It could be a dragon’s eye. Maybe a chambered nautilus done in blue brick. A stairwell – an actual well with stairs? The font is strange, with the title on what could be a music staff – the F and T both look like they have musical notes incorporated in their design (the P and E are made of spikes or nails). It could also be the lines you find in first grade, guides for those learning how to write. A boy and a shepherd are walking down the lantern lit stairs. Throw Stephen King’s name writ large on the top, and it’s one of the oddest book covers I’ve ever seen. Stephen King writing a fairy tale?

King is a master of horror, not fairy tales. Then again, if you un-Disneyfy and de-sanitize what passes for fairy tales these days, you’ll find that plenty of horror clings to the traditional versions. Is this cover giving fair warning that what is within might be dangerous? That ran through my mind when I saw it at the Northshire Book Store. And when I brought it home.

I think this cover asks a question: are you brave enough to dare looking inside? Will you open the door and go in? Are you willing to leave your ideas of what is real and what is possible behind?

If I’m honest, a look in the mirror or into the face of another brings up the same questions…am I up for the adventure of a lifetime, full of shadows and blinding light?

Are you?