Okay, here’s the deal: I’m a Stephen King fan. Have been for years and years. I’ve read just about everything he’s written (at least the major stuff) and have liked most of it, although I prefer his earlier work to his more recent stuff. I enjoy his writing style and buy his books usually the day they come out.
So what’s my problem?
I don’t like The Dark Tower series.
Actually, that’s not quite true, because I never got past the first book. I started to read it a few years ago, looking forward to having a new group of King novels to enjoy and I got bogged down and bored after about 50 pages or so. I never went back. Now I see he’s coming out with the latest book in the series, over 900 pages. I love long books, and really want to like this series.
Hence my request: Can someone please tell me what everybody who raves over these books see in them? I keep hearing that they’re some of his best work and they have a huge fan following–why? Did I just not read far enough? Should I give it another shot? Did I miss something? I’m generally a pretty intelligent person and am decent at picking up nuances, but I got the feeling there was a whole lot going on in that story that was going right over my head.
None of this is meant to be sarcastic, if it comes across that way. I genuinely want to know what their allure is, and if the chance I gave them wasn’t sufficient to get the “feel” for the series.
BTW, I like fantasy stories just fine, so it isn’t just that they’re not standard King horror.
Well, it’s hard to say exactly what’s great about it. I loved the series, personally, and I’m anxious to read the next book.
Let’s see…If you didn’t like Gunslinger but you’re a fan of his weirder, more far-out writing, pick up The Drawing Of The Three. It’s much closer to King’s standard surreal style of writing (and I think they stole the idea for “Being John Malkovich” from this book), so you might like it more.
Part of what I like about it is that I like westerns and fantasy, and this is the first fantasy western I’ve read. I really like the idea of a knighthood of gunslingers, and I like the way I feel like I’m there. King’s writing has always sucked me in, to the point that if I want to, I can forget that there’s real life going on while I read. Also, I think Roland is a very engaging character.
Just as much, I like the way it ties together a huge fraction of King’s work into one connected universe.
Anyway, like I said, the series gets more Stephen-King-y as it goes on, so give it another shot.
The first book is very slow compared to the others, FYI. I rarely re-read it except to brush up when a new one is due out.
There are very interesting characters, the plot is interlocked with several of his other books in an usual way, and there is an epic quest at the heart.
I think I like it so much because I love the characters, and I love their world.
I came back after The Gunslinger to find out how he deals with the loss of Jake. I came back after The Drawing of the Three because I wanted to learn more about Mid-World and I really wanted to find out how Eddie and Sue make it through. I came back after The Wastelands because I needed to know more about Roland and his past. Roland is a fascinating character, and King has carefully constructed him with each novel. He’s a mystery…and honestly, I didn’t like him very much when we first met him. But now I understand why he inspires such undying loyalty in the people who meet him. I’m going to read the next one because now I have to know how the worlds are connected…and why the barriers between the worlds are falling apart.
Plus, I really like books that are in a series. I hate to put a story down and lose that world and those characters forever.
I absolutely agree that The Gunslinger is very different from King’s usual tone and style. The rest of the series is much more in keeping with the King writing that we have come to know and love.
If you are a fan of SK’s characters, The Drawing of the Three and the following books should be enjoyable. Roland assembles a very interesting posse of characters to tag along on his quest for the Dark Tower, and for me, it is the group dynamics that keep me hooked. As with IT and The Stand, by the end of the book, I feel like I know these people.
Unfortunately, if you want to really get in to the series, I think you do in fact have to read all of The Gunslinger for everything to make sense.
You only read 50 pages of the first book and want to know why people like the whole series?
The Dark Tower series sets up mythology that has leaked into just about every other book he’s written, sometimes subtly, sometimes overtly. The series only gets better as it goes on, with the characters becoming intricate, deeply flawed but courageous human beings. Mid-World is a fascinating place, and it’s neat to see how it connects with our own, and other, worlds. Very very cool.
All that said, I started the series with a copy of “The Drawing of the Three” that I picked up at the library, not realizing it was part of a series at the time. That book really put me off (it’s very surreal), until out of a sort of morbid curiosity, I read “The Wastelands”. Then I was hooked. I went back and read “The Gunslinger”, then “Drawing of the Three” again, and on up through “Wizard and Glass”. I think that “The Gunslinger” is the least interesting and involving of them all, though it does lay important groundwork for later events.
What really made the first Gunslinger book for me were the fantastic Michael Whelan illustrations. The story is good, too. Vey unique and interesting. I’ve long since given up of Stephen King, but I might pick up the new Dark Tower book.
Like Miller, I, too, have given up on King. I really like the Dark Tower series. The mix of Old West, Knights of the Round Table, and bizarre sci-fi appeals to me.
Volume 4: Wizard and Glass was OK, but I guess it was important to set up the back story, kinda like SW:EP1:TPM.
My greatest fear is that he’ll screw up when the end comes and whoever is left in Roland’s band of gunslingers makes it to the Tower (assuming, as King has said, they do at all), it will disappoint and I will have wasted years of waiting and reading.
Yep, I agree that The Gunslinger isn’t as engaging as the rest of the series. My favorite so far is The Waste Lands. I didn’t like Wizard and Glass the first time I read it, but I just re-read it, and I liked it a whole lot better the second time through. I am definitely looking forward to the next one.
To the OP–over the years, I have found a few King books that were hard to get into. I must have started The Talisman 3 or 4 times before I got sucked in. But it was worth it. Give The Gunslinger another try.
I got into the Dark Tower through very strange means. When I was in the 7th grade, I read a short story called “Dorp Dead” and it involved a Tower. Then, when I went into Waldon Books, I saw “The Dark Tower” and somehow made a connection DESPITE them being two different stories.
The first line of the story got me, “The Man in Black fled across the desert and the gunslinger followed”. I wanted to know who the Man in Black was and why he was being chased. What is the Tower? Why does the Gunslinger want to get there? Why? Why? Why? Also, I simply found the characters very fascinating.