10 Stephen King Universe Fates Worse Than Death
9. Revival
This is one of the more recent novels by Stephen King and it is one of his better, creepier pieces of work in the last few years. The protagonist of the piece is left in little doubt as to why he should fear death by the end of the novel.
Charles Jacobs is the new minister in town, preaching from the pulpit while everyone grows to love him, his wife and their son. Jamie Morton is very excited to meet him and soon grows close, though Jacobs is banished from the town after a horrific accident kills his wife and child, causing him to renounce God.
Years later, Jacobs has discovered an underlying electricity that runs through existence, a thing that can be manipulated to cure people of illness and pain. He also believes that it can bring the dead back to life, something that he recruits Jamie to help him with.
Together, they revive a lady. The experiment works, but with an enourmous catch. Rather than cheerily waking, she becomes a conduit to the afterlife, showing them both the hellscape that waits for everyone after death. It is too much for Jacobs, who dies (along with all of the people he 'cured') and Jamie is left terrified to die, knowing that the second he does, he will plunge into an eternal pit of despair.