The Dark Tower

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."

Having made it to the ending, after all this time spent with Roland and his ka-tet, I feel confident saying the Journey to the Tower was absolutely worth the read. Looking back at all of it, the ending makes perfect sense. It was the only way this story could ever end.
This last book was a truly fitting last puzzle piece to King's magnum opus. From the moment you pick up this book, you know you'll be in for a rollercoaster of emotions. There were multiple moments where I had to put the book down, I couldn't read the words because my eyes were full of tears. I can't give this book any less than five stars. It absolutely destroyed me, in the best possible way. I show more dreaded reading on at multiple points, knowing what would happen next, knowing it was the only way this story could go.

"If Ka will say so, then let it be so." show less

I love this book. This is an amazing and heart-wrenching and appropriate end to this epic series. This book is the culmination of a huge investment, both for author and reader, and it's a draining one. So much is found, and lost, and gained and lost and it makes me heartsore.

As much as I love this book, I always hit a point on re-reads where I just stall. Not because the book is bad (it's most absolutely definitely assuredly not), but because after taking this journey with these characters I love so much, after being with them for so long, I dread the end... I dread having to put this story back on the shelf when it's over.

This is the kind of book that I love beyond almost all others - books that open up their pages and let me fall show more right in... books that take me with them wherever it is they go, and accept me as part of the gang. This series is the epitome of escapist reading for me. I dream about this series and live in it while I read, and love it for a multitude of reasons that I couldn't even begin to enumerate here.

It's amazing... So just read it already. That's all I'm saying. show less

I’ve spent the last six months with close friends. I’ve never laid eyes on these people but I can see them, see them very well. I know how their minds work, what drives them, what they fear, what they love. I know their strengths and weaknesses like they were my own. Worst, and perhaps best, of all, I already knew their fate, their ka, if it please ya’ to say. I have traveled with them these last six months, sweated with them, fought with them, bled with them, and wept with them. No matter that I knew how their journey would end. No matter that I’d traveled this way with them before. No matter that my heart had already been broken.

While their pace quickened near the goal, mine slowed, hoping to draw out the time, savor each show more second. Perhaps the reduced pace was also an irrational effort to alter their destiny, to allow time for these brave seekers to make different choices, travel different roads. Irrational is the key word there, for once fate has spoken, or the wheels of ka are in motion, if you would say, she is cruel and intransigent. And yet, given the way the quest ends, is it really so irrational to believe that the next time I travel this way things may be different. Commala-come-come.

This was my second time through the entire Dark Tower cycle, though it was at least the fifth time I’ve read some of the earlier books. And, as said before, I took my time – deeply reading every page. I won’t try to ‘review’ this last installment of the tale, named for the center-piece of Roland and his ka-tet’s quest, [The Dark Tower]. Doing so would seem irreverent. But I can say that this latest reading was richer, deeper.

Let me explain, if I can; or should I say argue. Many of Stephen King’s Constant Readers did not care for the last thirteen pages of the tale’s final installment, did not like what they found in the Dark Tower, especially in the top room. In fact, King himself takes two of those final thirteen to warn the reader that they should stop or risk disappointment. But a deeper reading of the whole story, all eight books, reveals many clues to what is in that room and to the final – use that word loosely here – fate of Roland. King’s message is hard to miss as the tale unfolds, however palatable it might be to the reader. I will admit a certain amount of reluctance to accept the ending. But focusing on the preceding seven books with an eye toward that message enriched the experience, made me appreciate Roland’s story a great deal more. I appreciated Roland’s predicament more – his struggle to balance nobility and obsession, love and obligation, constantly searching for redemption. And that’s what makes the idea of resumption so much more palatable, at least for me. Now, traveling with the horn of Eld, Roland’s ka may be different, the trail may be different. I look forward to seeing what may be.

5 bones!!!!!

An All-Time Favorite show less

So. I've been sitting here staring at this screen for about 2 hours after finishing The Dark Tower. It was pretty touch-and-go for a bit.

I couldn't see much through the tears.

But I'm back now. It's not like this is the first time I read the book. I had a book hangover then, also, but I think I'm recovering slightly better than that last time.

