Free Audio Book : Fairy Tale, by Stephen King

Renowned author Stephen King delves into the depths of his imagination in this captivating novel about a teenage boy who inherits the keys to a parallel world where good and evil are engaged in a war, and the stakes could not be higher for both that world and ours.

Charlie Reade appears to be a typical high school kid, excelling in sports and maintaining decent grades. However, he carries a heavy burden. His mother died in a hit-and-run accident when he was ten, and his grief-stricken father turned to drinking. Charlie had to learn how to take care of himself and his father. At the age of seventeen, Charlie meets a dog named Radar and her elderly owner, Howard Bowditch, a recluse who lives in a large house at the top of a hill, with a locked shed in his backyard. Strange sounds can be heard coming from the shed at times.

Charlie starts working for Mr. Bowditch and falls in love with Radar. After Bowditch's death, he leaves Charlie a cassette tape that tells an incredible story that no one would believe. What Bowditch knows, and has kept a secret all his life, is that the shed contains a portal to another world.

King's storytelling in Fairy Tale is exceptional. It is a magnificent and terrifying tale in which good and evil battle it out, and a heroic boy, along with his dog, must lead the charge.

At the beginning of the pandemic, King asked himself, "What could you write that would make you happy?"

"As if my imagination had been waiting for the question to be asked, I saw a vast deserted city - deserted but alive. I saw the empty streets, the haunted buildings, a gargoyle head lying overturned in the street. I saw smashed statues (of what I didn't know, but I eventually found out). I saw a huge, sprawling palace with glass towers so high their tips pierced the clouds. Those images released the story I wanted to tell."