Here is my thoughts about King's new collection You Like It Darker. It contains minor SPOILERS so be aware.
As a whole You Like It Darker is a solid collection. Not his best and I would have appreciated a bigger variation between the (new) stories but it’s a nice read. My favorites are "The Fifth Step", "The Turbulence Expert" and the new “The Answer Man”.
Exciting casting news: award-winning narrator Will Patton will read the audiobook edition of You Like It Darker with select stories read by Stephen King himself!
Here is the complete list of titles in You Like It Darker.
"Two Talented Bastids"
"The Fifth Step"
"Willie the Weirdo"
"Danny Coughlin's Bad Dream"
"Finn"
"On Slide Inn Road"
"Red Screen"
"The Turbulence Expert"
"Laurie"
"Rattlesnakes"
"The Dreamers"
"The Answer Man"
King’s next book, You Like It Darker will be out in the US on May 21 2024. Simon & Scchuster is listing it to be 512 pages. You can pre-order your copy here:
'You like it darker? Fine, so do I', writes Stephen King in the afterword to this magnificent new collection of twelve stories that delve into the darker part of life - both metaphorical and literal. King has, for half a century, been a master of the form, and these stories, about fate, mortality, luck, and the folds in reality where anything can happen, are as rich and riveting as his novels, both weighty in theme and a huge pleasure to read. King writes to feel 'the exhilaration of leaving ordinary day-to-day life behind', and in You Like it Darker, readers will feel that exhilaration too, again and again.
'Two Talented Bastids' explores the long-hidden secret of how the eponymous gentlemen got their skills. In 'Danny Coughlin's Bad Dream', a brief and unprecedented psychic flash upends dozens of lives, Danny's most catastrophically. In 'Rattlesnakes', a sequel to Cujo, a grieving widower travels to Florida for respite and instead receives an unexpected inheritance - with major strings attached. In 'The Dreamers', a taciturn Vietnam vet answers a job ad and learns that there are some corners of the universe best left unexplored. 'The Answer Man' asks if prescience is good luck or bad and reminds us that a life marked by unbearable tragedy can still be meaningful.
King's ability to surprise, amaze, and bring us both terror and solace remains unsurpassed. Each of these stories holds its own thrills, joys, and mysteries; each feels iconic. You like it darker? You got it.
Did King’s German publisher Heyne jump the gun on announcing King’s next book? Well, they did announce it. The release date is June 12 next year and the title is You Like It Darker. They even have a cover already…
Hopefully the US and UK announcements will follow and maybe then we’ll know what stories will be included.
In the latest episode of Talking Scared Podcast King reveals that he’ll have a new collection out in 2024. The title will be You Like it Darker. No word on when during 2024 it will be out but it will be over 600 pages long. Here is what King said about it:
Then last year, there’s a story. It’ll be in a book that comes out next year called You Like It Darker. They’re mostly news stories, long stories, for the most part. One of them is called The Dreamers. One night I was lying in bed. I tell myself stories before I go to sleep. That’s how I get to sleep. I had this image of a man who was under some kind of drug. He opens his eyes and they turn black and these tendrils start to come out of his eyeballs. They just creep me out. I couldn’t think about that anymore. I put that aside.
The next day I said to myself, oh, I remember that book, Lovecraft’s Beyond the Wall of
Sleep. I said, what if a man didn’t get through the wall of sleep or over the wall of sleep, but
under it? What if there was something beyond that wall, beyond the actual dreams that we have, a reality that’s huge, that’s apocalyptic, some huge darkness that’s sentient, that had something
like that? I thought that goes with the tendrils and the eyeballs. I had that story like that. But I couldn’t think about it at night. I couldn’t do that because it just was so creepy to me.
Here is a new interview with King. He talks about a lot of stuff but the highlights are these.
In passing King mentioned that he has written a new novella called Rattlesnake that’s actually a sequel to Cujo.
“I just wrote a long story called Rattlesnakes. And it involves, at one part, twins who are only four years old… falling into a rattlesnake pit. And the snakes get ’em. It’s a terrible scene.”
Unfortunately the interviewers didn’t follow up on this so we don’t really got to know how it’s connected to Cujo.
It also seams that Mr Harrigan’s Phone is done. King mentions that he’ll see it later the same day they did the interview.
He also talks about Fairy Tale and admits that the new Firestarter movie wasn’t all that good.