About the Author

STEPHEN KING is the author of more than sixty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes If It Bleeds, The Institute, Elevation, The Outsider, Sleeping Beauties (cowritten with his son Owen King), and the Bill Hodges trilogy: End of Watch, Finders Keepers, and Mr. Mercedes (an Edgar Award winner for Best Novel and an AT&T Audience Network original television series). His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller. His epic works The Dark Tower, It, Pet Sematary, and Doctor Sleep are the basis for major motion pictures, with It now the highest grossing horror film of all time. He is the recipient of the 2018 PEN America Literary Service Award, the 2014 National Medal of Arts, and the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.

Reviews

"[The Stand] has everything. Adventure. Romance. Prophecy. Allegory. Satire. Fantasy. Realism. Apocalypse. Great!"
   —The New York Times Book Review

"A master storyteller."
   —Los Angeles Times

“An undisputed master of suspense and terror.”
—The Washington Post

“King is one of the most powerful storytellers we have. His work satisfies on first reading and is even better the second time around.”
—Chicago Tribune

“Crackling . . . with explosive climaxes.”
—The Boston Globe

“[For] those who like their horror on a humongous scale.”
—Los Angeles Times

"As brilliant a dark dream as has ever been dreamed in this century."
    —Palm Beach Post

“Peerless imagination.”
—The Observer (London)

"A master storyteller."--Los Angeles Times

"[The Stand] has everything. Adventure. Roman. Prophecy. Allegory. Satire. Fantasy. Realism. Apocalypse. Great!"--The New York Times Book Review

"As brilliant a dark dream as has ever been dreamed in this century."--Palm Beach Post

Released in 1978, King's apocalyptic novel, even at a whopping 1200-plus pages, had been trimmed by 150,000 words. A restored version followed in 1990, and that unexpurgated text here makes its audiobook debut-and it's well worth the wait. The story offers the author's signature scenes of horror, but King devotes much time to describing a world gone mad and the people left to populate it after a virus wipes out most of the planet's population. Even though there are hundreds of characters, only a handful are primary, and King shows his skill at making them real, as the uncanny talent of narrator Grover Gardner brings them to life. His reading is flawless, his timing is spot-on, and his slightly Southern accent makes even curse words sound amusing. VERDICT Despite the price and the daunting listening time, this audiobook belongs in every library.-Joseph L. Carlson, Vandenberg Air Force Base Lib., Lompoc, CA (c) Copyright 2012. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.