The Institute (King novel)

Did You Know?

• A television adaptation directed by Jack Bender premiered on MGM+ on July 13, 2025.
• In August 2025, MGM+ ordered a second 8-episode season of the series.
• Ben Barnes and Mary-Louise Parker were set to star in the television adaptation.

Plot

Tim Jamieson leaves his job in Florida and heads toward New York, but gives up a plane seat and ends up in DuPray, South Carolina. A former policeman, he takes a job as a local patrolman and develops a relationship with deputy Wendy Gullickson. In suburban Minneapolis, twelve-year-old prodigy Luke Ellis, who has mild telekinetic abilities, is kidnapped after intruders murder his parents. He wakes in a room like his own at the Institute, a secret facility in the Maine woods housing other kidnapped children with telepathy or telekinesis.

Luke befriends Kalisha Benson, Nick Wilholm, George Iles, Iris Stanhope, Helen Simms, and later ten-year-old Avery Dixon in the Front Half. Director Mrs. Sigsby and staff experiment on the children to enhance their talents and awaken latent abilities; those who graduate to Back Half are never seen again. Luke develops weak telepathic powers from the experiments but hides this. After Kalisha graduates, she sends telepathic messages to Avery. Luke believes Back Half children are used for assassinations until they die, and he becomes desperate to escape.

Reception

Publishers Weekly gave the novel a rave review, calling it the most gut-wrenching tale of kids triumphing over evil since It and praising King's ability to create menace and intimacy through the young characters. Kirkus Reviews praised the book but noted it was less scary than The Shining and It. Booklist's Carl Hays said King devotees would devour the suspenseful page-turner and that any reader seeking a smart thriller about a black ops organization would find it compelling.

John Dugdale of The Sunday Times called it a captivating hybrid novel but questioned what it all added up to. Laura Miller of The New York Times wrote that the slow creep into inhumanity at the Institute was terrifying because it is all too real. In January 2020, Truly Hunter said fans would likely fall in love with the book and that it could stand as a new classic, though she criticized its length. King noted connections between the novel and President Donald Trump's family separation policy, which removed children from parents seeking asylum at the border.