Stephen King's Desperation appeared simultaneously with The Regulators (see separate entry). The latter was published under the Richard Bachman pen name, which, by 1996, would have fooled no one. Packaging and promotion lured the reader into purchasing the two novels together. Considered as a single work, Desperation and The Regulators provide alternate reality scenarios constructed around Tak, an earth spirit released during a strip mining operation. Tak threatens, respectively, Wentworth, an Ohio small town (The Regulators), and a Nevada mining town (Desperation). The Tak of Desperation differs slightly from his counterpart in The Regulators in its powers and what it wants from its victims.

It is King's startling innovation to provide, in each novel, alternate lives for a small group of Tak's victims and opponents. The families who live on Poplar Street in Wentworth (The Regulators) have another existence in Nevada (Desperation).

Some of these characters (e...