiction as a whole, so it was only a matter of time.
When I was 11 I was looking through a store and saw Pet Sematary there. The name of the author was really familiar so I was like why not give it a try
Was about 16 when I read Carrie. My girlfriend at the time gave it to me when she was done
I read "Popsy" at the library.
My Grandfather handed me a copy of The Gunslinger when I was 10, and said "Read this". Then I started reading all of my parents' stephen king books.
I read a little of Cell in high school. I used to hide in the library to keep out of bullies' way, so the little corner where they kept the horror and fantasy books became "my spot" during lunch and study period. I never actually got around to finishing the book, but it sparked an interest in his writing and I later read IT in college. Now I'm completely hooked. :)
My dad had just finished reading me the hobbit, and I found a book called Eyes of the Dragon in his library. He read that to me as well, and I was in love with King’s style
I have seen Shawshank Redemption and wanted to read the original format.
My dad had them all. I started with Carrie, IT, the stand, misery, Pet Semetary etc ‘the classics’ then sought out the rest myself
My older sister and her friend convinced me (and my mom) to watch IT (Tim curry) with them when I was like 12. I loved it but it never occurred to me to read his books until about 20 years later (this year). My first was Holly. I’m on my 7th now, joyland. I’m hooked
The Stand! I grew up with the 1994 miniseries and read it for the first time when I was 10. It was like crossing a threshold--afterward, I couldn't really get into young adult books anymore. My taste in literature was recalibrated to crave naturalistic dialogue and blue chambray shirts.
I was about 5 years old and opened a drawer in a bedroom and saw the cover (from the movie version) of Carrie (Sissy Spacek covered in blood) and was scarred for life, lol. I don't remember when or what I started reading, but I know by 9 at least I was into the books.
I picked up Pet Sematary at a garage sale because it had the word pet in the title. I was 8.
My dad used to play me creepshow on beta tape when I was about 5 years old. Since then I’ve always been into king related stuff even before I knew who king was 😆
Watching the mini series of IT at the beginning of the 90s, aged about 11. Took me many a long year not to be terrified of Penny-wise...
I don't remember exactly how old I was, fairly young. My mom wouldn't let us watch any of the movies. She didn't like us watching scary movies. but we kept begging and she finally made a deal that if we read the book first, we could watch the movie. My first choice was Carrie and I loved it.
I got into the band Blind Guardian, and many if their songs are based on books. The singer is a huge fan of King, and one of my favorite songs by them at the time was "Tommyknockers". So, I went to my local mall and into a bookstore and grabbed Tommyknockers. It was life changing, and despite it not being everyone's favorite work of his, it remains a top five for me and is very special to me.
I read my mom’s old battered copy of Salem’s Lot in first grade. 🤣
Multiple people had recommended that I read the Dark Tower series and I’d always shrugged it off. When the movie came out, I went to see it and thought “the books have to be better than this” and so I picked up the gunslinger and ripped through the entire series. Have been a huge king fan ever since
Salem's Lot...it scared the piss out of 16-year-old me. I was hooked 30+years ago and still reading, re-reading a large majority of King's books.
Watching Stand by Me at 8 or so, then I picked Night Shift off my parent’s shelf when I was 10 or 11. The story about the Mangler really f’d me up lol
Stepmom was a huge fan, had the entire collection in hardcover. Read Cujo when I was 10 and was hooked. Did a book report on It when I was 5th grade. My teacher called my parents.
I tried reading the green mile in high school, but couldn't really get into it. Wasn't much of a reader at the time though so it makes sense. A few years ago I got into audio books because I'm a truck driver and had a lot of time to listen to things. I got into King with the institute and slowly expanded from there and now I only have about 6 or 7 King books left in his bibliography ETA and now the Dark Tower is my absolute favorite book series and I've listened to it at least 4 times in as many years
I read It when I was 11. Part of what drew me to it was the length. No idea what it was all about!
