Harvey’s Dream by Stephen King (The New Yorker Magazine, 2003)
Thursday’s Suspense Story, December 8, 2022
How deep can the imagination go? How deep can a dream go?
Dreams are often horrors and great subjects for suspense stories and mysteries. This short story by Stephen King (The New Yorker Magazine) is a tale of a middle-aged married couple with daughters. We are in the kitchen and Harvey tells his wife Janet of a dream, describing details that his wife begins to recognize. Specifics like deviled eggs and a dent in the neighbor’s car. We follow Janet’s every thought that reaches psychological heights of fear and an ending that only Stephen King could write.
Read the short story here at The New Yorker Magazine:
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2003/06/30/harveys-dream
Readers, please drop a line in the comments if you liked the story, or didn’t like it. How many stars would you rate Harvey’s Dream?
Film: 14 minutes. Don’t miss this!!
Stephen King is a best-selling American author of suspense, horror, sci-fi and fantasy books. When he writes, he prefers to use pen and paper, using a Waterman fountain pen, instead of a computer. In his book On Writing, King says he tries to write at least 2,000 words a day. During the writing of his novel Carrie, King threw the first draft in the trash. His wife Tabitha retrieved it and eventually Doubleday bought the rights.
In the Atlantic, King revealed that he considers the introductory sentence of a book crucial for the book’s atmosphere and to successfully connect to the reader. He often labors over his first line for months or years until it’s exactly right.
Don’t forget to view the INDEX OF AUTHORS’ TALES above for more free reading at Reading Fiction Blog. This is a compendium of over 250 short stories by more than 150 famous storytellers of mystery, suspense, supernatural, ghost stories, crime, sci-fi, romance, ‘quiet horror,’ and mainstream fiction.
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Paula Cappa 
Generally I find King too wordy, in an excessive sense, but this is exquisite.
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MarceaeoloG, you make a good point. At only 10 pages long, it might be his shortest work and is tightly written.
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I don’t think I’ve read this one, Paula – thanks!
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Yeah, it was a new one for me too. The short film is done well.
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