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The Bazaar of Bad Dreams: Stories Audiobook
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Publisher Description
Winner of the 2020 Audio Publishers Association Lifetime Achievement Award
Includes the story “Premium Harmony”—set in the fictional town of Castle Rock, Maine
The masterful #1 New York Times bestselling story collection from O. Henry Prize winner Stephen King that includes twenty-one iconic stories with accompanying autobiographical comments on when, why and how he came to write (or rewrite) each one.
For more than thirty-five years, Stephen King has dazzled readers with his genius as a writer of short fiction. In this new collection he introduces each story with a passage about its origins or his motivations for writing it.
As Entertainment Weekly said about this collection: “Bazaar of Bad Dreams is bursting with classic King terror, but what we love most are the thoughtful introductions he gives to each tale that explain what was going on in his life as he wrote it."
There are thrilling connections between stories; themes of morality, the afterlife, guilt, what we would do differently if we could see into the future or correct the mistakes of the past. In “Afterlife,” a man who died of colon cancer keeps reliving the same life, repeating his mistakes over and over again. Several stories feature characters at the end of life, revisiting their crimes and misdemeanors. Others address what happens when someone discovers that he has supernatural powers—the columnist who kills people by writing their obituaries in “Obits;” the old judge in “The Dune” who, as a boy, canoed to a deserted island and saw names written in the sand, people who then died in freak accidents. In “Morality,” King looks at how a marriage and two lives fall apart after the wife and husband enter into what seems, at first, a devil’s pact they can win.
“I made these stories especially for you,” says King. “Feel free to examine them, but please be careful. The best of them have teeth.”
Stories include:
-Mile 81
-Premium Harmony
-Batman and Robin Have an Altercation
-The Dune
-Bad Little Kid
-A Death
-The Bone Church
-Morality
-Afterlife
-Ur
-Herman Wouk Is Still Alive
-Under the Weather
-Blockade Billy
-Mister Yummy
-Tommy
-The Little Green God of Agony
-Cookie Jar
-That Bus Is Another World
-Obits
-Drunken Fireworks
-Summer Thunder
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"I have enjoyed every work King has done. The storytelling is rich and complex, and is much better in this for then adapted for movies. Kink can rivet you to the seat with his works."
— MikeG (5 out of 5 stars)
Quotes
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“Bad Dreams packs plenty of bite into the twenty stories found here…A welcome dose of horror from the modern master. A large helping, too…As always, King conjures nightmares you don’t necessarily want to wake up from.”
— Fort Worth Star Telegram -
“One of the bonuses of Bazaar is that each story is preceded by a note from the author about its genesis…If you’re looking for King’s paranormal horror side, though, Bazaar has plenty to satisfy you.”
— Tampa Bay Times -
“Renowned author King’s impressive latest collection wraps twenty stories and poems in fascinating commentary…The stories themselves are meditations on mortality, destiny, and regret, all of which showcase King’s talent for exploring the human condition…This introspective collection, like many of King’s most powerful works, draws on the deepest emotions: love, grief, fear, and hope.”
— Publishers Weekly (starred review) -
“To the reader’s delight, King provides a backstory for each tale, enticing the reader with a memory or scenario that prompted that particular selection’s birth…The stories collected here are riveting and sometimes haunting, as is the author’s style. Surprise endings abound. King is in a class all by himself. Be prepared to read voraciously.”
— Library Journal (starred review) -
“A gathering of short stories by an ascended master of the form…This collection speaks to King’s considerable abilities as a writer of genre fiction who manages to expand and improve the genre as he works; certainly no one has invested ordinary reality and ordinary objects with as much creepiness as King…Best of all, lifting the curtain, King prefaces the stories with notes about how they came about. Those notes alone make this a must for aspiring writers.”
— Kirkus Reviews
Awards
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An AudioFile Editors’ Pick
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A 2015 Shirley Jackson Award Nominee
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A 2017 Selection for the ALA Listen List for Outstanding Audiobook Narration
The Bazaar of Bad Dreams Listener Reviews
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" I really liked this audio book it is a classic short story book from Stephen king. "
— Skye, 4/28/2018
About Stephen King
Stephen King has written more than sixty books, many hitting the #1 spot on the New York Times bestsellers list. He has won the World Fantasy Award, several Bram Stoker Awards, and the O. Henry Award for his story “The Man in the Black Suit.” He is the 2003 recipient of the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters, and in 2007 he received the Grand Master Award from the Mystery Writers of America. His epic works The Dark Tower and It are the basis for major motion pictures.
About the Narrators
Cotter Smith is an American actor of stage, film, and television. As an audiobook narrator, he has won two Earphones Awards and was a finalist in 1997 for the prestigious Audie Award.
Craig Wasson is an actor and audiobook narrator. His most notable film appearance was in the 1984 film, Body Double. Also a prolific reader of audio books, he narrated Stephen King’s novel, 11/22/63, as well as numerous books by James Ellroy and John Grisham.
Dylan Baker is an American stage, screen, and television actor. He attended Georgetown Prep and William and Mary College before earning his BFA at Southern Methodist University, where his passion for acting was ignited with numerous stage roles. Later refining his talents at Yale’s School of Drama, Baker turned professional with big screen roles in movies like Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Delirious, and Love Potion No. 9. His audiobook narration has won him eleven AudioFile Earphones Awards.
Edward Herrmann (1943–2014) was one of America’s top audiobook narrators. He won multiple Audie Awards and twenty-two Earphones Awards, and his narration of the King James version of the Bible remains a benchmark in the industry.
Hope Davis, an actress and Earphones Award–winning narrator, has starred in more than twenty feature films, including Arlington Road, American Splendor, and Next Stop Wonderland. Also an accomplished stage actress, she earned a Tony Award nomination for her performance in the Broadway play God of Carnage. She was voted Best Actress in 2003 by the New York Film Critics.
Tim Sample is a New England humorist, famous both for his presentation and his Maine accent. His books, albums, and videos have sold over a million copies worldwide, and his “Postcards from Main” segments on CBS News Sunday Morning are hugely popular in the United States and abroad.
Will Patton is an award-winning actor and narrator. HIs narrations have earned the prestigious Audie Award for Best Fiction Narration and also won dozens of AudioFile Earphones Awards. His numerous film credits include Remember the Titans, The Punisher, The Mothman Prophesies, Armageddon, and The Spitfire Grill. He starred in the TNT miniseries Into the West and on the CBS series The Agency and won Obie Awards in the theater for his performances in Fool for Love and What Did He See.
Santino Fontana is a stage actor, director, and composer. He is a graduate of the University of Minnesota/Guthrie Theater BFA Actor Training Program and recently provided the voice of Prince Hans in Frozen. In 2015 he became the first guest artist to perform three times in the space of one year with the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
Kathleen Chalfant is an audiobook narrator and an award-winning actor who is known for The Affair, Duplicity, and Wit, for which she received the Outer Critics, Drama Desk, Obie, and Lucille Lortel awards. She also won a second Obie Award for Talking Heads and was nominated for Broadway’s 1993 Tony Award for Best Actress in Angels in America: Millennium Approaches.
Brooke Bloom is an actress who was raised in Los Angeles and currently resides in New York. She has worked extensively in television, appearing in over twenty-five shows with a recurring role on CSI:Miami. Her film credits include He’s Just Not That Into You, Oscars nominee Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Ceremony, and the independent film Gabi on the Roof. She also won a Barrymore Award for her portrayal of Becky Shaw in the play Becky Shaw at the Wilma Theatre in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.