Over the course of his illustrious career, Stephen King has written more than a dozen bonafide classic novels. In fact, prior to the release of The Shining (his third book), he published two classics in the form of Carrie and 'Salem's Lot. The Shining is another classic.
The Shining follows a man named Jack Torrance, his wife, and his little son named Danny. The three move to the Overlook Hotel, an isolated hotel in the Rocky Mountains, after Jack takes a job as the hotels winter caretaker. His son, Danny, possesses unique physic abilities which allows him to see the violent past of the hotel -- death, murders, etc. After a winter storm hits the hotel, thus snowing the family in and not allowing them to leave, the evil forces that lurk in the hotel come out in full force, ultimately putting the family in serious danger.
The Shining was later adapted into a film of the same name by critically acclaimed director Stanley Kubrick. While King wasn't too pleased with the final product (he felt it derivated too much from his novel), The Shining (which was released in 1980) is regarded as one of the best horror films to have ever been produced. The novel was again adapted in 1992 into a miniseries of the same name. King personally supervised the creation of the scripts to ensure that they stuck closely to his novel. It received very solid but unremarkable reviews when it was released.