I'm afraid I can't say ANYTHING about this book without going into spoiler territory. It's brilliant and it's epic, of course, and it keeps blowing my mind over and over and over again right before it tears out my heart and stamps all over it again and again and again... but by the end, I'm saying to myself,

"Go then, there are other worlds than these..."

I DIED when Eddie and Jake died. When Oy show more sacrificed himself to fight Mordred, I also died. When Susannah left, finally taking the path AWAY FROM Samsara, I died, because all that was left was an artist, Roland, and Oy.

She gave up on him. Of course, there were the dreams and the DT sung to all the Ka-Tet, but still. Roland started his obsession alone and he ended alone, a victim of his own obsession. Or rather, not quite alone. The Crimson King joins him in his obsession. Forever. Time runs backward there, and as we learn later, it repeats.

What really freaks me out is the fact that Roland could have relied on the artist to erase the Crimson King entirely, kill evil forever, and yet Roland instead plucks a rose that serves as AN ENTIRE UNIVERSE, sacrificing it, having his blood mix with it, in order to blind the Crimson King before the great erasure. But it was this great evil of Roland's, along with the painting, that lets the Crimson King endure. Just his eyes, of course, but because he got painted with the Blood of Eld and the sacrifice of an entire universe, Roland ensures that his and the Crimson King's obsession endures forever.

The climb up the tower, his reliving his past, brought him back 34 years to the darkest point of his hopeless obsession, ever and forever coming back to the Dark Tower. Where do I get the 34 years? Roland and Stephen King are the same man. King wrote this Cycle between 1970 and 2004. It was his grand obsession, and he wrote himself, sometimes humorously and often as a victim of his own hubris, right into the Dark Tower in a very meta and awesomely brilliant way.

So. Who is who? Roland? Crimson King? Or Stephen King? They are all victims of their obsession, and their child, either metaphorically or TRULY, is Mordred, the complete body of Stephen King's writing.

Which, if you recall, brings in SO MUCH of the Dark Tower mythos.

So let's look at the deaths of our great antagonists who all serve the beam. Walter dies, is consumed by SK's bibliography. Mordred grapples with Oy, the last member of Roland's Ka-Tet, which, you should remember, is part dog. And SK has made a point of directing us to the reversibility of Dog as God. Roland and SK take a final parting shot at SK's body of work and kills him (it).

The Crimson King, the greatest evil in all universes, across all universes, is left with nothing more than two red eyes that will never die in the hub of all universes. This is SK telling us that as the beams regenerate and the Dark Tower brings magic back into all worlds, the seeds for new evil (And New Stories) will always be waiting in the wings.

And Roland? Well, SK's writing obsession will never end.

And with that, I beg your pardon. That I do.

I needed to say something REAL about this book that affected me soooo damn much. Still affects me. It's one of the most brilliant works I've ever read, together with the rest of the cycle.

Sure, there are some things that aren't all that good, but EVERYTHING SERVES THE BEAM. And the beam, the Dark Tower itself, is GOOD. For all the things I could complain about, the really awesome aspects FAR OUTWEIGH the bad... and so much so that I'm left giddy and lost in tears.

Say what you will, but these books are something truly memorable.

One more thing:

My edition of The Dark Tower has a picture of Roland carrying an uprooted rose at the base of the Dark Tower. This has got to be one of the most fucked up and nasty covers in history. I mean, it looks rather pretty, right? But what we're looking at is Roland SACRIFICING A WHOLE UNIVERSE, just like he let Jake die, in order to GET to the Dark Tower. This is SIN. Roland's sin. Endlessly repeated. He will never learn his lesson. A universe among so many universes is not so great a price, IS IT?

Of course, that universe could have been ours. Or another Keystone Earth. But what does he care? He is deep in the throes of his obsession.

Kind of like being a writer. Pouring your soul into your work and yet you always get shat on, and yet you keep writing. And writing. And writing. You may try to balance what you do against the needs of life, and Roland DID try to change, to love his Ka-Tet, to be a wonderfully rounded human being, but in the end, he chose writing over his friends and his family and Gan. And paid the price.

