Stephen King The Dark Tower (The Dark Tower VII)
Published November 26, 2004
"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed..."
I first began my love/hate relationship with the Dark Tower series just about 20 years ago when I read those words. I was 12 or 13 years old and we were going Disney World in Orlando. Since I had a plane ride in front of me and I was deathly afraid of flying, I decided to read a book. While we were in the airport, I bought The Gunslinger by Stephen King. At the time, it wasn't a subtitle, it was just entitled The Gunslinger. I bought it for two reasons. First, I liked Stephen King and had read several of his books and second, I was into westerns at the time. Any book entitled The Gunslinger HAD to be western-themed. However, since it was Stephen King, it probably had either horrific or sci-fi elements as well. I liked both of these genres as well, so I figured it was a lock.
Boy, was I surprised when I finished it a few hours later. I read it on the plane ride, I read it when we got back to the hotel and I stayed up as late as my parents would let me to finish it. I was hooked. And very, very pissed off. Nobody should write a book and NOT FINISH it. At the time, I was naive enough to believe that. If I only could see twenty years down the line and know that it would take that long to finish the series, I would have given up the pretense of being offended by the cliff-hanging endings in the first two books.
I eagerly anticipated each and every release of the series and yes, I was one of the many who sent letters begging Mr. King to finish the series. Yes, I was one of the ones who bitched, moaned and cursed about the fact that an epic series was only just developing while he was flying through other books, movies and countless other projects. I was also one of the collective masses who nearly had a stroke when Stephen King almost died by the side of that road in 1999. Not particularly, I'll admit, because I had any vested interest in his health and well-being, but because that would leave The Dark Tower series unfinished and a story only just unraveling in the heart and mind of me, that "constant reader" Mr. King so frequently addresses in his forwards and afterwards.
All that having been said, how does one go about reviewing a book twenty-plus years in the making? How do I objectively decide how good the book is when it's been a part of me for more than twenty years? (As a side-note, I do happen to be aware that others have waited longer than that, since the first volume of this series hit the shelves long before I was aware of Stephen King's work.)
- Stephen King The Dark Tower (The Dark Tower VII)
- Published: November 26, 2004
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- Section: Books
- Filed Under: Books: Horror, Books: SF
- Writer: Jim Schwab
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I was so disapointed with Dark Tower VII that a threw every Stephen King book straight into the dumpster. After 20 years of faithfully following this story, He failed to pull it off. He punked out on the ending. The only person he did not kill off was himself. If I was Stephen King, I would sue my doctor, apparently his Doctor forgot to remove Sai King's head from his ass.
Long Days and Pleasent nights
Anthony Johnson
It was the inconsistancy that bothered me. Certain charecters and parts of this story are so engrossing and compelling, they carry you through - lets face it - an unfinished and 2dimensional work-in-whole. The first and fourth books are truly the highlights of the series.
The last three books of the series are so dissapointing, one must wonder if King, like so many aging rock-stars, has either gotten lazy, or else lost his creative knack. Its as if the charecters are resolving the same plot complication (saving innocent simple-folk from the Crimson King's minions) the same way again and again.
There are so many questions left unanswered. All of the bad guys who pop up in these books turn out to be paper-tigers.... King acts as if by pointing out the cheesiness of his Machina Ex Deus technique, we ought to forgive him for using it to resolve nearly every single plot complication he creates. (come on Steve, an eraser?!) In my opinion, these books really turned sour when King wrote himself into them.
I think if he'd done like tolkien, and released the entire series at once, King might have been able to accomplish the editing and rewriting overhaul it would have taken to make the Dark Tower series into one of the great epic pieces in American Literature. Oh Discordia!
So the surprise ending is that there is another book in the series.
Ta da.
BTW - a little (or big) spoiler alert would have been helpful in an otherwise fascinating review.
I'm a few books behind. I think I finished IV.
While I thought there were a few writing snags and lags through the sixth and seventh books, overall I thought Mr. King pulled off a masterful job at a nearly impossible task.
If anyone wants to read an alternative take on Book VII, you can do so here.
