Haven is not real. The characters are not real. This is a work of fiction, with one exception:
The Tommyknockers are real.
If you think I'm kidding, you missed the nightly news.
Stephen King
Late last night and the night before,
Tommyknockers, Tommyknockers, knocking at the door.
I want to go out, don't know if I can, because I'm so afraid of the Tommyknocker man.
BOOK 1. THE SHIP IN THE EARTH
Well we picked up Harry Truman, floating down from Independence, We said, 'What about the war?' He said, 'Good riddance!' We said, 'What about the bomb? Are you sorry that you did it?' He said, 'Pass me that bottle and mind your own bidness.'
'Downstream'
The Rainmakers
Chapter 1. Anderson Stumbles
1
For want of a nail the kingdom was lost – that's how the catechism goes when you boil it down. In the end, you can boil everything down to something similar – or so Roberta Anderson thought much later on. It's either all an accident … or all fate. Anderson literally stumbled over her destiny in the small town of Haven, Maine, on June 21st, 1988. That stumble was the root of the matter; all the rest was nothing but history.
2
Anderson was out that afternoon with Peter, an aging beagle who was now blind in one eye. Peter had been given to her by Jim Gardener in 1976. Anderson had left college the year before with her degree only two months away to move onto her uncle's place in Haven.