Carrie by Stephen King

Stephen King launched his literary career on April 5, 1974 with little fanfare. Doubleday had printed 30,000 copies of Carrie, but the novel only generated sales of 13,000 hardbacks. The author received an advance of $2,500 for his efforts—a reasonable amount for an untested author, but hardly enough for King to quit his day job as a high school teacher.