Please join me in an episode by episode review of The Walking Dead. My goal with this is to keep the review alive during the season and hopefully also get your input on each episode. Each new review will go up around the time of the episodes airing, hopefully a little before the episode airs so you can head right over here and comment on what you have seen. Oh, and I will assume that you have seen the episode when I write about it so there will be SPOILERs.
A premonition of what’s to come? No, this book is a fake one that was used in a recent episode of Sons of Anarchy. Cool though and I’d read it, would you? Thanks to Timothy Feather
The moderator on King's message board has commented on King working with Aerosmith and it seems it was just, as I suspected, a fun suggestion from Jack Douglas.
It came as news to Steve when I asked him about it yesterday after hearing about it elsewhere. It's not anything he's actually been asked to do or plans to do.
There have been many reports about King working with Aerosmith on their upcoming album. Here is the story:
Aerosmith's record producer has revealed that he wanted horror writer Stephen King to write lyrics for the band's new album.
Jack Douglas, the band's long-time knob-twiddler, told Classic Rock magazine that he tried to convince the rockers that King would have provided inspiration to singer Steven Tyler.
"They looked at me like I was crazy," said Douglas about the unlikely collaboration. "I said, 'No, I'm serious. If there's anyone who's going to inspire him, it'd be Stephen King.'"
He went on to add:
Steven doesn't need melody – he needs someone who's going to inspire him as a wordsmith. I don't want a guy who's just writing hits right now.
There has been no confirmation on whether King will do this though so it might just have been a fun suggestion from Jack Douglas and nothing more…
The moderator of King’s official message board had the following answer to whether King and Straub has started to work on The Talisman 3.
Stephen and Peter haven't been able to coordinate schedules to begin working on the third book as they've each had other projects that needed their attention. I don't know if they have discussed plot development yet but even if they had, it would probably be too early to release any info.
There has been some confusion about the dust jacket for Hodder & Stoughton's limited edition of Wind Through the Keyhole so let me explain. If you buy the limited from anyone other than PS Publishing it won't have the dust jacket that you see on the trade edition but if you get it from PS Publishing it will and that is because they have made dust jackets, same as the trade ed, for the 400 copies of the limited that they have secured.
Oh, and Hodder's limited edition will have the color illustrations.
On February the 14th Random House will release the long-awaited audio edition of The Stand. It's narrated by Grover Gardner and it will be released for purchase digitally by Audible.com and iTunes. The only CD edition is the edition released for the library market.
Thinking about getting a copy of the UK limited edition of The Wind Through The Keyhole? Well, if you are, my suggestion is that you get it from PS Publishing and here is why:
* First off, there'll be a dust-jacket included (there will be no dust-jacket with copies of the book bought elsewhere; PS Publishing are having the jackets printed up and wrapped around their copies at their own expense).
In addition, the first 200 orders will:
* be post-free anywhere in the world;
* receive a special numbered 20%-off voucher (please note that the 20% discount does not apply to postage charges) to be used against a future order of pre-2012 PS titles (and please also note that there will be no restriction on the number of books on that order so the 20% reduction will apply to as many books as you want); and
* qualify the customer to be included in a special prize draw wherein the first 10 names pulled out of the hat will receive—completely free of charge—a copy of PS's One For The Road artbook (written by Stephen, of course, and illustrated by James Hannah). The retail price of this super-limited book is £75.
PUBLICATION DATE: April 2012
EDITION: Slipcased Hardcover with a facsimile signature and a specially-printed dustjacket
PRICE: £99.99
PRINT RUN: 700 with deluxe binding, photographic endpapers and with author's facsimile signature.
Please note though that PS Publishing only has 400 copies (and the dust-jacket is not included in copies bought elsewhere) so don't wait to long if you want this one! Order here.
Just found this article about the celebrate the 25th anniversary of Stand by Me and it's fascinating to see how everyone has grown up since 1985 when they shoot the movie. Check out photos here.
