On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft

King describes his room in Durham, with a bed that is beneath low-hanging eaves. Some prominent objects are comic books, an Old Royal typewriter, and a Webcore phonograph. When King receives his rejection from Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, he nails it on the wall above the Webcore. He keeps adding rejection slips to the nail until he must replace it with a spike. By the time he turns 16, his rejection slips sometimes contain personalized notes. Fantasy and Science Fiction provides a personalized rejection to “The Night of the Tiger” and encourages King to submit again. While in his twenties, King rewrites the story and resubmits to F&SF, and this time is accepted.

When Dave becomes “bored with high school,” he creates his own newspaper called Dave’s Rag (41). The publication “was an odd combination of family newsletter and small-town bi-weekly” (42). Dave runs the Rag out of the family basement using a hectograph for printing and a small, closet darkroom for developing his photos. The hectograph requires a long time to print and also tends to grow spores, so Dave buys a small drum printing press. This allows him to produce in two days what used to take a week, and the Rag moves into its “golden age” (44).