What the Heck happened to Stephen King?! (Dark Tower spoilers, beware)

[DuWayne Steurer]

Long rant coming...

 

Ok, I consider myself well read, in both fiction and non. I know a lot of people disdain anything MAINSTREAM, be it movies, books, comics, art, music, whatever. In a lot of things however, I think when a person is selling more books (or comics, or albums) than anyone else, it's generally because they are better. I understand advertising can and does create a lot of hype around a lot of things, but in the case of one Mr. King, who I'll be ranting about shortly, he has the track record to justify his book sales.

 

Dark Tower. The first four books of this series were simply.....spectacular. Some of his best tale spinning ever. Parts one and four, being the best in my opinion. He had "the accident" where he got run over, and then much later came back to finish the series. Part 5, "The Wolves of Calla", was more or less, a complete, 100% ripoff of Seven Samurai. Not that there hasn't been tons of material taken directly from Kurosawa's work (Being a masterpiece and all), but this book was a pretty down and out blatant ripoff. Part 6, "Song of Sussanah" was the most contrived piece of crap he's ever done. Just an awful book which drags on and on, and worst of all, he injects himself into the story as "Gan" or "God" of the world the gunslinger inhabits. Part 7, the finale, was going ok, up until the halfway point, where once again, he makes himself an integral character in the storyline, kills off the best character of the story during a retelling of his vehicular mishap, and then gets to the climax (which fell utterly flat) 100 pages before the end of the book. It was obvious reading the last 3 books that getting run over fundamentally changed his thought process on writing this story.

 

So quite a bit later, I pick up Cell. Zombie story, been done before, a million times. Plain old boring tripe. I pick up Lisey's Story. 700 pages of a woman on a treasure hunt left by her dead husband to help her find a mystical world where she may be able to find a way to defeat a guy who's threatened to beat her up if she doesn't turn over her dead husbands unpublished material. Or, you know, she could just shoot the guy, or call the police.

 

SO, I pick up "From a Buick 8", A couple weeks back, in which the supernaturally evil Buick protagonist does nothing but sit in a shed. Presumably in a sinister fashion. The good guys know that all they have to do to avoid it's evil powers is to more or less leave it alone, which they do. Now, I understand that the story was more or less about dealing with life as it hits you, appreciating the time we have, and not forgetting the past, and not forgetting what's important, but it seems like that could have been told without a completely ridiculous and non-threatening Buick sitting in the shed out back.

 

I understand that he had a life changing experience that made him totally rethink the very nature of his existence. I understand that his stories have always had a moral, or a message, or an underlying theme about people, our thoughts, our society, our dreams and so on, but the supernatural events were more than just a boring backdrop which did nothing more than distract from the message in the first place.

 

He hinted at retirement after the Dark Tower, and I really wish he would have, instead of pumping out this crap. I think about that episode of the Family Guy, where he's in his publishers office pitching a book, and the publisher says "Ok, what do you have for me Steve?" and King hesitates for a sec, grabs the lamp off the publisher's desk and says "It's a story about a lamp!...........but it's a SCARY lamp!", and the publisher sighs and says "We'll go with it".

 

Am I the only one that thinks he's just going through the motions anymore?

[MarquesJohnson2000]

Hmmm... I have just been catching up on my Dark Tower reading and am about to start reading Wolves of Calla.

 

Now I'm not so sure I should finish the series.

[RobertR]

Dark Tower. The first four books of this series were simply.....spectacular. Some of his best tale spinning ever. Parts one and four, being the best in my opinion. He had "the accident" where he got run over, and then much later came back to finish the series. Part 5, "The Wolves of Calla", was more or less, a complete, 100% ripoff of Seven Samurai. Not that there hasn't been tons of material taken directly from Kurosawa's work (Being a masterpiece and all), but this book was a pretty down and out blatant ripoff. Part 6, "Song of Sussanah" was the most contrived piece of crap he's ever done. Just an awful book which drags on and on, and worst of all, he injects himself into the story as "Gan" or "God" of the world the gunslinger inhabits. Part 7, the finale, was going ok, up until the halfway point, where once again, he makes himself an integral character in the storyline, kills off the best character of the story during a retelling of his vehicular mishap, and then gets to the climax (which fell utterly flat) 100 pages before the end of the book. It was obvious reading the last 3 books that getting run over fundamentally changed his thought process on writing this story.

