Four Past Midnight [Signed with J.S.A. Certification]

New York, New York, U.S.A.: Viking Press, 1990. Signed by Stephen King at front endpaper: "Stephen King". Very attractive. Contemporaneous inscription with original publication. Certified authenticity by James Spence Authentication. Includes JSA certification card, and label at signed page; certification #DD21852 may be confirmed at their site. First edition; number-line beginning w/4. Black boards, gilt SK, black cloth spine wrap, gilt spine titles, crescent moon and stars design. Golden endpages. Pages fine; no writing. Bind fine; hinges intact. Dust wrapper, light shelf wear; unclipped 22.95, protected in new clear sleeve. Code 0990 at front flap. Classic jacket design of Roman numeral clock striking 4 past midnight with a flash of fire into the starry cosmos. 763 pages. Insured post. Past midnight, something happens to time, the fragile concept we employ to order our sense of reality. It bends, stretches, turns back, or snaps, and sometimes our reality with it. And what happens to the wide-eyed observer when the window between reality and unreality shatters, and the glass begins to fly? These four chilling novellas, a feast fit for aficionados, provide some shocking answers. After all, past midnight is Stephen King's favorite time of day... Scenarios: survivors of a plane crash awake in a nightmare; a writer finds himself at the end of an accusing finger; a businessman struggles to uncover the evil driving him mad; and, a ravenous dog inhabits a camera, in a horror quartet. One Past Midnight: "The Langoliers" takes a red-eye flight from L.A. to Boston into a most unfriendly sky. Only eleven passengers survive, but landing in an eerily empty world makes them wish they hadn't. Something's waiting for them, you see.... Two Past Midnight: "Secret Window, Secret Garden" enters the suddenly strange life of writer Mort Rainey, recently divorced, depressed, and alone on the shore of Tashmore Lake. Alone, that is, until a figure named John Shooter arrives, pointing an accusing finger. Three Past Midnight: "The Library Policeman" is set in Junction City, Iowa, an unlikely place for evil to be hiding. But for small businessman Sam Peebles, who thinks he may be losing his mind, another enemy is hiding there as well--the truth. If he can find it in time, he might stand a chance. Four Past Midnight: The flat surface of a Polaroid photograph becomes for fifteen-year-old Kevin Delevan an invitation to the supernatural. Old Pop Merrill, Castle Rock's sharpest trader, wants to crash the party for profit, but "The Sun Dog," a creature that shouldn't exist at all, is a very dangerous investment. With an introduction and prefatory notes to each of the tales, Stephen King discusses how these stories arose in what is the world's most fearsome imagination. But it is the stories themselves that will keep readers awake long after bedtime, into those dark, timeless hours past midnight.. Signed by Author. First Edition. Hardcover. Fine/Fine. Illus. by Hokanson, Lars (Illustrations); Wood, Rob (Jacket Illustration). 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. Book.