*shiver* show less

This book, it broke me in places. Of course it did, I knew it would. I was so invested in this story, it's characters, their journey. I didn't want it to end...but, like them, I HAD to reach the tower. The highs and lows of this book were so close in proximity that I found myself having to put the book down to breathe. I read it at a breakneck speed for the most part, but sometimes I found myself closing it to have a good cry (and I don't cry, like at all). The ending...well I was so excited to get there and figure everything out. And now I know, I did not see it coming, and Stephen King is a bit of an asshole. But was it still perfection? It was, and I'd do it all over again. Bravo Mr. King, but also, bite me.

Was it the best book I've ever read? I do not know. Was it the best series I've ever read? I don't know either. But regardless I loved every second of it and couldn't stop reading until I was done. Roland's story was something I HAD to see concluding this year and I don't know why. I am happy that I did. And I recommend the journey for anyone who is even mildly interested in fantasy books. It's a damn good series. It didn't sadly make me a fan of Stephen King, but it did make me a fan of Roland. If KA wills it, I will read something by King again, but for time being I say farewell and thankee sai.

Ugh. This messy, messy seventh book caps off one of the most awe-inspiring and frustrating reading experiences of my life. Too often the chapters are either baffling or straight-up boring. It's either the endless cul-de-sacs of trivial descriptions or, for the love of Gan, the relentless mentions of 19. But then without warning I'd be caught breathless by moments of unforced artistry and think, "Yes, this is what it means to seek the Tower."

** a few spoilers ahead **

I've written this review before, a rather lengthly one. I was in college when Dark Tower 7 came out and I remember hauling that near-1,000 page hardcover to class, tuning out the lecture, and reading while pretending to pay attention. The final push through End World and the show more scarlet fields of Can'-Ka No Rey was one of the most memorable of my life. In spite of an uneven narrative and a somewhat baffling conclusion, I still couldn't hold back the tears of elation and anguish when it was all over. Few other stories have ever moved me in the same way.

In 2006 and again this year (2015) I revisited the entire series. Regretfully, this last book feels less and less inspired each time. There are exceptionally good passages throughout, but the lackluster ones stick out even more. I'm not going to churn out another elongated review for a series I may not return to again for a decade or longer (or ever).

So I'll keep it short. Well, shorter at least.

With the exception of Eddie's death, Roland palavering with Stephen King in 1999, and a few other random moments of odd brilliance, the first part of the book isn't nearly as good as the second. The Ka-tet's victory at Algul Siento was far too easy. And having that be the act that saves the Tower—a series-long tension that's resolved a third of the way through the book, no less—cheapens the reason Roland set out on his journey in the first place.

The second half has plenty wrong with it too, but overall it's an improvement because it's a return to the overland quest that's been MIA since book 3. After a quick stop off at 2 Hammarskjöld Plaza—an interesting visit that seems to raise just as many questions as it answers—Roland and what's left of his gang finally pass the sign announcing their arrival in End World. The anticipation of reaching the Dark Tower is so all-consuming at this point that it's easy to ignore the clunkier parts of the narrative—moments that upon closer inspection make you question if King's motivation for these final several hundred pages wasn't to just finish the darn thing.

And, at last, we reach the Tower. The Crimson King is a ridiculous adversary with his bag of Harry Potter sneeches so nevermind him. Roland's final march towards the Dark Tower while shouting all the names of his lost friends is still as powerful as ever in spite of all the literary distractions that came before it. I look forward to seeing this scene play out on the big screen one day.

What follows next, mere pages after Roland's triumph in the fields of Can'-Ka No Rey, is the worst offense of the entire Tower septology. I'm not talking about the weird happy ending in Central Park, nor about what Roland finds at the room at the very top. I'm talking about where Stephen King re-inserts himself in the story one last time to EFFIN' REPROACH HIS OWN FANS for caring about Roland's final fate. WTF? Tell us how you really feel? Was King trying for some kind of staged artistic indignancy? Or worse, was he honestly this resentful toward his Constant Readers?

Either way, that was cruel and it broke my heart.

** 2nd time completing The Dark Tower series: Summer 2006
*** 3rd time: April 19th, 2015 show less