Stephen King Jokes About Best Reading Order for Newcomers

With over 60 novels published and 200 short stories, the idea of diving into Stephen King’s entire library of books can naturally seem daunting. Luckily for anyone that is not yet a Constant Reader but wants to become one, the modern master of horror has released a hilarious guide for anyone that hasn’t read one of his books. Replying to a viral tweet asking for Stephen King recommendations for a newcomer, King simply wrote: “You should start with CARRIE and read EVERYTHING! HAHAHAHAHAHA.” King’s hilarious reply now has over 60k favorites on Twitter.

As one might expect, King’s tweet inspired many replies from fans about which of his books they started with before diving into his entire oeuvre. “Very true but more seriously Skeleton Crew,” one user added. “Short stories are always a good way to jump into an awesome author.” Another added, “No start with The Shining…couldn’t sleep until I finished it. Read my first Stephen King book in my gothic lit class in college…”Naturally, some replies noted that King’s response of “Start with Carrie” was exactly what they did from the beginning, since it was his first published novel. 

Adaptations of King’s work have been around for as long as the books have been released, but following hte success of IT in 2017 the reboots, retries, and re-adaptations have been full speed ahead. New versions of The Dark Half and The Running Man , plus a first swing at bat for the likes of The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon (which has Lynne Ramsay attached), The Long Walk, and The Tommyknockers. 

One of the upcoming adaptations from King’s work that is set to arrive soon is WB’s new version of Salem’s Lot. Top Gun: Maverick star Lewis Pullman is set to play the lead of the new movie, teasing in an interview with ComicBook.com that they hope to make King proud with the new film.

“It’s a scary thing doing these remakes, man. It’s like, this and [Top Gun: Maverick], there’s such pressure, it’s a hard concoction to conjure up to make it successful,” Pullman revealed. “But Gary Dauberman, the director, is really keen on doing justice to the book. But also, the previous adaptation was a two-parter, because it’s such a hefty book and there are so many different moving parts and so many characters. So there are some parts where Gary had to press and find what was really at the heart of the movie to keep in, but for the most part, he’s really true to the book and keeping a lot of the original dialogue in there. He’s a Stephen King hound dog so he doesn’t wanna do Stephen dirty.”