Stephen King has an important message but he's preaching to the converted. In this Kindle Single the novelist eschews fictional horror to tackle something even scarier: gun rage in the US. His efforts stem not just from the now regular news of innocent students, moviegoers, and shoppers killed in that country by someone going postal. He also wants to explain why he pulled from circulation
Rage, one of his early novels published under his pseudonym Richard Bachman. That book, linked to at least four teenage urban terrorists, was removed because, he says, "You don't leave a can of gasoline where a boy with firebug tendencies can lay their hands on it." Applauding recent initiatives to curb gun violence, he says that while background checks will probably happen, less likely is the proposed ban on sales of assault weapons. To show how laws can effect change, King points to Australia, where in 1996 the government banned or restricted automatic weapons. That reduced the country's private firepower by 20 per cent. But try reasoning with gun lobby the NRA.
