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55 of 65 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
One 'Constant Reader' to another... NO SPOILERS, February 16, 2006
Technically this book is not low quality enough to merit one star, but if you've been with this series since Day One, and believe as I do that this book carries more with it than just itself as a story, to give it anything more than one star would understate the magnitude of its failure.
All of the problems with book six are extended and compounded here in book seven: the reliance on New York and Maine as settings for an adventure story that's supposed to be grander than any one time or place, the prominence of annoying and unwelcome new characters, King's overuse of unbelievable internal dialogue to cram exposition down our throats, his narcissistic inclusion of himself as an important element, (more on that later) and his lack of focus on any one element worth caring about. The bottom line is this: "The Dark Tower 7" is King at his laziest and least original, which is hard enough to sit through in his lower-quality stand-alone output, but shockingly unforgivable in what is supposed to be the center of all his literary creation (his words, not mine) and his bid for greatness in the eyes of posterity.
Perhaps writing the Dark Tower had become a burden not unlike the Tower quest itself. Unlike his character Roland, however, King jumps ship rather than stick it out. Consider the evidence: the books inexplicably marginalize Roland and the Quest the further they go. By contrast, pointless distractions and King himself (with a profound dislike for the burden of being author) appear and assume importance. Roland is relieved of many of his soul-testing responsibilities (sacrificing his friends, dealing with his foes) by cheap plot devices that cause them to disappear outside of any action of his-- even the Tower itself is made practically irrelevant by a series of contrived events and unimportant characters. Forgive me, but wasn't the great central tragedy of this series that he'd give up anything for the Quest, and has in the past? King spent quite a bit of books one, three, and almost all of four dealing with this-- why throw it out the window in the closing 300 pages?
In "Dark Tower 7" Roland sacrifices nothing-- he is LEFT BEHIND and made irrelevant; this is perhaps symbolic of what has happened to the Series on the whole. The final three books in this series have a lurching, breakneck pace and reach their end with all the subtlety of a dump truck hitting a brick wall. Is it coincidental that they were penned all at once, contrasting with the twenty or so years it took King to write the first four? Consider also the growing preoccupation with the Tower in his other works over the last few years. The overwhelming presence in the first four books was the slow decay of a many layered world, one like and yet unlike our own, with complex characters that were all just a little bit crazy from their own mental decay. In the final three books, this world gives way to the familiar rushing and business-like atmosphere of omnipresent New York. The characters we knew fade and are replaced by cardboard heroes or villains, doing what they have to do to bring the story to an end.
The Quest (and possibly King's concern for his own mortality) probably proved too much to bear and King wanted out. If so, that is his prerogative. I do not feel he owes me any duty to "finish the series right," although I can offer my opinion that it would have been better to leave it unfinished than to drop it off a literary skyscraper like he has. In a self-serving note at the end, King remarks that the problem with Constant Readers is that they never want to acknowledge that sooner or later they'll have to let go-- whether there's real closure or not, and that it's a tragic thing to be insistent on some kind of neatly resolved 'ending.' I would answer that he should have taken some of his own advice: in the rush to close and end this series he's given up its soul. Tragic, indeed, as the once-great "Dark Tower" books deserved better treatment than this. If you are (like I was) an enthusiastic reader of the series and began to smell a rat in places during Book Five, I advise you to stop and leave your impression of the books as intact as it can be. If you've already read book six and enjoyed it without any problems, you might want to continue. For everyone else: it only gets worse.
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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Flagg, Mordred and the Crimson King, Oh my!, April 3, 2005
Roland Deschain is the Ageless Stranger, at least that's what I got from the whole mess that is the last episode of The Dark Tower. Apperently Roland has been doing this for quite a while. Anyway, is that all? S.K. Although I am a very loyal "constant reader" that doesn't necessarily mean I have to be happy with all of your work. For all you DT fans out there who simply LOVE this book just because it came from the mind of S.K. please stop reading this because I know you guys totally disagree. REALLY! Putting yourself into your own book is the cheesiest thing any one can do! Deus ex machina, anyone?
