Maine’s junior high school students will have to wait a while to get writing tips from Stephen King.

The best-selling horror novelist said that he is too busy right now to teach writing through the state’s laptop program.

“That’s something that’s really sort of on hold right now,” said King’s personal assistant, Marsha DeFilippo.

The laptop program puts a computer in the hands of every public junior high school student in Maine. About 18,000 seventh-graders received the computers last year, while 18,000 eighth-graders got them this fall.

In a press conference last November, King said he would use the laptops to teach an interactive, seminar-style writing class to the state’s junior high school students. The announcement made national headlines.

But now, King says it will be another year or more before he starts teaching.

He is currently in the middle of final production for “Stephen King’s Kingdom Hospital,” a 15-hour TV drama series that will premiere on ABC in February. He is also writing a monthly column for Entertainment Weekly and is editing his final book in the famed Dark Tower series.

“And trying to have a personal family life,” DeFilippo said.

Tony Sprague, director of the laptop program, said King’s writing class is “still in the planning process.” Even some basic details haven’t yet been settled, including which grades will be involved.

He said staffing issues within the Maine Department of Education have also held up the project.

“There’s a lot of different things going,” he said.

The controversial, multi-million dollar laptop program is set to receive state funding this year and next.

ltice@sunjournal.com

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