I actually just finished the revised first book, after having read Book VII. With the new edition, there is a fascinating connection (and potentially controversial to some purests out there) between the first and seventh books.
I'll check and see if anyone has written about it on blogcritics... if not, I'll likely take it as my own quest.
Eric Berlin
Dumpster Bust: Miracles from Mind Trash
http://dumpsterbust.blogspot.com
(major spoilers). i have a different take on the dt 7. i knew about the series for years but refused to start reading it until i had confirmation on when the last book was coming out. it would have been torture waiting for each successive book. i think alot of the (-) reaction is due to the wait most readers have gone through. after 10-20 years, NO ENDING can possibly be worth the hype. it's bound to be a dissappointment. i read the gunslinger in february, and proceeded through each book until the final came out in september. one thing i didn't like is how susannah was the only survivor (kind of).....however i feel king made this happen due to "constant reader". all the dt predictions i've read in the past always said "susannah is the one that must die....either eddie or jake will be the one to survive". king must read these and feel obligated to come up with a direction no one is thinking of. and don't believe sk totally when he says he always knew how it would turn out....jake dies saving sk from his car accident....that obviously didn't become part of the story until 1999! And the ending....i loved it....i didn't have 20 years of expectations to cloud my judgement. would you rather a kind of happy ending like lord of the rings....where everyone goes home? please! finally, to those who didn't like books 5-6-7......stephen king wrote the final 3 books under the post 9-11 influence (all the words & characters names adding up to 19......remember all those words that added up to 11?), as well as just getting run over and nearly killed by a van! after 9-11, i didn't view the world the same for a good 2 years.....imagine mixing in a near fatal running over to boot? how can that not affect the writing? don't go in to it thinking about all the expectations....just enjoy it for what it is...the best and least predictable series in history (i dont care what anyone else says). long days and pleasant nights........
I can't believe that people are so surprised or disappointed about the ending to the Dark Tower series. When even reading the first book you knew that Roland was not choosing the right path for himself. After reading through the first half of book 5 I knew the ending, the only ending that could be, that he would begin his journey again. It's the only way the book would have made sense. There was too much of a gap in his time in Gilead and his time with Jake, Eddie and Susannah. How many times has Roland been on this journey? Will he find redemption? Those are the questions since time began, and no one has the answers to those questions. Not even Stephen King.
Just finished the seventh book and I too feel bittersweet about the whole thing. I happened to like the ending, ths was not the series where a "happily ever after" ending would've been appropriate. I could've done without Sussanah meeting Jake and Eddie in Central Park, I would've like her ending to be a mystery, it seemed corny to me.
Things I HATED about the series:
1. Stephen King writing himself into the books, I read the explanation, but still to me this was almost jump the shark territory. It nearly ruined the entire series for me.
2. Mordred, for everything that Mordred was supposed to be, he turned out to be little more dangerous to Roland than a Taheen guard or mechanical wolf that raided the Calla. For all the attention he received old Mordred was essentially a pointless character.
3. Susannah having no legs, this just irked me the entire time. Carrying her around, the stupid carts, would it have been that difficult to write the character with some legs? Maybe Jack Mort (I think that's it) raped her, or killed her sister or something instead.
4. Jake was a gunslinger and a complete pussy...
Things I loved:
1. Wizard and Glass, any portion of any book in the series that speaks of Rolands days in Gilead or Mejis. King could write another ten books on that, just a really gripping concept.
2. Roland, by far the best character in an epic series I've ever read about.
3. Tying a lot of books together, believe it or not for awhile there I felt like the only one figuring this mystery out.
4. Action scenes, at times few and far between but when they went down they were great.
Overall I am glad the series is done, but also pissed I have no more books to look forward to. Maybe Steven King will write more on Roland who knows.
Who said 'Oh Discordia'? I can't seem to find it any where
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Awww.....I'm three books behind aready, and I really did like volumes 2,3 & 4. I started wolves, but had to take it back to the library before I got too far into it. So, should I bother with volumes 5,6 & 7?