Stephen King’s best book on Goodreads

When it comes to Stephen King fans, some have a penchant for Pennywise, while others secretly love The Tommyknockers. even if Stephen King himself is not a fan. However, after Goodreads conducted a survey, one book took first place after receiving an average rating of 4.35 out of 5. Published in 1978. The Stand is King’s epic story about a virus that wipes out most of Earth’s population, leaving those left to fight on the side of good or evil. Like some of King’s most compelling works, the wild tapestry unfolds with many different characters going their separate ways. Eventually, all roads lead to a final showdown with the mysterious Randall Flagg, who arrives just in time to throw what’s left of America into even more chaos, ending with the fate of humanity playing out in Las Vegas.

In this 1,153-page nightmare, the biggest terror in King’s massive end-of-humanity story isn’t Flagg, but a virus called “Captain Trips” that allows him to make it safely to the apocalypse. When Captain Trips is released, the spread sends the most chills down the spines of both those infected and those left to fight him. This is what made the 1994 TV movie adaptation such a great watch and one of a kind the best adaptations of Stephen King’s works (2020 miniseries, not so much). In 2020, it became even more relatable as fans noticed that reality began to look like one of the more disturbing parts of King’s book.

When the world was shut down after the spread of COVID-19, a part of pop culture eerily began to reflect the events in real time. Besides the likes of Contagion (which hit the iTunes Top 10 at the time) and 28 Days Later, people looked to King’s The Stand to compare the spread of a disease that was bringing the planet to a standstill. The author even referred to a section of the book about X (then Twitter) chronicles the spread of a world-ending story error. “Chapter 8 STANDARD. Here’s how it works. Pay attention. (But remember, COVID-19 is not as deadly as super flu.)”

In a book of nightmarish visions and otherworldly entities, the part of King’s huge page-turner that stands out as the most terrifying is the spread of Captain Trips. At one point, it was described as a “chain letter that really worked,” circulating between police patrols, restaurant workers and families returning from vacation, all of which felt more unnerving than 2020. During a video appearance on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”, King admitted he was still apologizing for the book decades later, when we can only assume his “sorry” count has increased. “People will come and say through their little masks, ‘I feel like I’m living in a Stephen King story.’ My response: “Sorry about that.”