Stephen King is set to give his first major insights into the writing process since his acclaimed On Writing, in a new collection of short stories due out this winter.

The Bazaar of Bad Dreams, due to be published on 3 November, will bring together 20 short stories by King, a mix of new writing and work already collected in magazines. But it will also include an introduction to each story by the writer, in which he will provide “autobiographical comments on when, why and how he came to write it”, as well as “the origins and motivation of each story. His editor at Hodder & Stoughton, Philippa Pride, predicted the inclusion would “delight all his readers including those who love his insight into the craft of writing”. A mix of biography and tips on writing, On Writing was published 15 years ago, in 2000.

In the new collection, King writes of how “little by little, writers develop their own styles, each as unique as a fingerprint. Traces of the writers one reads in one’s formative years remain, but the rhythm of each writer’s thoughts – an expression of his or her very brain waves, I think – eventually becomes dominant.”

The Bazaar of Bad Dreams will include the story A Death, recently published in the New Yorker, a 19th-century-set tale featuring Jim Trusdale, a man accused of murdering a young girl for her birthday silver dollar. “Watching someone hang, even a fictional someone, isn’t ever pleasant,” King told the magazine earlier this month. “But, because I only had to live with Trusdale for a short time, it was easier to see him executed than it was to see John Coffey go to the electric chair in The Green Mile. That was partly because I knew that Coffey was innocent, and partly because I lived with Coffey for 16 months as I wrote the book. He got to be a friend. Jim Trusdale was a mere acquaintance.”

Other tales will range from “a man who keeps reliving the same life, repeating the same mistakes over and over again”, said Pride, to “a firework competition between neighbours which reaches an explosive climax, a columnist who kills people by writing their obituaries” and “a poignant tale about the end of the human race”.

King published his first collection of short stories, Night Shift, 35 years ago. In his introduction to the new collection, he writes that “there’s something to be said for a shorter, more intense experience. It can be invigorating, sometimes even shocking, like a waltz with a stranger you will never see again, or a kiss in the dark, or a beautiful curio for sale laid out on a cheap blanket at a street bazaar”. He goes on to warn his readers, “Feel free to examine them, but please be careful. The best of them have teeth.”

The novelist, author of more than 50 books, also has a follow-up to his thriller Mr Mercedes out this June. Like one of his best known works, Misery, Finders Keepers is the story of a fan who wreaks revenge on a famous author who has stopped writing about his favourite character.

“Not since Misery has King played with the notion of a reader whose obsession with a writer gets dangerous. Finders Keepers is spectacular, heart-pounding suspense, but it is also King writing about how literature shapes a life – for good, for bad, for ever,” runs the novel’s synopsis.