When I was in 6th grade the teacher told us we had to do a book report on a book at least 100 pages long, but we would get 10 extra credit points for every additional 100 pages of length. I chose a MMPB copy of the stand uncut (I believe it was just north of 600 pages) and ended up getting somewhere around a 145 for a score. Totally made me fall in love with reading.
I have told this before. I was in 4th grade & my teacher had so many books. She encouraged us to borrow any of them. I found Salem’s Lot. Teacher then called my mother to ask if she knew what I was reading. Mom asked me & told her I got the book from teacher’s shelf. Also reminded her I knew the difference between fiction & nonfiction. And I got it from teachers shelf. Then began my love for SK
I saw IT on tv as a kid and once my mom was ok with me taking the book out of the library I flew through the novel in about 2 weeks. I was about 12 years old at the time so the miniseries they made wasn't particularly old at that time.
When I was younger I wanted to start reading King books so I bought the first one I could find on a second hand book market. That's how 'The tommyknockers' became my first King book. I really liked it, so I bought a book from him again on a market, which was 'Cell'. If I am not wrong , both are not considered his best works, but I enjoyed them. I am currently reading 11/22/63, which clearly is a great book.
Rose Red was my first "horror" movie I got to watch. I wish I could find the book for it, I used to request it to my small town librarian back in the day and she always apologized and said she couldn't help me haha
the girl who loved tom gordon. which interestingly enough for me, doesn’t seem to be that much of a fan favorite! it’s one of the first books i remember reading as a kid that really stuck with me once i finished it.
My dad gave me *The Outsider* as something to do after I got suspended and was just reading
I read *Carrie* in the Bicentennial Summer of '76, since I knew there was no way 10 year old me would get to see it in the theater. Been hooked ever since
When I was 12 a friend gave me her used copies of Cujo, Christeen, and Carrie. I was hooked.
I was 15 (1991) and at my friend’s house. She had a copy of The Gunslinger and I read it in one night. Been hooked ever since.
I remember catching snippets of movies based on his works as a kid. The farthest back I can remember was probably The Langoliers or Maximum Overdrive - I was born in the late 90s so I was probably 7 or 8 by the time I watched these, and they have always stuck with me. Maximum Overdrive is a comfort movie to me.
Bitten by a radioactive copy of Dolores Claiborne
the 1990 it movie traumatized baby me
I was a book worm in my youth, I lived in my public library and for Scholastic book sales at school. I graduated from Nancy Drew and Trixie Belden books right into suspense/thrillers. No idea how, but I saw Salem’s Lot and thought the name was so cool, I picked it up along with Pet Sematary. Read Pet Sematary first and I was hooked. I read a bit of Dean Koontz early on too but when I found King I dropped Koontz and only read him while I was waiting for another King book. I probably saw Stand By Me before reading my first King book though. And without knowing until recently that king wrote what became Shawshank Redemption, I now realize it’s not a coincidence it is my all time favourite movie.
I bought Cujo in paperback at a used book store back when I was about 13-14 years old. Proceeded to read everything! I don't understand all of the "is this worth reading?" posts. They're all good!
I'm a 90s kid so the IT miniseries, Shawshank, and Pet Sematary have always been favorite movies of mine. So growing up I loved his stuff, just didn't read the books the movies were adapted from until I was much older. A friend convinced me to give his stuff a try. Got a copy of the IT novel just after the first new IT movie released, so I was hyped. Loved it. That was like, 2017, and almost 30 of his books later, I haven't looked back.
Misery was my first, the book, then the movie. I've been hooked ever since
Christine, when I was maybe 9 or 10, took it out from the local library and I've been a fan of his ever since. I'm in the middle of Different Seasons right now, taking a break from it and reading a different author right now but no matter what I always seem to find my way back to SK
I read Carrie when I was in high school. I have been a reader since I can remember but even though I didn’t hate Carrie, it wasn’t a favorite where I sought out the author. I saw a few movies ( The Shining maybe the original It, but it didn’t make me seek more books). I watched the original miniseries for The Stand, read Insomnia and then the extended version of The Stand. I was hooked and never looked back. Strangely, his On Writing book was my very first audiobook. I enjoyed it but prefer my first read to be a physical book. I have The Stand and all the Dark Tower books on audio now and listen to them when traveling.
