It’s hard to imagine Stephen King needing another writer to make him look good.

But the Maine author says that’s what happened when he worked with Peter Straub. The two first collaborated on a dark fantasy called “The Talisman” in 1984 and then on the 2001 sequel, “Black House.”

Before Straub died in 2022 at 79, he wrote to King with ideas for a third book in the series. King thought the ideas were so powerful, so on point, that he used them as a basis for the new novel “Other Worlds Than These.” It goes on sale Oct. 6, with both authors’ names on the cover.

King wishes he had been able to work with Straub one more time, but is glad to have had the partnership at all.

“Oh man, he was so good. He was a better stylist than I ever was, and I thought this is going to make me look so good if I collaborate with him, and it really did,” said King in mid-September. “We kept saying we’re going to do it (a third book) next year, but I had things to finish and he had things to finish. Then time just ran out.”

Summer H. Howell plays the title roll in the new series “Carrie” on Prime. (Photo by Robert Falconer/Prime)

The day after “Other Worlds Than These” comes out, Prime will debut a new limited series based on “Carrie,” King’s first book. The 1974 novel was made into a Hollywood film in 1976, starring Sissy Spacek. The new series stars Summer H. Howell and was created and written by Mike Flanagan, who has done several TV or film projects based on King’s work, including “The Life of Chuck” and “Dr. Sleep.”

King said he really likes the way the story has been updated to the present, with Carrie’s fellow students using cellphones and social media to bully and humiliate her.

“It’s really smart and it expands on the book, which was fairly slim. The miniseries is all about social media and it’s fantastic,” said King. “It’s a timeless story, which is too bad. You would hope at some point we as human beings would stop bullying each other for no good reason.”

High school students use their cellphones to embarrass Carrie White in the new “Carrie” series on Prime. (Photo courtesy of Prime)NO SLOWING DOWN

At 79, King continues to be a pop culture powerhouse. He’s written more than 65 novels or novellas and his books have sold some 400 million copies. More than 80 films or TV series have been based on his work. Colleges around the country have held courses dedicated to his work.

Born in Portland and raised largely in Durham, King went to high school in Lisbon Falls and graduated with a degree in English from the University of Maine in 1970. He and his wife, Tabitha, have lived in Maine ever since. Their longtime Bangor home, a tourist attraction for its resemblance to a haunted house, now houses the couple’s charitable foundation and King’s archives. These days, King spends a little more than half the year in Maine and the rest in Florida.

King had only been a published author for a few years when he met Straub, in London, in the late 1970s. Straub had had success writing about the supernatural with his 1975 novel, “Julia.”

“The Talisman” focused on Jack Sawyer, who at the age of 12 starts an epic quest, walking from New Hampshire to the California coast to find a way to save his dying mother’s life. His trek takes him to the Territories, a parallel medieval universe, where people have lookalike counterparts known as twinners. Jack’s mother’s twinner is queen of the Territories, and is also dying.

“Black House” continues with Sawyer in his 30s, leaving his job as a police officer to live in small-town Wisconsin. A series of murders involving young children draws him out of retirement and into different worlds.

In “Other Worlds Than These,” Sawyer is called to journey to strange worlds again. He has to stop a rampaging group of infected teenagers in America-side and battle the forces of the mysterious Gullet at the edge of Mid-World. The book also wraps up the various worlds of King’s Dark Tower series.

Before Straub died, he sent King a letter with ideas for a third book. He also sent him the book “Redheaded Peckerwood” by artist and photographer Christian Patterson. The book uses photographs to retrace the route of teenagers Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate on a killing spree through Nebraska in the 1950s.

“Peter said to me, ‘Maybe somebody gets possesed by the spirit of Charles Starkweather and they go into the Territories, and all this stuff happens,” said King. “I thought, ‘Oh man, this is just tailor-made for a suspense novel.’ It really made me want to write this book.”

Summer H. Howell in Prime’s new “Carrie.” (Photo by Robert Falconer/Prime)DO YOUR THING

As for the new “Carrie” series, King said he was sent scripts, had casting approval and was credited as an executive producer. But he really wasn’t very involved. He said he doesn’t like to use his approval power unless he feels he really has to, which is almost never.

“Making a film is different (than writing a book). My thought is, you do your thing and we’ll see what happens,” King said.

Besides Howell as Carrie, the cast includes Samantha Sloyan as her mother and Matthew Lillard as the high school principal. Though the book is set in a fictional Maine town, filming for the series took place in western Canada. Because Canada and states like Massachussetts and New York offer lucrative financial incentives and tax credits to production companies, Maine has rarely been the location of a big-budget King film or TV show in recent years. Film advocates have tried to increase Maine’s film incentives several times in recent years, without much success.

King liked the new series and was particularly impressed with the gym shower scene, where classmates taunt Carrie because she doesn’t realize she’s having her period. Her mother never explained it to her.

In the original movie, the scene is steamy and dreamlike, showing girls in the shower through what King called “a male gaze.” But in the new version, Carrie is crumpled on the floor of the shower while her classmates, fully clothed, crowd around her, recording her humiliation on their cellphones.

Summer H. Howell as Carrie White, in a scene from the new “Carrie” series on Prime. (Photo courtesy of Prime)

“Teenagers still bully each other, but with social media it’s supercharged,” said King. “He (Flanagan) really caught that idea with his shot of all these kids taking cellphone photos of this girl who’s in terror. It’s a wonderful moment.”

King is also happy that while Flanagan updated some things, he didn’t change the story basics, which include a girl who is mercilessly bullied but who has hidden powers.

“It doesn’t reinvent the wheel. The prom scene, the pig’s blood, it’s all there,” King said.