Discussion of the collection. See separate topics for adaptations of individual stories.

Jerusalem's Lot
I wrote all these reviews for my wiki ([url="URL"]http://goppf.wikidot.com/swstart[/url]) a long time ago. For some unfathomable reason, I didn't include this, the first story in the book. Now I'm going to have to hunt down my copy.

Graveyard Shift
Test of wills between college-boy Hall and the Man (the foreman of an industrial Maine mill) as they descend into a basement ruled by huge rats. In King's hands, when social commentary meets pulp, horror wins the day. The basis for the 1990 film, directed by Ralph S. Singleton.
2.5

Night Surf
King's dress rehearsal for The Stand. A small, pathetic group of youths may be the last survivors of Captain Trips, a superflu originating not from a government lab, but from Southeast Asia — and this time, there is no immunity. Story generates little sympathy for these kids, even the one with sense enough to mourn the world they've lost.
2.5

I Am the Doorway
Silly sci-fi/horror hybrid of astronaut returning from an orbit of Venus with a malevolent alien presence in his body.
2

The Mangler
A Hadley-Watson Model-6 Speed Ironer and Folder runs amok after being possessed by a demon. Naturally. Wheels off nonsense.
2

The Boogeyman
Disciplinarian father blames himself for the unusual deaths of his three young children. Potentially interesting character study is cheapened by its poetically just, Tales From the Crypt-like ending.
2.5

Gray Matter
Three old men find out to their horror what a bad case of beer can do to a man. Reasonably effective gross-out chiller.
2.5

Battleground
Almost three decades before Toy Soldiers, tiny Vietnam military forces attack the hit man who killed the head of the toy company that created them. Uneven odds sabotage an otherwise gripping battle.
2.5

Trucks
King's dry run for his 1986 film Maximum Overdrive includes some of the same character types but packs an infinitely more effective wallop in its story of a disparate group of people trapped in a truck stop by impossibly sentient trucks.
3

Sometimes They Come Back
High school lit. teacher's special ed class is haunted by the very real, very dangerous ghosts of his brother's murderers. Well-turned modern spook story until King unwisely dips again into the occult. The basis for the 1991 TV movie of the same name, which features a more satisfying resolution.
2.5

Strawberry Spring
Subtle little Victorian horror story of a Jack the Ripper-type killer stalking youths on a college campus.
3

The Ledge
Gripping thriller of tennis-pro forced to accept an "Organization" kingpin's wager after being nailed for having an affair with the latter's wife. The bet? To circumnavigate the kingpin's 40th floor penthouse apartment on the 5-inch ledge outside the building.
3

The Lawnmower Man
King's distinctive style begins to assert itself in this bizarre tale of a fat man who eats grass and the unfortunate homeowner who hires him. Sound anything like the movie of the same name? King sued to have his name removed from that sad waste of celluloid.
2.5

Quitters, Inc.
Well-crafted tale of man who enters an unusual — and horrifying — treatment to quit smoking.
3

I Know What You Need
Coed learns the horrible secret of how her new boyfriend seems to be able to fulfill her every wish. Bland payoff.
2

Children of the Corn
Thoroughly gripping story of a man and his wife stumbling into a tiny Nebraska town populated by children who worship a malevolent deity in the cornfields. The basis for the 1984 movie starring Peter Horton and Linda Hamilton.
3

The Last Rung on the Ladder
Fine, whispery soft tale of a man trying to come to grips with lost boyhood idealism.
4

The Man Who Loved Flowers
A young man in love bumbles along the streets of New York to meet his beloved. Shirley Jackson-esque fantasy loses much in the translation to (brutal) horror.
2.5

One for the Road
Good vampire story that begins when a New Jersey man stumbles into a bar during a snowstorm asking for help: his wife and daughter are snowbound on the road leading to Jerusalem's Lot.
3

The Woman in the Room
Real-life horror as King expertly tells the tale of a son and his mother, who has terminal cancer.
4