#105 in Horror
Needful Things
- 698
- Pages
- about 13 h
- Reading time
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Our view
“Needful Things” is a long small-town horror novel in which a shopkeeper sells people what they crave and takes payment in spiteful pranks. What makes it work is the seller, a villain to relish, and the care with which a community’s grudges are wound up before they snap. Brutal and satirical by turns, it gives most to those who know Castle Rock from Stephen King’s other books. It runs to nearly seven hundred pages.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
Needful Things is a 1991 horror novel by American author Stephen King. The story focuses on a shop that sells collectibles and antiques, managed by Leland Gaunt, a new arrival to the town of Castle Rock, Maine, the setting of many King stories. Gaunt often asks customers to perform a prank or mysterious deed in exchange for the item they are drawn to. As time goes by, the many deeds and pranks lead to increasing aggression among the townspeople, as well as chaos and death. A protagonist of the book is Alan Pangborn, previously seen in Stephen King's novel The Dark Half.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 7.6 across 593 ratings. With that many, the reader vote carries 80% of the weight and the score stays at 7.6 — the Horror average of 7.5 barely moves it.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.3 | 32 | 5% |
| Hardcover | 7.6 | 561 | 95% |
Frequently asked
How long is Needful Things?
It has 698 pages — longer than 91% of the ranked books in Horror.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Horror — with scores between 7.5 and 7.6, closest to this book.
