This month marks an exciting release forStephen Kingfans - and horror fans in general - as well as a surprising first for the legendary author. Right now, it feels as though it’s Stephen King’s world (in more ways than one), and we’re just living in it. It’s not as though he’s ever experienced a lag in popularity, but the current Hollywood era of mining his work for adaptations and inspiration has expanded him to an even wider audience than before.
While he could rest on his laurels with all he’s accomplished, he’s still checking off firsts on his career list, and not just in Hollywood. He’s setto narrate an upcoming audiobook ofHansel & Gretelbased on Maurice Sendak’s illustrations. The first book he ever started writing way back when he was in high school,The Long Walk, is finally getting a movie adaptationthis year. And now, he has another first to add to his resume when a new project based on his work comes out next week.
2025’s The Stand Story Anthology Is Coming Out On August 19
The End of the Worldas we know it hits bookshelves and digital editions on Tuesday, August 19, so you still have a week to get your preorder in. Not a novel, but an anthology, it brings together three dozen of today’s most inventive and notable horror and dark fantasy authors, as well as a few comic book authors, who have contributed their own original short stories set in the world of Stephen King’sThe Stand.
Those authors include, to name just a few, C. Robert Cargill, Chuck Wendig, Tananarive Due, Premee Mohamed, Alex Segura, and more. Constant Readers will be especially excited to see that Richard Chizmar is also lending his talent to the anthology with a short story of his own. Chizmar, of course, is King’s longtime collaborator on theGwendy’s Button Boxtrilogy, and a writer who knows King intimately, having worked with him so closely.
The End Of The World As We Know It Marks A First For Stephen King
What’s even more exciting is thatThe End of the World As We Know Itwill be a first for Stephen King. Surprisingly, despite how influential King has been over the past half a century, as well as how collaborative he is, this is the first time that other authors have been allowed to pen their own stories that take place in one of his worlds. And, while other, older anthologies have been loosely inspired by King’s work, this is also the first time that an anthology has been based on a specific one of his books.
Allowing other writers to share their take on a small corner of Stephen King’s expansive universe opens the door for a really interesting experiment: How will three dozen different writers each interpretThe Stand, one of King’s most seminal works? What fascinating questions will they raise – or answer?
The possibilities are especially intriguing considering it’s been confirmed that the stories in the anthology will be set both during the events ofThe Stand, and after – and, in some cases, long after theStephen Kingnovel. The flexibility allowsThe End of the World As We Know Itto finally address several lingering questions that have been hanging for decades about what happened to the world after Randall Flagg was (temporarily) vanquished and what was going on outside the Boulder and Las Vegas camps.