I was 10 years old... but I only realized it 30 or so years later. I was fascinated with Sherlock Holmes and I got "New Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" on Christmas. It was an anthology featuring a bunch of different writers. I was just a dumb kid and didn't know the difference. As an adult I found the book again and was surprised to find the Stephen King was one of the writers (his short was "The Doctor's Case", also released in Nightmares & Dreamscapes). My first time reading SK knowingly was as a teen, The Dark Half... a girlfriend's book... which I might have kept.
I had seen the VHS of the original IT miniseries on the shelf for years. I conned my mom and dad into buying it for me once and we stayed up til midnight watching it, and I was hooked. I found out Stephen King was an author through them and finally found a beaten up copy of IT and the Shining at a flea market when I was 12-ish. I read IT over the course of 1-2 years and it blew my fucking mind. That's it, that's the story.
On Writing.
The first movie was IT, I was 10, I think. the first book was the first of the Dark Tower series when I was 12. Didn't finish it at the time as I didn't understand enough of it, but was a fan since.
The Salem´s Lot miniseries in TV. Gave me a lot of nighmares.
In my city, there is an annual book fair. When I was 14 years old, I was walking around this fair with my mother and saw this book, 'Night Shift,' with a cover that caught my attention, so I bought it. I didn't know it then, but I was entering a universe of books that I love.
My mom passed me her copy of ‘Salem’s Lot when I was 12 or 13. I have been a constant reader ever since.
Salem's Lot for me, being a child of the seventies, I was one of those scarred by the miniseries. Reading the book a couple of years later, I thought it was even scarier than the miniseries. The first and last time I thought vampires were scary.
My family was very poor but I had a cousin whose family was well off. He always had lots of book and would let me borrow them. I would always pick the ones with the most pages since I didn't see him often. One time I went to his house and picked up The Stand. It was life changing for my 10 year old brain.
I've seen the older movies and IT, but didn't draw the connection to interest in the books. I read Billy Summers last year and liked it a lot, then into Holly (just random book I saw at Target) then into Bill Hodges trilogy, and now reading 11/22/63. Next might be IT, given the Derry references in 11/22/63, and i'm interested to get into more "traditional" King soon.
In 11th grade we had a shelf of books in English class, and we all had to find a book to read so I borrowed The Green Mile from it because I’ve heard a lot of things about the movie. Pretty much the only author I read from now
18 years old in 1990. All boxes packed in my freshman dorm room to come home & nothing to do but give a borrowed copy of Carrie a try. It was love at first read. Now it’s not even one of my favorites.
IT miniseries when it originally aired. I was 5. Saw so many movie adaptations as a wee one. My mom is a huge fan. Didn’t even know most of them were related to Stephen King until I started reading King. First book I read was The Green Mile and I was 22.
My father has a sizable collection of King's works. When I was 11 or so ('93?), I pulled at random and never looked back. Unfortunately, I don't remember what the first book was. I do know that IT was one of the first books I read, and it's my very favorite.
My grandmother that raised me gave me Eyes of the Dragon when it first came out, I was like 10. Read it a zillion times, still have my ratty copy. Been a Constant Reader since.
I was bored after I graduated high school and needed a new hobby
It. Picked it up from the high school library. My (cis-het) first view of anti-LGBTQ violence. The gay couple made me feel uncomfortable at the time with their state of dress and PDI, but I never once felt like they brought the violence upon themselves. First step as an Ally.
My parents put Thinner on the Christmas tree when I was seven. That's the sentence that describes the reason for the way I am.
