A fellow named Richard Bachman wrote Blaze in 1973 on an Olivettitypewriter, then turned the machine over to Stephen King, who used it to writeCarrie. Bachman died in 1985 ("cancer of the pseudonym"), but in late2006 King found the original typescript of Blaze among his papers at theUniversity of Maine's Fogler Library ("How did this get here?!"), and decidedthat with a little revision it ought to be published.

Blaze is the story of Clayton Blaisdell, Jr. -- of the crimescommitted against him and the crimes he commits, including his last, thekidnapping of a baby heir worth millions. Blaze has been a slow thinker sincechildhood, when his father threw him down the stairs -- and then threw him downagain. After escaping an abusive institution for boys when he was a teenager,Blaze hooks up with George, a seasoned criminal who thinks he has all theanswers. But then George is killed, and Blaze, though haunted by his partner, ison his own.

He becomes one of the most sympathetic criminals in all of literature. Thisis a crime story of surprising strength and sadness, with a suspenseful currentsustained by the classic workings of fate and character -- as taut and rivetingas Stephen King's The Girl Who Loved TomGordon.