In the book business, Stephen King, a down-to-earth, mid-30s former schoolteacher who talks with a pronounced New England twang and loves rock 'n' roll, is the nearest thing they've got to a superstar. He's written nine books and has had nine best-sellers, his novels becoming filmscripts seemingly overnight: Carrie,

Salem's Lot, The Shining, The Stand, The Dead Zone, Firestarter, Cujo (the last four are still at the screenplay stage). He made his acting debut this year in Creepshow, a flick he created with Night Of The Living Dead director George Romero. By next spring, his new novel will be available with, he promises, "rock 'n' roll as its dominant force." And like all of Stephen King's work, that book will inevitably do two things—scare a lot of people and sell a lot of copies.