From Derry to Salem’s Lot: Finding My Voice by Finding Stephen King
By Harper Smith
I had just turned nine. Impressionable, afraid, and with an absolute lack of self-esteem, a much younger me walked into a MacFrugal’s store (long since out of business and replaced by Big Lots for discounted items). My grandmother, Pearl, loved to take me to this particular store, always willing to let me choose a toy or movie to pass the time, everything ranging from TMNT figures to a copy of A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 2 on VHS, my memories of visiting that store with my grandmother are aplenty. This particular trip though is in no way just a good memory — it’s the most important memory of my entire life and the exact moment I was “born” into who I am today.
I have written and spoken about my childhood abuse at the hands of my then-stepfather quite a few times, a scared child, my roots firmly planted into hell, forever haunted by those sad, defeating nights with a figure at my doorway. I needed an escape, something to lose myself, and on that particular night at MacFrugal’s, browsing the aisles for toys and movies, I stumbled across a book that wouldn’t just be that escape…no, readers…it would be my saving grace.
I saw a book lying down on an end cap, surrounded by items on clearance. It was a single book that seemed to call out to me with fervor; the bright green hardcover with a diamond shape in the middle, a fire-breathing dragon within that diamond, and big bold and dangerous-looking red text that read STEPHEN KING popped out to me. I picked up the book and looked at the title: The Eyes of the Dragon. I needed this book, and I needed it right then and there. I asked my grandmother if I could get it and, almost shocked, she asked, “You don’t want to get a movie or a toy?” But I knew at that moment the book was calling out to me like The Neverending Story called out to Bastian with an urgency to experience what was within that novel.
To say King’s work latched onto me that evening would be a huge understatement. From the moment I started reading the book in the car on the ride home, to as recently as this week, deep into my 42nd year of being alive, what I found that evening would be impossible to articulate, but I can say it changed my life in many ways. I was hooked. I finished The Eyes of the Dragon in two days, reading it every single moment I could. The moment it was finished, I knew I had my first favorite author.
I couldn’t tell my grandmother about the book soon enough, but the youthful excitement she saw in my 9-year-old self meant so much to her since she had lived through the previous two years with all the doctor trips and the therapist meetings to figure out what was wrong with her grandkid. In those two years prior to finding that book, I had become a shell of myself, afraid of life and everything found within it. But from the moment I finished King’s novel, my grandmother knew I had found my happiness again, and she became the biggest cheerleader of me chasing that happiness. That very night, Pearl said, “Well, sweetie, if that book made you that happy, then goddamn it, let’s make you even happier,” before grabbing her purse and driving me to our local mall’s bookstore. When we got there, she told the clerk, “My grandson found this book and loved it. I need every book you have from that writer.” Nine-year-old me ended up walking out with copies of the then-newly released uncut edition of The Stand, as well as The Dark Half, The Tommyknockers, and Misery. The last book (and one that I am holding back tears even writing about) was one that in many ways not only acted as much-needed escapism but was also a lifesaver — quite literally saving my life at that time. A massive book with over 1,000 pages and featuring a sewer drain with a paper boat and a claw on the cover, this one had big bold text that read: IT.
It was a novel that stood out from the rest. While I was excited to jump into the other books my grandmother had bought me that night, I chose King’s It as my go-to and spent every waking moment possible, fully engulfing and consuming every single word, every single line. I found so much within that novel, but more important than anything else, I found something I hadn’t experienced prior: kindred spirits. I saw so much of myself in the novel’s protagonist group. I saw my terrified self in Eddie, my awkwardness in Ben, and not knowing how to talk to people but loving to use my words in a written way in Bill. I found myself in those characters. They meant the world to me; they meant so much that I am currently holding back, even as I write this, how much those characters mean more to me. They’re still my friends and are characters that mean so much to my own children for their own respective reasons all these decades later.
After reading It, I knew I was a King devotee to the end. I could not get enough: I read every single book he had written and when new novels dropped, it became a tradition to rush to the bookstore to grab it on release day, something I still do. Stephen King became my solace, my therapy, my way to take the pain I was dealing with as a child and give it a name, whether it was Pennywise, Randall Flagg, Kurt Barlow, or Annie Wilkes. I used King’s books as a way to confront and ultimately defeat the evil that stole my childhood. I lived because of those books and, in time, I found the strength I needed because of the empowerment King’s writing gave me.
When I started 4th grade that year, I quickly became the kid in class that everyone loved to make fun of for choosing reading over talking to girls or breakdancing, that is until it came time to do book reports and all of my bullies asked me to borrow books. My books acted as peace offerings, as wild and screwed up as that sounds, and I knew I was being used, but to feel like I would be liked even just for a little time felt good. The schoolteacher and recess workers would stop me on the playground and ask me about King’s work. Instead of the typical, “Stop doing that!” that most kids would get during recess, I would instead be met with, “Jerry, I heard a movie version of Misery is coming out, are you excited?!” I was known as the kid who wanted to be a writer. I was known as the kid with an imagination who could take anything thrown at me and write a silly story about it.
I knew from the moment I picked up King’s The Eyes of the Dragon that I would be a writer, that it was my calling. Again, I was born that night, in many ways. The horrors I had lived through were replaced by the excitement of continuing my journey of self-discovery, something that I never would have had without Stephen King’s work.
I’m in my 40s now, with kids the same age as I was when I discovered the most important book of my life. It’s wild to see so much of myself in my kids every time I take them to our local bookstore and see their eyes light up when finding books that stand out to them. It gives me the greatest feeling of both nostalgia and hope for them. I live vicariously through them each time. It is beautiful, and it is fruitful, and it makes up for every difficult situation we’ve had to endure.
I don’t remember much of my childhood — the trauma did a number on my brain where I seemed to have forgotten huge chunks of my early life to help cope with the awful things I was forced to experience — but I do remember the most important night of my youth, the moment I discovered a best friend that doesn’t even know how much he meant and still means to me. I remember the night I discovered Stephen King’s work. I remember the moment I was reborn and good lord is it a great memory. 🩸
About
Harper Smith is a film journalist and composer, hailing from the Central Valley of California. For over a decade now, they have annoyed readers of many sites and magazines with an overabundance of Halloween 4 love and personal essays. Follow them on X @HarperisjustOK and visit their website Rainydaysforghosts.bandcamp.com.
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