You have probably seen her in both The Walking Dead and Zombieland. Sonya Thompson has played a Zombie more than probably anyone else. I got a chance to talk to her about it and I don't know about you but I'd sure like to trade places with her for a couple of days. Here is what she had to say.
Glen Mazzara took over as show runner for The Walking Dead after Frank Darabont and when the show returns on February 12 we'll be seeing the first episodes where Glen is the boss and not Frank. New York Magazin spoke to Glen about this and you can read all about it here. And let me tell you, I have seen episode 8 and I don't think anyone of you will be disappointed.
The writers have already moved on to season three, which AMC recently expanded to sixteen episodes. That’s exactly where Mazzara wants to be. “If you want to know who I am,” he says, “I hate when a show I’m working on is broadcast. I’m dreading when the show comes back on. I’m sure people will like it, but I don’t like the spotlight, and I can’t wait for the last one to run so I can get back to work.”
News about a limited edition of Wind Through the Keyhole by Hodder & Stoughton from Pete over at PS Publishing.
We just found out that those lovely people at Hodder are doing a special 700-copy facsimile-signed and slipcased edition of Stephen King’s new standalone Dark Tower novel, The Wind Through The Keyhole and the good news is we’ve snagged 400 copies for our customers! Whoo hoo!
The second part of season 2 of The Walking Dead hasn't even started yet but already we're getting info about season 3. Hopefully that mean it'll premier as early as this fall. Here is what I've heard.
- The small town of Senoia in Coweta County is about to become zombie central for the filming of a hit cable show The Walking Dead. The show is scheduled to shoot in the town in May and construction of zombie sets will begin next week, which will involve 60 local carpenters. Scott Tigchelaar of Raleigh Studios Atlanta says people can expect to see the town a little dirtier than normal to fit the look of the show. (If anyone notice anything and get photos; send them to me and I'll post them on Lilja's Library.
- It was earlier rumored that John Hawkes would play Philip Blake, the psychotic zombie-killer who declares himself the Governor of Woodbury. Now, it looks like that won't happen. Hawkes' publicist states quite plainly that "John is NOT appearing on The Walking Dead." So, that is that.
- According to IMDb, Marvin Duerkholz who's probably best known for his role as Cody on MTV's Teen Wolf, is set to appear in The Walking Dead's season 3 premiere episode as Phillip Eagle. As all fans of the comic knows there are no character by that name in the comic. The closes is Philip Blake, known as The Governor, but I don't think Duerkholz will be playing that role.
Both The Dark Tower (23) and The Stand (25) are on NPR's top 100 fantasy books. Also, do yourself a favor and check out World War Z (54). A great book.
How would you like to read Wind Through the Keyhole in February? As you know both Scribner and Hodder & Stoughton’s editions of the book is set to be released on April 24th. Well, I don’t know about you but I’d love the chance to read the book before that. And one of you will be able to do that. On February 29th I will draw one lucky winner that will get an artist edition from Donald M. Grant. This edition is produced in 5,000 copies and signed by Jae Lee and issued in a stamped slipcase (retail price is $75.00). And, remember that as far as we know today Grant’s edition is the only edition that has both the color and black & white illustrations.
Well, what do you have to do to get the chance to win this beautiful book then? It’s easy, there are two steps you have to complete.
1) You have to follow Lilja’s Library on facebook or / and twitter.
2a) If you follow on facebook you have to follow Lilja’s Library and then either "Like" or "Share" (or both) at least one post from me. Each "Like" and "Share" is a chance to win.
2b) If you follow on twitter you have to follow @LiljasLibrary and retweet this (each retweet is a chance to win):
Retweet this for a chance to win a copy of Grant’s Wind Through the Keyhole. Follow @LiljasLibrary to be eligible http://www.liljas-library.com/article.php?id=2917
Then on February 25th I will make a random drawing deciding if the winner will be drawn from facebook or twitter(FAITH SELECTED FACEBOOK) and by doing this 4 days before the winner is drawn give those of you that has backed the wrong horse, so to speak, a chance to work on the other one. Then on February 29th I’ll draw one lucky winner that will then get his or her book in the mail and being able to read it about 1½ month ahead of everyone who’s getting the trade edition.
