A collection of short stories by Stephen King. "Suffer the Little Children" is read by Whoopi Goldberg, "Crouch End" is read by Tim Curry, "Rainy Season" is read by Yeardley Smith, "Dolan's Cadillac" is read by Rob Lowe. Stephen King reads an introduction.Amazon.com ReviewMany people who write about horror literature maintain that mood is its most important element. Stephen King disagrees: "My deeply held conviction is thatstorymust be paramount.... All other considerations are secondary--theme, mood, even characterization and language."These fine stories, each written in what King calls "a burst of faith, happiness, and optimism," prove his point. The theme, mood, characters, and language vary, but throughout, a sense of story reigns supreme.Nightmares & Dreamscapescontains 20 short tales--including several never before published--plus one teleplay, one poem, and one nonfiction piece about kids and baseball that appeared in theNew Yorker. The subjects include vampires, zombies, an evil toy, man-eating frogs, the burial of a Cadillac, a disembodied finger, and a wicked stepfather. The style ranges from King's well-honed horror to a Ray Bradbury-like fantasy voice to an ambitious pastiche of Raymond Chandler and Ross MacDonald. And like a compact disc with a bonus track, the book ends with a charming little tale not listed in the table of contents--a parable called "The Beggar and the Diamond."--Fiona WebsterFrom Publishers WeeklyThis is a wonderful cornucopia of 23 Stephen King moments (including a teleplay featuring Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson, a poem about Ebbet's Field and a brilliant New Yorker piece on Little League baseball) that even the author, in his introduction, acknowledges make up "an uneven Aladdin's cave of a book." There are no stories fans will want to skip, and some are superb, particularly "You Know They Got a Hell of a Band," in which a husband and wife drive through a town that may literally be rock-and-roll heaven; "The Ten O'Clock People," about unredeemable smokers; and "The Moving Finger," which chronicles a digit's appearance in a drain. Together with Night Shift and Skeleton Crew , this volume accounts for all the stories King has written that he wishes to preserve. The introduction and illuminating notes about the derivation of each piece are invaluable autobiographical essays on his craft and his place in the literary landscape. An illusionist extraordinaire, King peoples all his fiction, long and short, with believable characters. The power of this collection lies in the amazing richness of his fevered imagination--he just can't be stopped from coming up with haunting plots. 1,500,000 first printing; BOMC main selection.Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.