Doctor Sleep is an epic war between good and evil, a gory, glorious story that will thrill the millions of hyper-devoted readers of The Shining and wildly satisfy anyone new to the territory of this icon in the King canon.King says he wanted to know what happened to Danny Torrance, the boy at the heart of The Shining, after his terrible experience in the Overlook Hotel. The instantly riveting Doctor Sleep picks up the story of the now middle-aged Dan, working at a hospice in rural New Hampshire, and the very special twelve-year old girl he must save from a group of murderous paranormals.On highways across America, a tribe of people called The True Knot travel in search of sustenance. They look harmless - mostly old, lots of polyester, and married to their RVs. But as Dan Torrance knows, and tween Abra Stone learns, The True Knot are quasi-immortal, living off the 'steam' that children with the 'shining' produce when they are slowly tortured to death.Haunted by the inhabitants of the Overlook Hotel where he spent one horrific childhood year, Dan has been drifting for decades, desperate to shed his father's legacy of despair, alcoholism, and violence. Finally, he settles in a New Hampshire town, an AA community that sustains him and a job at a nursing home where his remnant 'shining' power provides the crucial final comfort to the dying. Aided by a prescient cat, he becomes 'Doctor Sleep.'Then Dan meets the evanescent Abra Stone, and it is her spectacular gift, the brightest shining ever seen, that reignites Dan's own demons and summons him to a battle for Abra's soul and survival...King is a very remarkable and singular writer. He can catch dialogue, throw away an observation or mint a simile, sometimes, brilliantly...Storytelling is everything - and by golly does he know how to carry the reader. - ObserverDoctor Sleep is King expertly returning to the milieu of his most beloved novels, combining not just elements from the original Shining but themes and imagery familiar from King's books, including Carrie, Salem's Lot, Firestarter and It. It also has a structure King has often utilised before, with a group of essentially good people having to band against a gang of baddies but within this structure King works masterful variations, showing just with a brilliant storyteller he is. When King is on form, as he is in Doctor Sleep, he has no rivals for sheer page-turning suspense. It is as addictive as anything he has written: a triumph from the world's finest horror novelist. - Sunday ExpressIt's a gripping, powerful novel, all the more so for being patently heartfelt. - Financial TimesKing finds a mode of the supernatural that has a melancholic beauty while avoiding spiritualist blather - GuardianDoctor Sleep is a warm, entertaining novel by a man who is no longer the prisoner of his demons, but knows where to find them when he needs to call on them. - Daily TelegraphThirty-six years on from his horror classic, THE SHINING, Stephen King's sequel shows he still has plenty of creative steam. - The Sunday TimesKing has written a sequel, the tale of what happened to little Danny when he grew up. Need one say more? It cannot fail...the best thing to emerge from King's glittering, warped imagination is of mundane, small-town America corrupted by hidden forces...you cannot but respect his ruthless expertise as a storyteller...even those of us who would never freely pick up a Stephen King must genuflect to a master. - The TimesStephen King's frightscapes are among the most incredible in literature, yet one believes in them unquestioningly. - SpectatorStephen King is the bestselling author of more than 50 books. His recent work includes Doctor Sleep and Under the Dome, now a major TV series. His novel 11.22.63 won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller as well as the Best Hardcover Book Award from the International Thriller Writers Association.Many of his books have been turned into celebrated films including Misery, The Shawshank Redemption and The Green Mile. He is the recipient of the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives with his wife, novelist Tabitha King, in Maine, USA.
