Short answers, pulled from the story.
The number 1408 adds up to 13, a sum that Stephen King deliberately engineered to trigger deep-seated superstition in his readers. This mathematical coincidence serves as the first weapon in a psychological war waged by the haunted hotel room in New York City.
The story centers on Mike Enslin, a man who makes his living debunking the supernatural as a best-selling author of non-fiction books like Ten Nights in Ten Haunted Houses. Enslin carries a heavy secret because he does not believe in ghosts despite profiting from the fear of others.
Room 1408 has been responsible for 52 deaths during its 68-year morbid history, including at least 12 suicides. The hotel manager Mr. Olin warns Enslin that something in the room causes terrible things to happen to anyone who stays there for more than a brief moment.
The movie adaptation 1408 was released on the 22nd of June 2007 and starred John Cusack as Michael Enslin and Samuel L. Jackson as Mr. Olin. The film earned $20.1 million in its opening weekend and expanded on the story's visual elements like melting walls and shifting patterns.
The story was first published in the audiobook collection Blood and Smoke, released in 1999, and later collected in written form in King's Everything's Eventual in 2002. Stephen King originally wrote the first few pages as part of an appendix for his non-fiction book On Writing, published in 2000.