Prolific Authors – 21 Books

It is time once again to take a look at the authors I have read the most, dating back to high school.  This year, I’m once again on pace to set a new record for books read in a year, so I thought it would be nice to take a deeper dive into those books I’ve read through August of this year. Since our last check-in, I’ve read an additional 1xx books, so there should be some movement over the past two years.  Without further ado, it’s time to take another look and see if my “favorite” authors have changed much over the years.  We continue today with our penultimate entry and the lone author I’ve read 21 times, starting in my freshman year of high school.

Stephen King

I remember my first introduction to Stephen King, reading Pet Sematary after finishing my Biology final at the end of freshman year, waiting for the class to be dismissed.  My total reached nine novels by 1993, but then college and other pursuits got in the way and King fell out of my favor.

That changed in 2012, when the release of 11/22/63 brought me back into the King fold.  There was another brief lull from between Joyland in 2015 and The Colorado Kid in 2019, but he’s been a consistent read since, especially with the introduction of the Holly Gibney character and limiting, if not outright removing, the supernatural elements in his work.  This year alone has given King a big push, as I’ve completed three books so far with nearly half the year to go.

Book 13 (of 52) – The Colorado Kid

The Colorado Kid – Stephen King

The Colorado Kid, a short novel by Stephen King, is a mystery about a mystery in a small, New England town.  A young intern at the town’s small paper, finally earning the trust of her 2 bosses, is told the tale of a body that had washed up and was found by two local kids.  The man, eventually identified, was from Colorado, where he was seen the day before.  How did he get back east without anyone noticing he had left Colorado?  How did he die?  Why did he come?

The questions abound, and are not to be found within the pages of King’s first contribution to Hard Case Crime.  It’s an interesting mystery, and there probably isn’t a satisfying answer to be found.