Bag of Bones

Bag of Bones
First edition cover
AuthorStephen King
Cover artistFrank Oudeman
LanguageEnglish
GenreHorror
PublisherScribner
Publication date
September 22, 1998
Publication placeUnited States
Media typePrint (Hardcover)
Pages529
ISBN978-0-684-85350-5

Bag of Bones is a 1998 horror novel by American writer Stephen King. It focuses on an author who suffers severe writer's block and delusions at an isolated lake house four years after the death of his wife. It won the 1999 Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel, the 1999 British Fantasy Award for Best Novel, and the 1999 Locus Award for Best Dark Fantasy/Horror Novel.[1]

The book re-uses many basic plot elements of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, which is directly referenced several times in the book's opening pages; however, the relation of these elements (including a wife who is dead as the book opens, her posthumous effect on future romance, a drowning, and house haunted by the memories of previous inhabitants) to the plot and characters is markedly different. When the paperback edition of Bag of Bones was published by Pocket Books on June 1, 1999 (ISBN 978-0671024239), it included a new author's note at the end of the book, in which Stephen King describes his initial three-book deal with Scribner (Bag of Bones, On Writing, and a collection of short stories titled One Headlight, which later became Everything's Eventual), and devotes most of the piece describing the origins of the then-forthcoming Hearts in Atlantis.[2]

  1. ^ "Stephen King Awards". Science Fiction Awards Database. Archived from the original on 2018-07-21. Retrieved 2021-01-04.
  2. ^ "Hearts in Atlantis by Stephen King - Powell's Books". Powells.com. Archived from the original on 2020-02-03. Retrieved 2013-02-16.