For over a quarter of a century, best-selling horror novelist and screenwriter Stephen King has kept his fans delightfully terrified by the monsters, demons and aliens that populate his fiction. But his deepest fears are decidedly more powerful and down to earth, as is the man himself.

The Hardworking Guy Next Door

Shhh...Stephen King is a Virgo. You might expect the author of such books as Carrie, The Shining and Cujo to be a dark and brooding Scorpio, or maybe an otherworldly Pisces suffering from recurring nightmares. But success in writing is as much about consistently getting down to the details of arranging words as it is about great ideas, and Mr. King's Virgo Sun very clearly shows someone who puts his nose to the grindstone. He sits down every day except Christmas, the Fourth of July and his birthday, and puts words on paper without fail.

Like any self-respecting Virgo, Mr. King is a natural when it comes to hard work, consistency and following up on the details. In fact, it is his acute consciousness of life's details that make his fictional characters seem so alive that his fans have been known to write and ask after them, as if they were real people. It has been said that his work has chronicled the experience of middle America for the past 50 years and, as with any good story, the real truth is in the details.

Adding to this steady approach to his work is the fact that Saturn (hard work) and Pluto (power) are found together, or conjunct, in his natal chart. His earthy, practical Virgo Sun, combined with Saturn and Pluto together in fixed and determined Leo, show the tremendous work ethic that has resulted in an incredible volume of work, including novels, novellas, screenplays and short stories.

So What's Hiding in His Closet?

Stephen King's stories are the stuff of nightmares, but it isn't things that go bump in the night, supernatural bogeymen or even the more garden-variety human monsters that terrorize him. What really haunts the King of Fright is the specter of being unable to write.

Typical of the Saturn-Pluto conjunction is a lack of self-confidence (Saturn) in one's creative (Leo) power (Pluto), and King himself has admitted that he has always worried that he didn't have what it took to be a successful author. It is well known that he tossed the manuscript for his first successful novel, Carrie, into the trash. It was his wife, novelist Tabitha King, who pulled it out, dusted it off, and told King it was good. Fortunately, this position also suggests that with maturity, fears and lack of confidence can be mastered and transformed into positive energy.

According to King, Pet Sematary, a story about a man who brings his son back to life after he is killed by a speeding truck, was written after the same thing nearly happened to his own son. Likewise, King felt tremendous financial stress during the years prior to publishing Carrie, and The Shining was written as much about how financial and other stresses can tear apart a marriage as it was about a haunted hotel.

Transformation is a recurring theme in his fiction and in his personal life. True to the potential of Pluto/Saturn in Leo, King has transformed (Pluto) his fears (Saturn) into creativity (Leo) in spite of his innate lack of confidence in his own creative abilities; and he is now considered one of the most powerful men in publishing.

Back From the (Nearly) Dead

In June of 1999, as he was taking his daily four mile walk near his home, King was struck by an oncoming van and severely injured. One of the emergency crew who responded to the 911 call later told King that he was surprised King was still alive. It took months before he could walk, and it is still not certain if he will ever regain full use of one of his legs. What worried him most at the time, however, was not his brush with oblivion. In an interview following the accident with Dateline NBC, King spoke of writing:

“At first it was as if I’d never done this in my life. It was like starting over again from square one. I mean from like being twelve, thirteen years old. There was this one awful minute when I sat there and I thought, ‘I can’t do this, I don’t know how to do this anymore.’”

Stephen King is still writing, albeit at a somewhat slower pace, and his injuries are healing. True to form, he has once again used the energy of Saturn and Pluto to transform and regenerate himself and is channeling that energy into creativity. When asked if he would write about the accident, King said: "Sooner or later, everything goes in."