The contest is open to anyone anywhere as long as you follow the guidelines above. Thanks to Donald M. Grant who donated the book! Good Luck to you all!
Water Street Bookstore, located at 125 Water Street in Exeter, is thrilled to be hosting Lauren Grodstein in conversation with Stephen King on Saturday, March 3, at 7 p.m. at the Cooperative Middle School auditorium in Stratham.
John Mellencamp & Stephen King’s Ghost Brothers of Darkland County CD Due On May 22, 2012 Featuring: Elvis Costello, Rosanne Cash, Kris Kristofferson & Sheryl Crow
John Mellencamp and Stephen King’s dramatic musical, Ghost Brothers of Darkland County will debut as a theatrical presentation beginning April 4 in Atlanta; a guest star-packed studio concept album will follow on May 22, via Hear Music, in both a single disc and 3-CD deluxe edition.
Elvis Costello, Rosanne Cash, Kris Kristofferson, Sheryl Crow, Taj Mahal and Neko Case are set to sing on the project, with Matthew McConaughey, Meg Ryan, former boxer Joe Frazier and Costello doing readings, as well. Both projects are produced with the input of producer T-Bone Burnett — who described the sound as “dark, foggy … and scary.”
The novelist King authored the narrative, while veteran singer-songwriter Mellencamp added music and lyrics. “It sounds like the Sgt. Pepper of Americana to me,” Mellencamp said in pre-release materials, adding that the goal was to make the recording sound something like “an old radio play” complete with dialogue and sound effects.
Unless you’ve been sleeping under a copy of The Stand lately, you’ve heard the news: Stephen King is coming to town as part of the 5th annual Savannah Book Festival.
But you may not have heard about the host of other outstanding authors festival organizers are bringing to the Hostess City starting Feb. 15.
It's now less than two weeks until the return of The Walking Dead and even though we won't see The Governor until season 3 (at the earliest) there are already speculations on who will be play him. In an interview with Movieweb Tom Savini says he's ready to step in and do the role but that the creators of the series are looking to have John Hawkes play The Governor. And for those of you that doesn't follow the comic version of The Walking Dead I can tell you that The Governor is one of the cruelest characters I have encountered.
And here is an interview with Robert Kirkman (creator of the comic) and Glen Mazzara (showrunner for the TV series) about season 2.
As the infamous musical Carrie — based on the Stephen King novel — prepares for its first-ever New York revival at MCC Theater, Playbill look back at the original UK and NYC productions and offer a glance through the pages of the Broadway Playbill.
Remember the poll on King’s site about who we wanted to do the illustrations for The Wind Through the Keyhole? Well, I heard today that King wanted Lee from the get go and it was a misunderstanding that the poll was done to decide who the artist was going to be as that decision was already made. Also, Lee's wife did the coloring for the book.
Thanks to all you loyal fans of Lilja’s Library. The last month the number of visitors to the site, the facebook group and the twitter feed has increased more than I dared dream of. Soon the site will have its 3,000,000 visit and the facebook group are about to reach 11,700 followers. Twitter is a bit behind with just over 2,300 followers but that is still very satisfying numbers. And this is all because of you who visit the site and spread the word about it. For that I thank you!
Looking ahead I see two contests ending in February (please check them out because the prizes are really good and you don’t want to miss out on this) but that’s not all. During February I have at least one more contest coming up, and it’s a really good one with a prize I think many of you would love to win. And, if Ka is with us there might be as many as two more contests during February as well. Not 100% sure of those yet but keep your fingers crossed and keep an eye out for them.
The easiest way to stay updated is by following Lilja’s Library on facebook or/and twitter. That way I will let you know when something happens. If you don’t want to do that I recommend that you check in here a couple of times a day. And please keep spreading the word about Lilja’s Library.
