The Dark Half

This book is about a writer (again!) who uses a pseudonym, George Stark, to write horror novels which are much more different than his own written works. The author, Thad Beaumont, is to a point where he is being pressured to reveal the pseudonym so he and his wife decide to kill George off and hold a burial for him. All of which is published in People magazine along with a story about Thad and George. The headstone they plant for the fake grave has an epitaph based on a quote Thad made that says that George is "Not a very nice guy".  All of this makes Thad a little nervous, not that he can quite understand why, but he is glad to be focusing on his own work again. Immediately after the magazine is published he has horrible nightmares about George hurting his family and threatening him.  At the same time the local grave digger discovers a hole in the ground at the cemetery in the spot where they pretended to bury George that looks like someone crawled out and a local man winds up beaten to death with his truck stolen. Which promptly turns up just outside New York full of blood.

People connected to the demise of George Stark start dropping like flies and it looks like it is Thad who is doing it as it is his fingerprints that are found at the crime scenes, but he has an airtight alibi. The police sheriff, Alan Pangborn, begrudgingly realizes that Thad is telling the truth and starts investigating it from the angle that it is some crazed fan pretending to be George Stark and who is angry at George's death. Unfortunately, this is not the case either as we come to realize that it is really George Stark and he is pissed about being killed off. So angry that he is destroying in a horrific manner anyone who he believes is directly responsible, despite police protection. His ultimate goal is to force Thad to write with him a new book and therefore bring George back to life - even if he has to kill his family to do it. Along the way we discover that Thad had a twin that he absorbed in Utero and that part of the fetus was found in his brain years later when he was having severe headaches. Thad never knew that there was a twin inside him, but it makes sense to him when he finds out as he always felt this darker part of himself.

This is a very interesting story and even more so when you realize that King wrote it as a direct result of Richard Bachman being discovered and not wanting to write under his name anymore.