Critically acclaimed, The Institute (2019) is the 60th entry in Stephen King’s body of more than 100 works. While best known as a horror writer (and one of the most popular writers since the 1970s in general), King dabbles in many genres, including fantasy, mystery, and science fiction—often blurring the boundaries between them. The Institute is more sci-fi thriller than horror, sharing story beats and themes with King’s earlier novels Firestarter and It: It follows 12-year-old Luke Ellis, a psychically gifted boy, as he is abducted by the titular Institute and tries to escape with other imprisoned children.

Stephen King won over 30 awards for his fiction, including the Locus Award for The Institute in 2020. His novels and short stories were adapted into 39 films (with another 16 planned as of 2022) and 13 television series (with another seven planned as of 2022). As of May 2022, a limited television series for The Institute is in the works.

Content Warning: The Institute contains child abuse and references to concentration camps.

This guide is based on the 2019 Scribner Kindle edition.

Plot Summary

Ex-police officer Tim Jamieson is on his way to New York from Sarasota, Florida, when he cashes in his plane ticket and hitchhikes north on a whim. After a series of impulses, he finds himself walking down the main street of DuPray, South Carolina. Passing the sheriff’s station, he sees a flier requesting a “Night Knocker,” a town watchman. Following another impulse, he takes the job—and is suddenly turned to for help by a boy named Luke Ellis.

Twelve-year-old Luke Ellis is a prodigy: He just passed the SAT and plans to attend both MIT and Emerson University in the fall. He also exhibits minor telekinesis. One night, he goes to sleep and awakens in a room that looks like his—but with no window.

Stepping outside, Luke finds himself in a dormitory and sees a girl sitting in the hallway. The girl introduces herself as Kalisha Benson, a telepath. Kalisha tells Luke that he was abducted and brought to the Institute, a mysterious organization that collects children with special abilities. She introduces Luke to their housekeeper, Maureen, and three other psychically gifted children who live in “Front Half”—Nicky, Iris, and George. The children inform Luke of Front Half and Back Half: Front Half is where the children are tested and experimented on until they are moved to Back Half. The children moved to Back Half are never seen by the Front Half residents again.

The Institute staff are sadistic, and their tests, painful and humiliating—with Maureen being the only adult to exhibit sympathy for the children. Luke learns that Maureen is struggling to pay off her estranged husband’s debts before creditors take her house and savings. Using the computer (with limited internet access) in his room, he researches debt relief. By the next day, Luke absorbed enough information to help Maureen. Grateful, she wishes to help Luke escape the Institute.

Two new children arrive: Helen and 10-year-old Avery Dixon, an immature but powerful telepath. Kalisha mothers Avery, while Luke plays the role of older brother. The Front Half children continue to be tested and tortured—one of the experiments causing Luke to develop telepathy, which he hides from the staff. With his friends slowly being taken away to Back Half, Luke becomes increasingly determined to escape. As telepaths, Kalisha and Avery can communicate with Luke via Avery when Kalisha is moved to Back Half. The three learn that the children in Back Half are used as psychic assassins. The attacks leave the children with brain damage and eventual memory loss; they are then moved to “Ward A” to fuel further psychic attacks as living batteries. Kalisha implores Luke to escape and find help.

With Maureen and Avery’s help, Luke concocts an escape plan involving a boat. Maureen gives Luke a flash drive on which she recorded everything she knows about the Institute, including a video of the children in Back Half.

Luke manages to dig a way out under the Institute’s playground fence and eventually finds the boat left behind by Maureen. He floats downriver and boards a freight train at a train station.

Maureen, who is already dying of cancer, commits suicide to avoid interrogation. The Institute director, Mrs. Sigsby, questions Avery—but he refuses to disclose Luke’s location. Mrs. Sigsby sends Avery to Back Half to punish him for helping Luke escape.

Luke falls asleep in a boxcar and is carried south to DuPray, where he leaps from the train right in front of newly hired “Night Knocker” Tim Jamieson. An Institute spy planted in DuPray recognizes Luke and reports his location; Mrs. Sigsby responds by assembling a retrieval team. In Back Half, Luke’s friends collaborate with the children in Ward A.

In DuPray, Tim and the rest of the sheriff’s department watch Maureen’s video via Luke’s flash drive: Maureen confesses that she was a false ally to the children, a spy charged with relaying information to Mrs. Sigsby (which changed with Luke’s act of kindness). The video is enough to convince Tim that Luke is telling the truth.

Together, Luke’s friends and the children in Ward A launch a psychic attack on the Institute, subduing the staff and making their way back to Front Half via a tunnel. They soon find themselves trapped behind a locked door and telepathically reach out to Luke.

While Tim and Sheriff John Ashworth contemplate Luke’s flash drive, Mrs. Sigsby and her retrieval team arrive. A shootout follows in which the Sheriff and most of the deputies are killed, but Tim and some DuPray residents capture Mrs. Sigsby. Luke uses Mrs. Sigsby’s phone to call Security Chief Stackhouse at the Institute and arranges a trade: Luke will hand over the flash drive in exchange for the other Institute children (an attempt at buying time).

The Institute is only one facility of many in the world. Luke’s friends and the other facilities’ children attempt to link up and launch a massive psychic assault. However, the attack requires that Luke stall Stackhouse.

Luke returns to the Institute with Tim, their arrival signaling the Institute children to tear down the facility. Avery and the Ward A residents sacrifice themselves so the rest of Luke’s friends can escape.

Luke, Kalisha, Nicky, George, and Helen return to DuPray with Tim. Institute representative “Mr. Smith” arrives and tells the children that the other Institute facilities were destroyed at the same time as theirs. For the last 70 years, the Institute used people with precognitive powers to identify and kill individuals with the potential to destroy the world within the next 20 years. Mr. Smith claims the Institute saved the world more than 500 times and that without it, humanity will destroy itself.

Luke shares his own research, telling Mr. Smith that precognition is only accurate within a few hours or days at most; the Institute murdered children for nothing.

Mr. Smith appeals to Tim, asserting that saving the world even once is worth the lives of a few thousand children. Tim shocks him by disagreeing, arguing that sane societies don’t sacrifice the young. When Mr. Smith leaves, Tim tells his charges that they aren’t responsible for the world—that they are to live life to the fullest and love each other.

One at a time, the surviving children return to what family they have left, leaving only Luke, whose parents were killed the night of his kidnapping and who now remains with Tim. Kalisha is the last to leave; in her absence, Luke reflects on Avery being the real hero of their story.