If It Bleeds

The No.1 Sunday Times bestseller featuring the story 'The Life of Chuck', adapted for film by Mike Flanagan, starring Tom Hiddleston and winner of the People's Choice Award at the Toronto Film Festival. News people have a saying: 'If it bleeds, it leads'. Following a horrific explosion at a school, Holly Gibney of the Finders Keepers detective agency notices something suspicious about the TV reporter who is first on the scene. In this riveting title story, Holly sets out to discover what he is hiding in her first solo crime case. Dancing alongside this stand-alone sequel to The Outsider are three more irresistible long stories: 'Mr Harrigan's Phone' sees young Craig introduce a curmudgeonly retired businessman to the wonders of the smartphone; 'The Life of Chuck' is a three act life-story - told in reverse order - about a man whose face appears on a billboard; and 'Rat' sees a struggling author head to a remote cabin in the woods of North Maine, where a deal-making rodent offers him a life-changing pact.

The No.1 Sunday Times bestseller featuring the story 'The Life of Chuck', adapted for film by Mike Flanagan, starring Tom Hiddleston and winner of the People's Choice Award at the Toronto Film Festival. News people have a saying: 'If it bleeds, it leads'. Following a horrific explosion at a school, Holly Gibney of the Finders Keepers detective agency notices something suspicious about the TV reporter who is first on the scene. In this riveting title story, Holly sets out to discover what he is hiding in her first solo crime case. Dancing alongside this stand-alone sequel to The Outsider are three more irresistible long stories: 'Mr Harrigan's Phone' sees young Craig introduce a curmudgeonly retired businessman to the wonders of the smartphone; 'The Life of Chuck' is a three act life-story - told in reverse order - about a man whose face appears on a billboard; and 'Rat' sees a struggling author head to a remote cabin in the woods of North Maine, where a deal-making rodent offers him a life-changing pact.

*#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER* Includes "Mr. Harrigan's Phone"-- now a Netflix original film starring Donald Sutherland and Jaeden Martell! From the legendary storyteller and master of short fiction Stephen King comes an extraordinary collection of four new "exceptionally compelling novellas that reaffirm [King's] mastery of the form" ( The Washington Post ). Readers adore Stephen King's novels, and his novellas are their own dark treat, briefer but just as impactful and enduring as his longer fiction. Many of his novellas have been made into iconic films, including "The Body" ( Stand by Me ) and "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" ( Shawshank Redemption ). The four brilliant tales in If It Bleeds prove as iconic as their predecessors. In the title story, reader favorite Holly Gibney (from the Mr. Mercedes trilogy and The Outsider ) must face her fears, and possibly another outsider--this time on her own. In "Mr. Harrigan's Phone" an intergenerational friendship has a disturbing afterlife. "The Life of Chuck" explores, beautifully, how each of us contains multitudes. And in "Rat," a struggling writer must contend with the darker side of ambition. If these novellas show King's range, they also prove that certain themes endure. One of King's great concerns is evil, and in If It Bleeds , there's plenty of it. There is also evil's opposite, which in King's fiction often manifests as friendship. Holly is reminded that friendship is not only life-affirming but can be life-saving. Young Craig befriends Mr. Harrigan, and the sweetness of this late-in-life connection is its own reward. "An adroit vehicle to showcase the...nature of evil" ( The Boston Globe ), If It Bleeds is "exactly what I wanted to read right now," says Ruth Franklin in The New York Times Book Review .

*#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER* Includes "Mr. Harrigan's Phone"-- now a Netflix original film starring Donald Sutherland and Jaeden Martell! From the legendary storyteller and master of short fiction Stephen King comes an extraordinary collection of four new "exceptionally compelling novellas that reaffirm [King's] mastery of the form" ( The Washington Post ). Readers adore Stephen King's novels, and his novellas are their own dark treat, briefer but just as impactful and enduring as his longer fiction. Many of his novellas have been made into iconic films, including "The Body" ( Stand by Me ) and "Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption" ( Shawshank Redemption ). The four brilliant tales in If It Bleeds prove as iconic as their predecessors. In the title story, reader favorite Holly Gibney (from the Mr. Mercedes trilogy and The Outsider ) must face her fears, and possibly another outsider--this time on her own. In "Mr. Harrigan's Phone" an intergenerational friendship has a disturbing afterlife. "The Life of Chuck" explores, beautifully, how each of us contains multitudes. And in "Rat," a struggling writer must contend with the darker side of ambition. If these novellas show King's range, they also prove that certain themes endure. One of King's great concerns is evil, and in If It Bleeds , there's plenty of it. There is also evil's opposite, which in King's fiction often manifests as friendship. Holly is reminded that friendship is not only life-affirming but can be life-saving. Young Craig befriends Mr. Harrigan, and the sweetness of this late-in-life connection is its own reward. "An adroit vehicle to showcase the...nature of evil" ( The Boston Globe ), If It Bleeds is "exactly what I wanted to read right now," says Ruth Franklin in The New York Times Book Review .