Reviews provided by Syndetics

Booklist Review

This is really Fitzgerald's book, an album of architectural detail photography, but it's easy to see why he's taking second billing: the King name coins gold. Fitzgerald's views are intense and mood drenched, recalling in their artistry the beauties and the title of Roloff Beny's The Romance of Architecture [BKL Ja 15 86]. And they are disquieting, just as King maintains in his garrulous, off-the-cuff, thoroughly readable introduction. Even when-- quite often-- the carved faces in the photos aren't monstrous, they're crazed, raging, creepy, or, at mildest, direly overbearing, like the crouched rotter sneering an insult about someone over his shoulder to whomever looks his way. A brilliant exposure of those well-known, unobtrusive decorations that King says shouldn't be ignored because ``they are watching you.'' List of locations concludes. RO.

Kirkus Book Review

A striking collaboration between King and photographer f-stop Fitzgerald, whose stark photographs of city gargoyles are what the Maine horror master ponders upon in a lengthy introductory essay. Although King's rumination on ""the 'goyles"" slips too often into his customary teen stance--""l do believe they are alive. . .and am in complete possession of my faculties (ask any lunatic and he'll tell you the same thing, heh-heh-heh)""--he does evoke the weight and brooding presence of these bizarre stone guardians and neatly excavates their possible purpose (""venting the waste material of our own hidden fears""). What stands out here, though, are Fitzgerald's 100 black-and white and 24 color photographs of the gargoyles perched high above New York and other East Coast cities--forceful, mournful, frightening depictions in light, shadow, and color of these usually unnoticed symbols of darkness. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Author notes provided by Syndetics

Stephen King was born in Portland, Maine, on September 21, 1947. After graduating with a Bachelor's degree in English from the University of Maine at Orono in 1970, he became a teacher. His spare time was spent writing short stories and novels.

King's first novel would never have been published if not for his wife. She removed the first few chapters from the garbage after King had thrown them away in frustration. Three months later, he received a $2,500 advance from Doubleday Publishing for the book that went on to sell a modest 13,000 hardcover copies. That book, Carrie, was about a girl with telekinetic powers who is tormented by bullies at school. She uses her power, in turn, to torment and eventually destroy her mean-spirited classmates. When United Artists released the film version in 1976, it was a critical and commercial success. The paperback version of the book, released after the movie, went on to sell more than two-and-a-half million copies.

Many of King's other horror novels have been adapted into movies, including The Shining, Firestarter, Pet Semetary, Cujo, Misery, The Stand, and The Tommyknockers. Under the pseudonym Richard Bachman, King has written the books The Running Man, The Regulators, Thinner, The Long Walk, Roadwork, Rage, and It. He is number 2 on the Hollywood Reporter's '25 Most Powerful Authors' 2016 list.

King is one of the world's most successful writers, with more than 100 million copies of his works in print. Many of his books have been translated into foreign languages, and he writes new books at a rate of about one per year. In 2003, he received the National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. In 2012 his title, The Wind Through the Keyhole made The New York Times Best Seller List. King's title's Mr. Mercedes and Revival made The New York Times Best Seller List in 2014. He won the Edgar Allan Poe Award in 2015 for Best Novel with Mr. Mercedes. King's title Finders Keepers made the New York Times bestseller list in 2015. Sleeping Beauties is his latest 2017 New York Times bestseller.

(Bowker Author Biography)