Again, thank you so much for all the support!
Lilja
Did you catch Stephen King in Pet Sematary? Did you see his wife Tabitha in Knightriders? Did you see the ATM call him an asshole in Maximum Overdrive? You probably did but what you might not know is that King has done a lot of cameos in both his own movies and in others. If you’re up for it I’ll be happy to guide you so that after you’ve read this you’ll know exactly where to find them.
As I said King has done a lot of cameos in both his own movies and in others and every time a new King movie is released the fans hope to see King in it. However, it’s far from all movies that get a visit from the master but still, he is out there. King did his acting debut in George A Romero’s movie Knightriders from 1981. In it he played a spectator who has a pretty sloppy way of eating. And, the lady by his side is none other than his wife Tabitha King.
In 1982 King had a much bigger part in the movie Creepshow where he, in the section called The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill, plays the unfortunate Jordy Verrill who after touching a meteor turns into a mix of a plant and a human. What few know about Creepshow is that King’s son, Joe Hill (author of Horns and the comic Locke & Key), is the kid playing Billy. King returned for Creepshow 2 in 1987 but this time he only did a short cameo as a truck driver that stops to help Lois Chiles character after she’s been in an accident.
The Jordy Verrill role is by far the biggest King has done but he’s done quite a few Hitchcock-like cameos. He played a guy that tries to get some cash from an ATM machine in Maximum Overdrive and it’s here he delivers the classic line “This machine just called me an asshole”. After that he played a minister in Pet Sematary, a bus driver in Golden Years and a cemetery caretaker in Sleepwalkers in which he was joined by Clive Barker and Tobe Hopoper as well, a lawyer in a TV commercial in Storm of the Century and a pizza delivery guy in Rose Red.
You could also see him as Teddy Weizak in The Stand, Tom Holby in The Langoliers, a pharmacist named Mr. Bangor in Thinner and a bandleader called Gage Creed in The Shining (the miniseries). But even though these characters actually had names none of them are anything other than cameos.
King has also done quite a few voice cameos. The first was for an episode of Frasier where he’s listed as the voice of Brian. This voice cameo is really short but you can clearly hear that it’s King’s voice. The next time we could hear King was in Kingdom Hospital (King’s US version of the Danish TV series Riget) in which he plays an AA (Alcoholics Anonymous) sponsor of the seismologist who is visiting the hospital and he is only heard on the other end of the phone line as the seismologist first arrives in Lewiston. In a later episode of Kingdom Hospital King also appears as Johnny B. Good, the janitor at the hospital. We also get to see King in a longer version of the commercial seen in Storm of the Century. King has also done voice cameos in the Dollar Baby Stephen King’s Gotham Café where he plays Steve’s (not King) attorney Mr. Ring. And he did the voice to an animated version of himself in The Simpsons episode Insane Clown Poppy.
With the exception of Knightriders all of the above has been movies based on King’s work but King has also been featured in works by others. In Fever Pitch he plays himself as he pitches the first ball of the baseball season. In George Romero’s Diary of the Dead he does the voice of a radio priest and in Sons of Anarchy he plays the cleaner Bachman.
As you can see, King has been involved in a lot of movies and now you know where you can find him. If you don’t feel like running to your local video store you can check in on the Classic King section here at Lilja’s Library where many of the clips can be found. Good hunting!
To stay updated on all news about Stephen King follow Lilja’s Library on facebook and twitter.
Robert Kirkman has turned in the outline for the second Walking Dead novel and the plan is to release it in October. No more info has been released but if it's anything like the first book Rise of the Governor I'm excited.
The fourth season of the UK version of Being Human starts Sunday February 5, 9.00pm on BBC Three. I'll be doing weekly reviews of it of it like with the US version so please look for that if you like the show.
...that back in 1998 King wrote an episode for the TV series The X-Files? It aired (on FOX, February 8:th) as the 10:th episode of the 5:th season of the series and was called Chinga. King wrote this episode with the series creator, Chris Carter who later rewrote most of it...
