10 Most Important Features Of Stephen King's Writing

Stephen King once said, “As a writer, one of the things that I’ve always been interested in doing is actually invading your comfort space.”

Pushing boundaries seems to come naturally to Stephen King and he has made this into something of a speciality. In the first scene of his first novel, teenage innocent Carrie White is pelted with sanitary towels by her classmates as she suffers through the trauma of her completely unexpected first menstruation. In The Shining, readers recoil uncomfortably but in a state of utter fascination at the tale of a father hunting down his own five-year-old son. The insides are turned to tense, uncomfortable ice as our eyes race across the lines of fathers abusing their daughters in Gerald’s Game and IT, among others. The description of Pet Sematary's Gage Creed's death as he is instantly destroyed by a lorry and the ideas that are toyed with as his father considers the possibility of resurrecting him make parents across the world shudder. The apocalypse itself becomes King’s playground in The Stand.

Whichever of his books you read, you know that you will find yourself challenged and enthralled by content that will cause if not a physical reaction, then certainly a sense of complete engagement.