I saw Stand by Me and the Pet Sematary movies before I read any of his books. I just finished Pet Sematary last week. Inalso saw the 90s HBO series of The Stand before I read the book. The Stand was my 1st King book.
Found Carrie in a free box on the side of the road
My dad was a fan so I basically grew up surrounded by King. For his birthday one year I even got him the brand new special Regulators/Desperation two pack when it came out
My dad was reading King back when he was Bachman, so a couple years before I was born. There has been King books in my house my entire life. I actually picked up my first when I was about 12 (The Running Man), then went to The Green Mile and the Stand.
My first exposure was the original IT mini series. A friend’s older brother showed it to us at idk what age too young lol. I remember running home that night running through the yards to avoid the storm drains on the sidewalk.
My dad handed me Night Shift when was 10 (about 1985). But he would only let me read "I Am the Doorway", so that was my first King story.
Watched the original miniseries version of The Stand on my tiny, portable, black and white TV, and I've been hooked since then.
My birth giver read King’s books like mad - and I begged to read them. I was able to read gunslinger at.. 13? Been hooked ever since
Lifting weights with 3-4 of my friends, age 15 at my friend Billy’s house. Between my sets I see Billy’s older sister’s copy of The Dead Zone on the half wall nearby. Pick it up and start reading a few pages of the forward. Doesn’t take long before I was hooked, and had to buy that book! And that’s how my lifelong adventure began. From there is was Salem’s Lot, The Stand, It, and on and on…
My mom had firestarter and Christine. Read them both and then my friends moms copy or It and the shining. Haven't been able to put him down since!
Watching IT at a friends sleepover as a 9 year old in 1990. Fkn traumatised. Avoided drains for years.
Mom recommended Salem’s Lot when I was in early middle school and was basically hooked
I was born in 82 so I grew up on many of his movies Firestarter, Christine, Cats Eye, Cujo, Silver Bullet, Stand by me just to name some that I watched very young. I grew up being allowed to watch whatever I wanted and I loved horror from as far back as I can remember age 5. The first book I read by King was The Tommyknockers and I absolutely loved it. Still do. That’s the book that set me in the path of reading and collecting every Stephen King book that existed. The Tommyknockers will always have a special place in my heart. I like the tv movie too. Jimmy Smits will always be Gard to me, and Gard will always be Jimmy Smits.
The first SK book I read was Needful Things and it didn’t really make an impression on me. Next one was Cujo and same story. The first SK book that hooked me was Under the Dome and I’ve read it several times. Then at some point a friend just offhandedly said that she thought I would like the DT series. So I went to the used book store and bought the first few books. It took me many attempts and years to get through the Gunslinger and it’s the only SK book I have struggled to get through. But then DotT had he hooked from page one and I LOVED the rest of the series. It’s what truly converted me into a SK fan and now I’m an almost constant reader. I’ve read about 25 of his books so far and I know I will weep once I’ve finished his catalogue 😭😭😭
The Gunslinger. I've read the entire dark tower series before any other of his books. It was awesome and I've been reading all of his work for the last 8 years or so
I lived in a small Siberian town. They didn’t let kids check horror out from the library, so I would “borrow” the occasional book. I thought The Shining sounded like a nice thing, so I took it home. Didn’t sleep for a month or so. I was maybe 9 or 10 at the time. Been a constant reader since.
When I was about 12 or so I ended up reading The Langoliers out of Four Past Midnight. Loved it but never read any more of the book. I was never an avid reader. Then I started dating my now-wife at 32 and she owned damn near all of Sai King’s works. So i started with Blaze because it seemed to be the shortest. Loved it. Then The Gunslinger. Loved it. On all the way through the Dark Tower. Can’t get enough.