Not that I disagree with much of this, but he didn't kill off Oy during the vehicular mishap recreation. I'm only half joking when I suggest that Oy is the most fleshed out, emotionally invested character in the series.

 

I'm actually fine with King's conclusion to Roland's quest. Makes sense to me. The fate of Susannah made me genuinely angry though. That was a cop out and a half.

Robert

[DuWayne Steurer]

Not that I disagree with much of this, but he didn't kill off Oy during the vehicular mishap recreation. I'm only half joking when I suggest that Oy is the most fleshed out, emotionally invested character in the series.

 

I'm actually fine with King's conclusion to Roland's quest. Makes sense to me. The fate of Susannah made me genuinely angry though. That was a cop out and a half.

Robert

Robert, I might actually agree with you that Oy was the character that probably had the most emotional attachment, now that I think about it.

 

As far as the conclusion, I can live with it, that's fine, (although an explanation of how he came by Cuthbert's horn would have been nice) but the climax, which should have felt so.........epic, really didn't. Coming to the tower felt like driving 500 miles to go to your 2nd cousin's house. Well, we're here....now what?

 

And you're absolutely right about Susannah. Her "wrap" really cheesed me. I didn't really like her character to begin with, and then he copped out with the way he finished her story. Sorry, Eddie died. You can't go back and make the reader feel better about it because she gets to be with "fake Eddie".

[DuWayne Steurer]

Hmmm... I have just been catching up on my Dark Tower reading and am about to start reading Wolves of Calla.

 

Now I'm not so sure I should finish the series.

 

Sorry about the spoiler, guess I should have mentioned in the thread title. Well anyways, Wolves of Calla is not a bad book, it's just that you have to get past the fact that it's almost an exact retelling of the 7 samurai.

 

[greeg35]

I'm a lifelong King fan. My favorites of his were done in the 90's with Bag of Bones, The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon, and Hearts in Atlantis. His work since then has seemed to be an attempt to get back to his roots instead of pushing forward with the soulful storytelling. I haven't enjoyed that ride.

As far as the Dark Tower series, I thought he actually lost the story after I and II. The Waste Lands was a waste to me. He recaptured something with Wizard and Glass, and then promptly (or not so promptly) lost it again. The end of the story was what it had to be. I think he was just playing out the string.

[logan82]

It almost seems like the back story to The Dark Tower might be more interesting than most of the series itself. I would like to read more about Roland's journeys preDark Tower series. Wizard and Glass type stories. I liked the first 4 books alot. After that they just seemed off. Not bad, just off. Like they could have been interesting, but weren't. I really didn't mind the end.

 

"Death, but not for you gunslinger."

[davego]

Just my 2-cents on King. I loved the Bachman books. The Running Man and The Long Walk were awesome (again, just my opinion). The Stand is hard to top. I haven't' read much since the start of the Dark Tower series, but I'll frequently pick up the 'old stuff' and read a bit. It, those kids feel like the ones I grew up with (minus the clown). Maybe King is a great one that has stayed to long, but when he was great...wow.

[Katuluu]

King started heavily recycling his themes back in the mid 90's, which is about when I got tired of him. It also doesn't help that he has admitted that he has no idea how a book will end when he starts it, which results in pages and pages of filler and an eventual use of deus ex machina to end the book. He'd gotten lazier as a writer before the accident, and that certainly didn't help him any. That all being said, when he's on he writes some outstanding books across multiple genres.

[DuWayne Steurer]

It also doesn't help that he has admitted that he has no idea how a book will end when he starts it,

 

 

Nowhere was that more evident than the Dark Tower series. He had built up the Tower and it's contents to such an extent that just about ANYTHING was going to be a letdown, and to me, it felt like once he got there, he had no idea what to do with it.

[TURBO]

I liked "the Cell" a lot...

 

I've read everything he has ever written, once in a while he throws out a stinker, but I can't wait to grab his new stuff when it comes out.

[danzig6767]

King started heavily recycling his themes back in the mid 90's, which is about when I got tired of him. It also doesn't help that he has admitted that he has no idea how a book will end when he starts it, which results in pages and pages of filler and an eventual use of deus ex machina to end the book. He'd gotten lazier as a writer before the accident, and that certainly didn't help him any. That all being said, when he's on he writes some outstanding books across multiple genres.

 

You pretty much summed up my thoughts to a tee. Been awhile since i picked up a King book and don't really feel any desire to change that. My mother is an avid reader and gives me plenty of her books when she is done with them, but she's not a King fan so i haven't even thought him in awhile.