The Drawing of the Three: Amazon.ca: Stephen King: Books

Product Description

From Publishers Weekly

Elaborating at great length on Robert Browning's cryptic narrative poem "Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came," the second volume of King's post-Armageddon epic fantasy presents the equally enigmatic quest of Roland, the world's last gunslinger, who moves through an apocalyptic wasteland toward the Dark Tower, "the linchpin that holds all of existence together." Although these minor but revealing books (which King began while still in college) are full of such adolescent portentousness, this is livelier than the first. Roland enters three lives in the alternate world of New York City: junkie and drug runner Eddie Dean, schizophrenic heiress Odetta Holmes and serial murder Jack Mort. If King tells us too little about Roland, he gives us too much about these misfits who are variously healed or punished exactly as expected. Typically, King is much better at the minutiae and sensations of a specific physical world, and several such bravura sequences (from an attack by mutant lobsters to a gun store robbery) are standouts amid the characteristic headlong storytelling. BOMC alternate.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

King is a master at creating living, breathing, believable characters. -- Baltimore Sun

This quest is one of King's best...communicates on a genuine, human level...but rich in symbolism and allegory. -- Columbus Dispatch

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Inside This Book (Learn More)

First Sentence
Three. This is the number of your fate. Read the first page

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Concordance

Browse Sample Pages
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Back Cover

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Customer Reviews

122 Reviews

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4.5 out of 5 stars (122 customer reviews)

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5.0 out of 5 stars My 100-word book review, April 30 2007

By

A. J. Cull (London, UK) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Drawing of the Three: (The Dark Tower #2) (Paperback)

The Drawing of the Three is the second, and possibly the best, of the Dark Tower novels. On a desolate beach in the middle of nowhere, Roland of Gilead must start to gather his ka-tet, his group of close companions; however, he is hampered by injuries caused by the horrible denizens of that beach. Stephen King juggles the complexities of inter-dimensional travel between Mid-World and 20th century New York with exuberant ease and verve, making this a terrific, edgy rollercoaster ride of a novel, sometimes exhilarating, mostly gruelling, that tests the last gunslinger's resources to their very limits. Highly recommended.

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3.0 out of 5 stars Regarding the audiobook version, May 12 2005

By

J. James "ic0n0klast" (Toronto, ON) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)

This review is from: Dark Tower #2 Drawing Of The Three Unabridged Compact Disc (Audio CD)

The story is okay. It's compelling enough that I'll probably go on to read the next one. But what I really wanted to say is that it's hard sometimes to listen to audiobooks without laughing. They're so cheesy. For The Drawing of the Three, they've hired someone who sounds like the Deep Voice Hollywood Movie Trailor Guy. You know, the one who always says "In a world where..." So you know... if you don't mind listening to that deep, very serious voice telling a 13 hour story (and also trying to do a variety of character voices that end up just sounding completely rediculous) then, well, go for it.

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3.0 out of 5 stars Loosely drawn, July 15 2004

By

E. A Solinas "ea_solinas" (MD USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME) (TOP 10 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Drawing Of The Three (Hardcover)

Stephen King's Dark Tower series has become a modern classic, with its gritty imagination and mix of fantasy and horror. "The Drawing of the Three" is an expansive follow-up to "The Gunslinger," but it's a bit slow and too devoted to setting up the main quest of the series.

Roland of Gilead wakes up on a beach, surrounded by carnivorous lobster creatures that manage to bite off fingers and part of his foot. Sick and possibly dying, he stumbles away and collapses. But he still has to find and "draw" two people to assist him in his quest for the Dark Tower. He finds a door that leads him into our world, and inside the head of Eddie Dean, a young junkie/drug smuggler. Eddie reluctantly allows Roland's voice to guide him, as his beloved brother is murdered and his drug deal self-destructs.

As Eddie goes cold turkey, Roland starts to pursue the second person: Odetta Holmes, a beautiful African-American civil-rights activist, who lost her legs when someone pushed her off a train platform. She is also schizophrenic -- she has a second personality, the foul-mouthed, psychotic Detta. Now Roland and Eddie are stuck with a woman who can turn into a malevolent killer at any moment. And now Roland pursues Jack Mort -- and runs into a familiar face from his past.

"The Drawing of the Three" is almost very good, but not quite. Unlike "The Gunslinger," this is pretty obviously a bridge between the first and third books, setting up the scene for the rest of the series. So it's rather awkward at times, as King tries to write a story around his formative characters. In that, he does a pretty good job.

King's writing is not technically very good, but it has an evocative slam-bang quality -- the lobstrosities, the doors, the airplane, the blistering postapocalyptic world that Roland lives in. The descriptions comes alive with vibrant intensity. But he doesn't seem to be at ease with the constant, sprawling flashbacks to Eddie and Odetta/Detta's past lives, which add a weirdly fragmented quality to the book. It's easy to lose track of the action.

Enigmatic gunslinger Roland doesn't get much fleshing out in this book -- it's all about Eddie and Odetta/Detta. King brings their struggles and feelings up in all their beauty and ugliness, showing Eddie's love for the brother who led him astray. Odetta/Detta is particularly interesting: One personality is a cultured, refined heiress, and the other is a murderous, racist psycho.

King stumbles over his fragmented narrative at times, but "Drawing of the Three" is a good follow-up to "The Gunslinger" and sets the stage for the remainder of the Dark Tower series.

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Most recent customer reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Drawing of the Three
This second book in the DT series is much more understandable and enjoyable to read than The Gunslinger. Read more

Published on July 1 2004 by Captain Trips

5.0 out of 5 stars The Second amazing installment in the breathtaking series
In the seond book of the Dark Tower series, we find that Roland is on a beach. I have to admit myself that the prologue was a bit of a drag to read through, and it made lose a... Read more

Published on Jun 22 2004