“CYCLE OF THE WEREWOLF” (aka “Silver Bullet”) By Stephen King #WeirdDarkness #ThrillerThursday

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There s no better source of horror fiction than the King of Horror himself Stephen King Each chapter of Cycle of the Werewolf is a short story unto itself It tells the story of a werewolf haunting a small town as the moon turns full once every month It was originally published as a limited-edition hardcover in 1983 by Land of Enchantment and then in 1985 as a mass-market trade paperback by Signet If it sounds familiar to you it s because Stephen King also wrote the screenplay for its film adaptation Silver Bullet which was released to theaters in 1985 although if you have seen the film you won t be disappointed in the book as there is a lot that changes from the original pages before it hit the big screen The movie received mixed reviews at the time but has since achieved cult status in the US after appearing on television regularly In 1985 Signet Books re-issued Cycle of the Werewolf under the title Silver Bullet in an edition that included King s screenplay alongside the original novella This re-published edition also included a foreword by King recounting the impetus of the novella and the background of the film adaptation In this episode of Weird Darkness however I will be narrating the original novella The book at 127 pages is technically a novella rather than a novel but there is no shortage of scares I assure you The novella wasn t even supposed to be a novella at first The entire concept started out believe it or not as a calendar by the Zavista company with illustrations by renowned comic-book artist Bernie Wrightson Each month of the proposed calendar featured a drawing by Wrightson complete with a short vignette by Stephen King But King found the size of the vignettes which were both small and extremely limited to be problematic for his writing style So he proceeded instead with the short novel and had it published by Land of Enchantment in 1983 but kept Wrightson s illustrations for the publication because they were so beautifully or horrifically brilliant In the author s notes at the back of the novella King admits to taking liberties with the lunar cycle For example if a full moon was on New Year s Day another one wouldn t occur on Valentine s Day but these dates are widely recognized in January and February He explains that this was done to focus the relevant months more clearly in the readers minds But then this is fiction so of course liberties are going to be taken and who are we to question Stephen King SOURCES AND REFERENCES FROM THE EPISODE Cycle of the Werewolf by Steven King https amzn to 2YNP4u6Weird Darkness theme by Alibi Music Library Check out all of my podcasts – Auditory Anthology Retro Radio Old Time Radio In The Dark Church of the Undead Micro Terrors Weird Darkness and more by clicking on EPISODES at https WeirdDarkness com Over time links seen above may become invalid disappear or have different content I always make sure to give authors credit for the material I use whenever possible If I somehow overlooked doing so for a story or if a credit is incorrect please let me know and I will rectify it in these show notes immediately Some links included above may benefit me financially through qualifying purchases I have come into the world as a light so that no one who believes in me should stay in darkness John 12 46 WeirdDarkness is a registered trademark Copyright 2024 Weird Darkness Originally aired February 04 2020CUSTOM WEBPAGE https weirddarkness com cycle-of-the-werewolf-aka-silver-bullet Click here to visit this podcast episode