Ah, Stephen King. I've never read any of his books, though I have a few on my shelves, but I can finally see why the man's so popular. He does have a way with words. Maybe one day I'll actually get around to reading one of those decrepit paperbacks I have hanging around. (If only horror was my preferred genre. Oh well.) 
 Anyway, the book. I picked it up (finally!) because so many people insisted I read it and had so many good things to say about it, and also because I wanted to read the part where he bitched about adverbs endlessly. I...have somewhat mixed feelings about it. I wasn't aware that it was half autobiography to give "background" on how he became the type of writer he is (really, dude? don't actually care.), and was terribly irritated by his constant need to bring up his wife and harp on about how amazing and perfect and blah blah blah whatever. (No, seriously, dude? Don't actually care. Like, glad you love your wife and all, but I picked up a book to read about how to write, not to read about how great your wife is.) So yeah. If I wanted a biography on Stephen King, I would've went looking for one. If I wanted a biography on his wife, likewise. If he felt the need to write an essay on how beautiful she was, he should've done so. And not on a book about writing. Do. Not. Care. 
 I won't begrudge him the points on drug abuse or the small portion at the back of the book on his near-death experience, though. The alcoholism and drug abuse were, I felt, necessary to point out (that you don't need it to be creative, no matter how much you might feel otherwise when you're in the throes of addiction); the accident was as much a part of this book as the writing process was. So I was fine with those parts. They were even somewhat logical, and at least I felt connected to them in relation to writing, which is what I came to this book to read about. (Your wife and kids being perfect is not about writing. It is about bragging. Shut up, Stephen.) 
 And this is where my mixed feelings REALLY come in. I could put up with the autobiography and the constant need to talk about his wife, if it weren't for the fact that in order to get to the actual good writing advice you had to wade through the bog of King's gigantic blustering ego. Throughout the entire book, the thing I most understood was that King felt that his way was better than anyone else's way. Oh, sure, other people might not work in the same way he did...but that was because they were inferior, see? Oh, and also liars. Because people who plot are liars. (I don't think he even once outright said that. But if you didn't catch it, you weren't paying attention.) What you take from King's method of writing is that plotting is evil and so are adverbs. Oh, and don't do any research before you start writing. Research is evil--until the second draft, where it may make you rewrite half the book. Really? No, seriouly: REALLY? STFU, Stevie. 
 Not that it was all bad, especially if you're new to the craft and haven't had much good advice yet. There's always the time-honored "kill your darlings" (a phrase I'm getting sick to hell of hearing myself, let me tell you), and of course the desperate need to revise everything. There's even a few notes on revising, though not much of it. But for the most part, I got too bogged down in the way the man seemed to honestly feel that his way was the only true and honest way to write to take much away from the book.