Once upon a time, in the haunted city of Derry (site of the classics "It" and "Insomnia)," four boys stood together and did a brave thing. Certainly a good thing, perhaps even a great thing. Something that changed them in ways they could never begin to understand.

Twenty-five years later, the boys are now men with separate lives and separate troubles. But the ties endure. Each hunting season the foursome reunite in the woods of Maine. This year, a stranger stumbles into their camp, disoriented, mumbling something about lights in the sky. His incoherent ravings prove to be dis-turbingly prescient. Before long, these men will be plunged into a horrifying struggle with a creature from another world. Their only chance of survival is locked in their shared past -- and in the Dreamcatcher.

Stephen King's first full-length novel since "Bag of Bones" is, more than anything, a story of how men remember, and how they find their courage. Not since "The Stand" has King crafted a story of such astonishing range -- and never before has he contended so frankly with the heart of darkness.