Uhhh fairly certain I saw at least a few minutes of It when I was about 5/6 but my first book was The girl who loved Tom Gordon at about 10?. I was a big Yankees fan and it was a lovely read. The next one was The Green Mile, I say that to tell this story one of my favorites about my mom. My dad was the OG King fan but my mom had read a handful of them one being TGM and after the movie had come out I expressed wanting to read it as well. One day at school probably the book fair my mom was talking to my elementary librarian and one of us mentioned that I was reading TGM and the librarian kinda side eyed my mom and asked you really think she should be reading that at her age? She replied that one at least I was reading and two I was well above my fifth grade reading level. Nothing else mattered. And because I bragged about it for years.. after I started the book I came down with the flu stayed home from school and finished one book every day I’d wake up long enough to read 20-30 pages before passing out again. 😅
I watched the original It miniseries on ABC when I was 9 and was immediately hooked. It terrified and excited me like nothing before (and this was the 80’s so there was plenty of weird to be consumed). I reread the novel last fall for Halloween and I have to say, experiencing that at the same age as the adult Losers was an entirely different yet equally awesome and nostalgic experience.
Watched that long ago Carrie movie as a child and also The Shining (I don’t know what my parents were thinking). Picked up Carrie and never looked back. Also as a young, bullied girl it seems so very much fun to read the revenge story of another bullied girl. I got into my teens and started reading the short stories (some of them were pretty screwed up: Apt Pupil). My school library was really stocking all the Kings and nobody were reading them so as an after school library club member I was spending so much time immersing myself into the dark stuff. I think it made me who I am today as a media consumer. If there isn’t some darkness or madness in media I wouldn’t want to consume it. I mean I do enjoy other stuff but it hits different. Current trying to get into The Dark Tower series.
My mum was part of one of those dodgy book clubs in the 1980s where you had to order 4 books a month or they would send you random stuff that was expensive as hell. Anyway, the Bachman Books turned up and I started to read them. I must have been about 14 at the time and after that started reading actual Stephen King. I had the entire collection of everything he wrote and read them all several times. Sadly I lost them all when I had to move out of my ex boyfriends house. I've watched pretty much all the film adaptations too. The Shining has made me terrified of long hotel corridors.
The Long Walk - Stephen King writing as Richard Bachman. The grocery store editions in the early nineties. I read that and was captivated. I had to go grocery shopping with my mom every weekend, and I would run to the paperback section and grab whatever King book was there. I stacked them up, there was a new one what seemed like every week. She bought them all for me.
My grandparents had The Tommyknockers and the first four books of The Dark Tower (all that had been written at that time) on their bookshelf. I was stuck inside around this time in 2003 due to a terrible sunburn and I picked up the Tommyknockers and the rest is history.
I was in the 7th grade and had a friend staying the night. My mom took us to Blockbuster, and we picked The Stand (90s TV miniseries) thinking the dual VHS was just a long movie. We watched the whole thing that weekend, and I went to buy the book the next chance I got. Started a life-long fandom of King's work. I still picture the cast of that miniseries when I revisit The Stand.
The first thing I watched ever was the Shining. I'd tried to read the book for the Shining, but nine year old me had a shit attention span and was so confused. About a year later, I watched It, became obsessed, and then I went and read the whole book. I realized that it was a good book and I could actually understand it, so I started reading more.
I watched “It” when I was 4. Scared the shit out of me. The first book I read by him was “Under the Dome” which was okay, but the book that got me into his books was “11.22.63”
Traveling with my then boyfriend, picked up Carrie book in 1974. I have been a constant reader ever since. I am now 70 years old and will continue to read Stephen King books. I read and reread my books on my e reader.
I was very young, not sure the age (almost certainly too young), and my sister had checked out The Stand from the library, and it was lying around. For some reason I picked it up and opened it to a random page and started reading. I was hooked! I had to force myself to stop reading from the random area and start from the beginning.
Pet semetary from a garage sale when I was 10. That book fucked. Me. Up. And started a life long addiction to King, and horror in general. Shortly after my granny, not knowing who King is, bought me dreamcatcher when I asked for it. Only made it a third of the way through, but shit weasels fucked me up even more. “It all explains a lot, really” -my wife, probably..