Misery

by Stephen King

Annie Wilkes was the perfect audience, a woman who loved stories without having the slightest interest in the mechanics of making them. She was the embodiment of that Victorian archetype, Constant Reader.

That first one had had all the life of an eighth-grader’s “How I Spent My Summer Vacation” theme. This one was different. The furnace was on. Oh, not that he had written particularly well—the story was hot, but the characters as stereotyped and predictable as ever—but this time he had been able to at least generate some power; this time there was heat baking out from between the lines. Amused, he thought: She felt the heat. I think she’s afraid to get too close in case I might burn her.

But he bent over the book again. In a weird way it was just too good to put down. It was like a novel so disgusting you just have to finish it.

Her eyes were mild and drifting. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m a trained nurse.”