Since Chinga apparently means "the f-word" in Mexico (apparently it means different things or nothing depending upon which type of Spanish you speak) the title was changed to Bunghoney when it aired outside the US.
It was rumored that King and his son Joe Hill was going to write an episode of The Walking Dead (not happening any more) last year. If you could decide, what TV series would you like King to write an episode for and why?
18 days until the premier of the second part of season 2 of The Walking Dead and more and more news are being released...
- There maybe have been a major spoiler released unintentionally when Variety announced that Jon Bernthal who plays Shane is in early talks with TNT about him staring in Frank Darabont's new drama L.A. Noir. If Jon gets the part it's not likely that he'll do both shows, especially since the role in L.A. Noir would be a lead.
- In a recent trailer for episode 8 (airs Feb. 12), at the very end two new characters were revealed. They have now been identified. According to The HD Room, the two mystery men are actors Aaron Munoz and Michael Raymond James. Munoz will play Tony, one of two new survivors that will cross paths with Rick's group. James' character's name is still unknown. Both roles are being labeled as "guest stars" so these characters could potentially only be around a couple of episodes or less.
Sam Ernst (one of the writers for Haven posted this on his twitter yesterday:
OK,I know every writer sez this,but SERIOUSLY, S3 of Haven will be our best.Writers room is on FIRE.Creepy, weird,big story answers a-comin!
The stage adaptation of one of Stephen King's most memorable psychological thrillers, Misery, will be brought to the First Group Theatre at Madinat Jumeirah from February 1 to 11 for 16 performances by the London-based theatre company Popular Productions.
I’m going to try something new. It’s really not King related but it’ll fit right in over at my Non-King section. There are some TV series that I really enjoy and follow each week and I was thinking that it would be really fun to get your input on these shows. So, what I’m going to do is review each episode (it will be reviews that are shorter than normal) and hopefully you’ll add your comments about it in the commentary fields and we’ll get a nice discussion about each episode. I’m calling it Episode by Episode. Please join in!
First out is season 2 of the US version of Being Human. Episode 1 aired last week and is now reviewed and I’ll add my thoughts on episode 2 later today. I hope you all follow this series, it’s a good one.
Please join me in an episode by episode review of The Walking Dead. My goal with this is to keep the review alive during the season and hopefully also get your input on each episode. Each new review will go up around the time of the episodes airing, hopefully a little before the episode airs so you can head right over here and comment on what you have seen. Oh, and I will assume that you have seen the episode when I write about it so there will be SPOILERs.
On February the 14th Random House will release the long-awaited audio edition of The Stand. It's narrated by Grover Gardner and it will be released for purchase digitally by Audible.com and iTunes. The only CD edition is the edition released for the library market.
* be post-free anywhere in the world;
You have probably seen her in both The Walking Dead and Zombieland. Sonya Thompson has played a Zombie more than probably anyone else. I got a chance to talk to her about it and I don't know about you but I'd sure like to trade places with her for a couple of days. 
Glen Mazzara took over as show runner for The Walking Dead after Frank Darabont and when the show returns on February 12 we'll be seeing the first episodes where Glen is the boss and not Frank. New York Magazin spoke to Glen about this and you can read all about it 
AMC has released this multimedia magazine that gives you an inside look at the most iconic walkers from the series. 
How would you like to read Wind Through the Keyhole in February? As you know both Scribner and Hodder & Stoughton’s editions of the book is set to be released on April 24th. Well, I don’t know about you but I’d love the chance to read the book before that. And one of you will be able to do that. On February 29th I will draw one lucky winner that will get an artist edition from Donald M. Grant. This edition is produced in 5,000 copies and signed by Jae Lee and issued in a stamped slipcase (retail price is $75.00). And, remember that as far as we know today Grant’s edition is the only edition that has both the color and black & white illustrations.
Don’t miss out on the writing contests:
