The Dark Tower: Wizard and Glass v. 4 [Paperback]

Earlier this year, upon hearing that Stephen King had completed the Dark Tower series and that the last 2 books were to be published in 2004, I chose to finally crack up this series. I was immediately enchanted by the truly grandiose landscape that King was painting and thought the first 3 books were excellent, especially #3 The Waste Lands. It is in this third novel that the path to the dark tower finally became clear and oh so much happened in that book to advance the story. The fourth novel Wizard and Glass, although a fine literary achievement, does practically nothing to advance the series.

The story of Wizard and Glass picks up immediately where the third book left off, with Roland and his companions trapped aboard Blaine the monorail, a suicidal train running at a speed of about 800 miles an hour. Blaine, who adores riddles, cuts a deal with the group whereby they must ask him a bunch of riddles and if they happen to stump him on one he'll let them off the train safely. Once safe and sound, the group sit around a campfire and it is here that Roland will tell them the tale he had promised to tell. It is a tale of Roland at the age of fourteen and two of his friends, Cuthbert and Alain, who leave the land of Gilead after being sent west on a mission by Roland's father. They settle into the county of Hambry, where Roland will fall in love with a woman named Susan, and make enemies with almost everyone in town.

I was aware before diving into Wizard and Glass that the majority of the novel was set in Roland's past and welcomed the idea with open arms, wanting to learn more about Roland. The book focused on the wrong things however. I was hoping for things like character development on Roland's parents and on his mother's affair with the wizard Marten that devastated family dynamics. Or of Roland's training as a young gunslinger at the hands of Cort. Cort appears to be such a fascinating character and this would have seemed to be the best opportunity for King to develop him but alas he barely gets a mention. Or how about digging into the roots of Roland's obsession with reaching the dark tower? Nope, not in this book. The 500 pages focus pretty much on events that bear little to do on the quest to the dark tower. Roland falls in love. Great. Him and his companions battle forces of evil in a small town. Great.

To be fair, King does weave an enchanting tale that is fun to read, therefore that's why I still gave this book a high rating despite my frustrations. The town of Hambry is vividly captured, the setting feels magical, the characters really burst to life. The love story between Roland and Susan is heartfelt. I also found Rhea, the witch who lives on top of a cliff, to be an amazing character. Every scene with her was great, and lent some much-needed gloom to a story that otherwise would have had all the gloom of a harlequin romance novel. One problem that bordered me immensely: Roland is narrating the tale to his friends around a campfire. So how does he know all corners of the story? Such as all the things that happened between closed doors in Rhea's lair, or in Susan's home, at the Sherrif's office, all events where he was not present. Around the campfire, Eddie Dean asks him precisely this question, to which Roland replies:"I don't think that's what you really want to know Eddie". A one sentence cop-out for something that just doesn't make any sense. Or maybe Roland knows all these things because he saw them through the crystal ball? It's not explained and I've given up trying to make sense of it.

My final analysis of Wizard and Glass is that although still good, so far this is the weakest entry in the series especially after the absolute high that was "The Waste Lands". Wizard and Glass reads well as a singular tale, but for those looking for advancement towards the dark tower I would actually go so far as to recommend reading only the first 112 pages and the last 60 and skipping everything in the middle. It would be a much better use of time.

This series was doing so well! The first book, I liked a lot. The second (The Drawing of the Three) took some getting used to, but then it all came together in the third (The Waste Lands), and then this dropped.

This book, to which I was looking forward because it would explain more deeply Roland's youth and what society was like before the world moved on, but it was really, really, boring. I skipped to the end, skimming occasionally, and never looked back.

Unless you must have completeness, and say truthfully that you have read the whole series, let this book go.

When I had first picked up the Gunslinger series, it was unlike anything I had ever read before. The descriptions of a post- apocalyptic future rang horribly true and real for me, and Roland had the dark appeal of a man with a noble cause doing questionable acts in the hopes that one day it would all be justified by the ends.
The more I read the more I became trapped in the world that King had created, and as a reader Roland's quest became my quest. What was the Dark Tower? What would happen in the final climax? Who would walk away in the after math to start the day anew?
Needless, to say King had me wrapped around his pinky in a manner of speaking.
However, the spell was not to last.
The fourth book came out, and with it came perhaps the one of the greatest insults to story and innovation I have ever witnessed a creator inflict on his own creations.
The DT series went from being a powerful tale that lampooned many of the stereotypes associated with the genre, to one that shamelessly espoused it.
The love interest has always been the bane of almost every form of entertainment be it film or literature. S/he is the anti-thesis of the hero and often makes one either gag or roll their eyes in exasperation at his or her blandness and/or sheer stupidity. Susan here is no different from every other typical damsel in distress we've been forced to swallow since childhood in fairytales. As another reviewer once stated there is nothing particularly beautiful or admirable about her, and we only know that she is pleasing to look at because King tells us so, however other than that she is merely a foil for Roland's own character rather than a real character herself. She isn't smart, she isn't strong willed, she doesn't actively try to refute the machinations of her aunt, nor does she have any real defining qualities but her supposed beauty. The maddening thing about this is that when one reads King's Dolores Claiborne, Rose Madder, and Gerald's Game it is quite clear that he is more than capable of writing interesting and strong females characters and as such one can only assume that he does this on purpose so as not to detract from the main characters.
However, Susan herself isn't the only thing that brings down the whole novel. The very idea that King has written a book about a single flashback into Roland's past that for all intents and purposes has no bearing on the current events is the problem. The concept is inherently flawed, then to devote 400 pages to it plus cliche characters , plus a cheezy love story makes one want to vomit all over the book, and a super sexually charged Roland- that no woman can resist- seems more like an ideal rather than the rugged fanatic he was depicted to be in the previous books... Add all these things together and you have a book that seems more like a Harlequinn Romance rather than a King novel.
The characters of Alain, and Cuthbert are no better than Susan in their cheeziness they are again identified by gimmicks: Cuthbert as the sly risk taker, and Alain as the sweet, innocent boy who would stick up for any of his friends *TM.. and dear god the bit at the end with the ruby cowboy boots was just taking pop culture too far...
The only thing I can think of in an attempt to explain the popularity of such below standard piece of work is the name of Stephen King, like other authors his name has such commercial drive that even if he slapped it on to a turd it would sell..

As I said even after revisting it years later, I find it to be as much an insult to me as a fan, a woman, and reader, as it had been when I picked it up so long ago as it is now, and maybe even more so. I still have difficulty accepting how something so good just went to hell and never came back, and how a creator could be so calloused as to let it happen.
ON a final note:
Please Mr. King go back to Robert Browning's disenfranchised and stoic Childe Roland, literary brother and the heart and soul of Roland of Gilead.