In novels, one of my favorite whipping boys is Stephen King. How many times can he use the ‘magic negro’ trope?” King’s Christians are all shorthand lunatics and traitors to humanity. “At a certain point, an observant reader might ask, ‘How goddamned lazy does this writer have to be? Can’t he even conceive of a black Democrat taking bribes? A member of the Green Party who is quite happy to kill to protect Gaia?’