As were a lot of his more recent short stories, Stephen King's newest publication Cookie Jar - first released yesterday, on June 23, is a nostalgic look into the past of an aging protagonist who reminisces the ordeals of his past in a conversation with his thirteen-year-old great-grandson.

"There were seventy-seven years between them, and Dale Alderson probably considered that an ocean, but to Rhett it was only a lake. Maybe no more than a pond."

Aside from a small supernatural element as it is usual for King, this story included some interesting thoughts about a child having to bear his mother's suicide and the experiences of young adults in the Second World War. King always has a gift for creating believable elderly people as protagonists in his stories, and he succeeded in the attempt yet again right here. In the end, nothing really stood out of the plot or the writing, but it wasn't unworthy of spending half an hour with.

You can read this little story online for free here. ( )

《Too many sweets weren’t good for you.》

RTC ( )

I've read some Stephen King for my Horror Fiction class last semester and eagerly read this short story that Neil Gaiman tweeted about. I have never been so creeped out by cookies in my life! Like the majority of the genre they weave you through this complicated plot that can't possible be real and yet leave you with this sense of wonder and curiosity at the end. This was like that Lovecraft story about the artist in the north end of Boston. I can't remember the title now... But the perfect balance was struck between the deterrent of my heebie jeebies and the draw of my natural sense of curiosity! ( )

I read this free short story yesterday and enjoyed it. It's hard to say much about a short story without spoiling things, but I can say this one left me slightly dissatisfied. Maybe because it's King and I wanted MORE.
You can read it for free too, just click here: http://www.vqronline.org/fiction/2016/03/cookie-jar ( )

Stephen King always, and I mean always, has a way of drawing this reader into his stories, be they 31-pages shorts like this one or 1500-page books like [b:The Stand|149267|The Stand|Stephen King|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1213131305s/149267.jpg|1742269].

Part of that draw is the fact that he uses everyday objects, in this case, a cookie jar, as the means to tell a fantastic little tale. Another part of the draw is that he allows the readers' imaginations to carry them into what isn't said, what isn't described.

The Cookie Jar drives a ton of questions that make this a five-star read: was Rhett's mother crazy or was she "gifted" somehow? Was Lalanka and its "entities" real or a figment of her imagination, perhaps a picture of how she perceived the horrors of the real world?

Some have suggested that this should be developed into a longer book. I disagree. If King has to explain it to us, it will lose its magic entirely. ( )