Looking For a Good Book

It’s been a minute since I read Stephen King’s The Stand and I know I’ve probably forgotten more than I remember from the book, but I haven’t forgotten the feelings I had during the reading and when I’d finished it. Awe, fear, exhaustion, and the realization I’d read something ‘very special’ (I would have read the book club edition in 1978 or 1979). I have not re-read (or, simply, ‘read’) the 1990 unabridged edition, but after reading these short stories set in King’s post-apocalyptic world, I’ve put it on my TBR list.

For this book, editors Christopher Golden and Brian Keene have done an amazing job collecting stories from a wide range or authors who have presented us with an incredible array of stories in King’s world. At 800 pages, they’ve nearly equaled King’s book.

The collection is divided into four parts:

I’m presuming that anyone interested in reading this collection is already familiar with The Stand and so these parts likely need no further explanation.

One of the things I look for when I read an anthology is a good mix of new (new to me, anyway) authors along with some established and favorite authors. This anthology mixes this well. It also provides diversity in content as well as in the make-up of the creators.

As with nearly any collection of diverse authors and stories, I find that most such anthologies will contain a few stories I really like, a few that don’t grab me too much, and a few that I’d consider pretty average. I am pleased that there were very few that I didn’t like.

The first story that really struck me was Alex Segura’s “La Mala Hora.” The story really provided a claustrophobic-ness to the pandemic and the accompanying ghost added chills.  This felt the most Stephen King-like up to that point.

While Poppy Z. Brite’s “Till Human Voices Wake Us, And We Drown” didn’t strike me as fitting the world particularly well (mermaids?) I did think it was an excellent, dark story. I recognize the author’s name, but I can’t recall reading anything by Brite prior to this.

“I Love the Dead” by Josh Malerman was enjoyable but I found it interesting in that it seemed to have an obvious moral or message in it, which I didn’t really notice with any of the other stories.

Perhaps my favorite story in the burgeoning bunch – “Keep the Devil Down” by Rio Youers. This was sweet and exciting and full of hope. If someone were to tell me this was King writing under a pen name, I’d believe it. I’ve already ordered Youers’ novel The Bang-Bang Sisters because of this.

Once of the best openings to a short story goes to Catherynne M. Valente for “Came the Last Night of Sadness.” I was hooked early and help rapt all the way through. It was a great story.

And for me, wrapping up with the stories that stood out – rose a little higher than the rest, which mostly was of high caliber already – was Sarah Langan’s “The Devil’s Children.” Like Alex Segura’s story early in the collection, this one (which sort of closes out the book), really felt like it fit the world.

Two more stories finish the collection, but even the editors note that they didn’t fit well elsewhere in the collection. They didn’t really add anything for me but I didn’t dislike them.

Only two stories stood out in a negative way for me. While I didn’t necessarily dislike Caroline Kepnes’s “Room 24” I did find it odd. The story of a depraved policeman infatuated with a married woman, didn’t fit seamlessly into this world. This could have been a short for any horror anthology but I was definitely looking forward to something more “The Stand”-specific.

Perhaps my least favorite was “Across the Pond” by V. Castro. It was oddly pornographic, but even putting the sex and violence aside, I just didn’t enjoy this.

This collection rivals Harlan Ellison’s Dangerous Visions series. Lots of quality stories. While I only listed a couple of standouts, most of these are really great and well worth reading.  With greats like Joe R. Lansdale, Chuck Wendig, Richard Chizmar, and David J. Schow, you know you’re in for a good time.

While this is mostly an anthology of horror and could be read without prior knowledge of Stephen King’s The Stand, why would you want to? Why would you not want to read one of the greatest horror epics ever written first?

This book contains the following:

Looking for a good book? The End of the World As We Know It, a collection of short stories in the world of Stephen King’s The Stand, will long be a requested book in libraries and have a coveted spot on bookshelves across the world.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Edelweiss, in exchange for an honest review.

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The End of the World As We Know It: New Tales of Stephen King’s The Stand

editors: Christopher Golden, Brian Keene

publisher: Gallery Books

ISBN: 9781668057551

hardcover, 800 pages