In this book King does not focus on the traditional features of the Supernatural or Horror genres – and there is not much of the usual things such as cemeteries, blood, gore and things that go SCRRREEEEECH!!!! in the night.

But the twist in this tale will make your skin crawl. When he is feeling really down and needs someone to talk to, Craig calls Mr. “And I like him, Dad”, but he cannot explain why the old codger has grown on him.Ĭraig grows up and runs into trouble with a bad guy called “Kenny Yanko”. The only person he can stand to have around him is Craig. Harrigan is wise and quickly catches up with modern technology – that’s why he made a lot of money and is called the “grand high poobah”.

Harrigan, and in return he shows the old man how things like smartphones work. Harrigan’s Phone is the story of a boy, “Craig”, who, for some years, does jobs around the house for the old and very wealthy, “Mr. Harrigan’s Phone – Be careful what you wish for Here is what each of the stories are about and what the plot twists entail: Plot twists explainedġ. Sometimes, the stories are not very thrilling or scary, but more like Science Fiction – meaning that the theme is intellectual rather than visceral – and in those instances King alters the reality of the stories to something alien. You’re happily reading along, aware that the scene set by King looks normal, and then, wham!, he hits you with a weighted wet sock of a twist. In these stories, all the twists are clever, startling and thought-provoking.

But the degree of toe-tickling surprise depends on which tale-twisting technique the writer uses, and how unexpected it is. According to Google’s Ngram viewer, the phrase “a twist in the tale” was first used in 1910, and subsequently the technique of giving a story an unexpected turn became common in literature. If It Bleeds consists of four longish stories, and a helpful Author’s Note, which I’m glad I read afterwards, and not before:Įach story seems to be relatively straightforward, but what makes them particularly good is the twist in each story. The glossy, copper-coloured cover is a clever Ambiguous Image of a rat and a mouse in one. (Hardcover, publisher: Scribner, April 21, 2020, 448 pages)

If it bleeds stephen king