Stephen King novel will never be printed again after being removed from shelves

With a writing career spanning nearly 50 years, Stephen King's books have been read by millions around the world.

If you visit your local bookshop, you'll inevitably come across his most famous best sellers - Carrie, Misery, The Shining and Salem's Lot, just to name a few.

But there's one book you're not to likely to pick up any time soon.

In fact, even you saw it, you likely wouldn't recognise it as one of his own.

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That's because he wrote the book under a pen name.

Rage was originally written in 1965 while King was still in high school.

It wouldn't hit the shelves until 1977, when he got it published under his alias Richard Bachman.

The story would later appear again in 1985 as part of a collection called The Bachman Books.

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Rage follows a troubled high school student who brings a gun to his school and murders teachers before going on to hold a class hostage.

King addressed the book in an 2013 essay called 'On Guns'.

He reflected: "I suppose if it had been written today, and some high school English teacher had seen it, he would have rushed the manuscript to the guidance counsellor and I would have found myself in therapy posthaste.

"But 1965 was a different world, one where you didn’t have to take off your shoes before boarding a plane and there were no metal detectors at the entrances to high schools."

So why has Rage disappeared from the shelves of bookstores?

Because King asked that publishers remove it when it was linked to four real life school shootings.

In April 1988, a student in California held his humanities class hostage before handing himself over.

According to the Los Angeles Times, he told police that he'd gotten the idea from King's book.

A year later, a Kentucky student repeated the stunt and held his classmates hostage for nine hours in homage to Rage.

Over in Washington, a 14-year-old boy shot and killed his teacher and two classmates in 1996.

He was apparently also inspired by the novel.

And finally, in 1997, a 14-year-old boy in Kentucky killed three people in his school's prayer group.

It was believed he had a copy of Rage in his locker.

Given these unsavoury ties, it's no wonder that King didn't want the book appearing in bookstores any longer.

Topics: Stephen King, Books

Ben Thompson