The Dreamers (novella)

In June 1971, Vietnam veteran William Davis is discharged from the military; his wartime experiences have left him "empty", with his "emotions scrubbed".

Elgin and Davis begin their experiments, which entail administering the hypnotic drug Flurazepam to a human test subject who is instructed to study a picture of a red house with a green door in a forest.

The sixth subject, Annette Crosby, awakens screaming, having dreamed of opening the green door to encounter a disembodied voice that uttered a word resembling "tantullah" or "tamtusha".

Davis drives Devereaux to a rest area off Route 119 and abandons him there in his car, then hitchhikes back to Castle Rock.

"[5] Gorian Delpâture (writing for RTBF) described The Dreamers as "both a tribute to Cormac McCarthy (in style) and to HP Lovecraft (in theme)".

[7] Mike Finn suggested that the story "...worked because it focused more on the struggle of a young man who has recently returned from the war in Vietnam and who has grown so used to numbing his feelings that he is now unable to connect with life and the living.

[11] Bev Vincent noted The Dreamers as an example of the "common theme in King's stories [...] that the other universes that abut against ours are not nice places.

"[12] A less positive review was received from Justin Hamelin, who stated that The Dreamers "...just missed the honor roll for me", noting "the outright mention of Lovecraft and one of his strongest works pulled me out of the story a bit, even for only a paragraph or so.