The Stand by Stephen King - Newspaper Ad

San Francisco Examiner - November 5, 1978

Having just read and reviewed a book about the 1918 influenza epic, why not share this newspaper ad hyping the release of Stephen King's End Times epic The Stand?

When the COVID-19 pandemic started, there was a lot of chatter and jokes about Captain Trips and such. There were even chain letter tweets sharing and spreading, back when there were tweets worth sharing and spreading, the eighth chapter of the novel, which charted the explosive spread of the super flu.

Further back in time, however, I struggled to get through the totality of The Stand. I could make it as far as the end of the plague, but would start to lose patience with the seeming meandering pace of this behemoth novel. Then again, I was all of eleven or twelve at that time and had the attention span of a gnat. So it goes.

I also remember being super disappointed to learn that the Star Wars invoking cover art, featuring a sword-wielding Luke Skywalker type fighting a scythe-wielding crow creature of some kind, did not happen in the book.

Although props should be given for that art, which does a great job of invoking the epic fantasy vibe of the work more so than the epic horror expectations this potential (and future constant) reader had in the early months of 1979.

Further props for it invoking both the grim reaper, via the scythe, and the plague, via that beaked countenance. I love it.