I honestly expected for Roland to dish out some lead at Flagg/Walter instead of being eaten by a damned werespider and I also expected some grand clash between baby Mordred and daddy Roland but did that happen? Of course not because when things start to wind down everything happens so quickly and anti- climactically. I wanted Roland to get to the tower and with Patrick's incredible abilities be able to have the ultimate battle between good and evil! A magically equipped Roland with lightning quick reflexes and lead up against the keeper of the tower, The Crimson King, no matter how senile the old coot was. Geez at least some magic fire balls or lasers coming out of The Crimson King's eyes would have been better than the "sneetch" thing. EEEEEEEEE!! to that! I accepted Eddie dying, heck even poor old Jake, I knew some of these guys would never make it, but I at least wanted Roland to fight The Crimson King! I wanted Roland to climb the tower and see "other worlds than these" to get to the top of the tower and become a god! To set all the things right in all the worlds created by S.K. Instead; Do Not Pass Go, Go Directly To Jail, because that's all Roland has been doing for ages trying to escape the jail that is The Dark Tower.
Anyone interested in reading this book, you're better off writing your own ending.
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33 of 38 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
better had the Tower never been reached..., April 10, 2005
What a let down. The first 4 volumes of this series are worthwhile, gripping, interesting, mysterious, cryptic (although the 4th started showing some signs of weakness). But the last 3 are sorry excuses for Dark Tower books. I think Stephen King was scrambling to finish his series after his nearly-fatal injury, and even he realized that these last books were disappointments. Many artists lose the fire & vigor of their youth, especially those surrounded by mega-riches and mega-adulation, and that is the case with this author & series. A young King bit off more than the old one could chew--and I think he feels some serious regret that he waited so long to finish it that he could no longer do his wonderful series justice.
The last few books of the series have him making these very criticisms about himself. But what is really annoying is the sense one gets that King is projecting some of his frustrations onto his audience (he literally pauses and chastises readers eager to know what happens when Roland comes to the Tower). Well excuse us for caring in the first place, Mr. King! Taking the time to warn people away from writing him or visiting him? I've always been fond of King, for a popular writer, but his tone in the afterword just leaves a bad taste in one's mouth.
I feel like those reviewers praising the last 3 DT books are, in some way, dishonoring the first 4 by not being keen enough readers to notice the obvious differences between the quality of the first half of the series and the last. Sure, the last 3 DT books are a fun, "action-packed" read that will have you turning pages quickly, but c'mon, you could turn to any comic book or "young adult" novel for that, and the first few DT books were MORE than that. I get the sense that the big fans of these last 3 DT books also heap praise on Star Wars novels, Sci-Fi channel TV movies, and other junk-food for the mind that takes no real discernment or taste to appreciate. And hey, that's fine if you're a teenager whose reading tastes aren't yet that sophisticated or nuanced, or just someone stuck at the reading-level of an adolescent, but I feel that the first DT books were really something more than dorky, fan-boy fodder, which is what the series ended up sinking to.
Stop and think about it: King using inventions/ideas from the Harry Potter universe?! Geez, how desperate must he have really been to resort to such cheap corner-cutting?! Even basic rules of writing, such as "Show, don't tell" are violated by King in these last books. His book _On Writing_ clearly shows that he knows a lot about the craft of writing intelligently and telling stories well, so what in the hell happened to his judgement? Not to be disrespectful or crude, but I suspect that getting hit by the van and being put on heavy medication might have really affected his abilities, even to the point of brain-damage. The lure of the mega-bucks these last books would bring probably played a part in bothering with them, as well.
Praise these last Dark Tower books all you want, fan-boys, but don't assume that it means that you appreciate the series as much as those of us who feel seriously let down! It would have been a better end if the series remained incomplete---much more mystery and magic would have been retained, and the series might have gone down as a classic, with everyone left to imagine to themselves, "What was going to happen to Roland? What about the Tower? What did it all mean?" Well folks, now we know (sort of)--and it really isn't worth knowing. By rushing the job & quickly hacking away at these last 3 books, King has unfortunately tainted the original promise that the series once held.
If that damned fool in the van hadn't nearly killed King with his reckless driving, maybe things wouldn't have ended like this...
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