Podcasts
Stephen King’s 10 Best Stories for Summer [The Losers’ Club Podcast]
Don Henley failed to mention it in his 1984 hit, but Stephen King is certainly a boy of the summer. Whether it’s venturing outside of Castle Rock to see a dead body or evading shapeshifting clowns in the barrens of Derry, the best-selling author has carved out a number of parables that make us sweat and fan our faces with a fury.
And so, that’s why The Losers’ Club is heading into the Fourth of July weekend with the best summer stories in King’s Dominion. Yes, just as they did for Halloween, Christmas, even Valentine’s Day, the Losers are turning to the stacks to name the 10 best Stephen King titles everyone should consider “summer reading.” You know, the stuff that burns.
Of course, it should be noted that not all of these stories take place in the summer, but they all bring the heat and beg to be read on the beach. So, grab some suntan lotion, maybe even a cool root beer, and catch a wave with Losers Justin Gerber, Jenn Adams, Michael Roffman, and special guest Janelle Janson of Dark Matter Magazine and Cemetery Dance.
Stream the episode below and return next week when the Losers begin their coverage of Everything’s Eventual. For further adventures, join the Losers’ Club over long days and pleasant nights via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, RadioPublic, Acast, Google Podcasts, and RSS. You can also unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive content in The Barrens (Patreon).
Maybe you haven’t thought about your good friend Sweeney Todd in a while, or maybe you have. The 2007 movie is a bit of a memory, though a fond one – it has a healthy 86% on Rotten Tomatoes, for what it’s worth. But 2023’s Broadway revival starring Josh Groban, who your mom thinks is “so talented” (she’s right!), was enough of a hit that its run was extended.
It appears we’re in a bit of a Sweeneyssaince.
For the uninitiated, Sweeney Todd is the story of a barber who kills his customers and disposes of the bodies by passing them off to pie shop owner Mrs. Lovett, who uses them as a special ingredient. But there’s more below the trap door.
Sweeney Todd isn’t just a late 70s musical that turned into a movie; it started as a penny dreadful called The String of Pearls: A Domestic Romance (author unknown), told week-to-week in the 1840s. Penny dreadfuls were essentially fiction zines featuring serialized stories that were usually horror-based and cost a penny, leading to the very literal nickname.
The String of Pearls differs from the more well-known Sweeney Todd plot in that it follows the investigation of a missing persons case that leads to the reveal of Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett’s arrangement, as opposed to the more modern iteration which treats audiences to the duo hatching their homicidal plan and then giving the worst haircuts ever. What a delightfully wild reveal that must have been if you were a reader in Victorian London after weeks of wondering what had become of the missing sailor carrying a string of pearls to deliver to a lovely girl.
Kristen and Will discuss the history and future of Sweeney Todd and works inspired by it this week on Guide to the Unknown. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts to get a new episode every Friday.
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