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laurieather's review against another edition
3.0
The Susannah/Mia story dragged on too much for me.
And why, oh why, do writers put themselves in their own story. Longtime King fan here, but that took him down a notch or two.
Hopefully the final book in the series will redeem this book for me.
And why, oh why, do writers put themselves in their own story. Longtime King fan here, but that took him down a notch or two.
Hopefully the final book in the series will redeem this book for me.
adenevosirch's review against another edition
5.0
i can’t believe this is thought of as the worst book in the series… i fucking loved it. it was so meta and a book that only stephen king could get away with writing
esidisi's review against another edition
5.0
Wow that was great! I get why it’s not as popular as some of the other books in the series but I was hooked the whole time. The last stretch of the book was so good and the last bit floored me. I’ll be checking my libby app everyday waiting for The Dark Tower.
culuriel's review against another edition
5.0
The epic continues! Our gunslingers are getting the hang of traveling between worlds, but get split up in their pursuit of Susannah as she is drawn into a trap.
madisonh701's review against another edition
5.0
This has been my favorite installment of the series so far. The individual character growth (namely, Jake's) was fun to witness in this one. Now, onto the Tower.
heathergrayyy's review against another edition
3.0
I have mixed feelings about this book. It jumped around a lot more than the others - it was back to the overlap in perspectives that was used in the Waste Lands. Unfortunately, I found the back and forth far more bothersome this time around. It wasn't until three-quarters of the way through the book that it grabbed me and I couldn't put it down. I really thought the ending would be more dramatic, but it looks like he's leaving everything for the final book. I also hated Mia's character completely, but I guess that's the point.
That said, I absolutely loved the little stanzas at the end of each chapter. A fine read.
That said, I absolutely loved the little stanzas at the end of each chapter. A fine read.
batrock's review against another edition
4.0
The go-kart continues its inexorable journey to the end.
Song of Susannah is approximately half the length of both its predecessor and its successor, and it is a focused shot across the boughs of the Crimson King. The other King, our malevolent puppet master, races our friends along their ways in a limited amount of times and spaces. There are set pieces, there's great character work, there are multiple Dogans (get used to that word), and at the end ... only 900-odd pages separate the reader from finding the Tower, breaching it, and climbing to the top.
Song of Susannah is approximately half the length of both its predecessor and its successor, and it is a focused shot across the boughs of the Crimson King. The other King, our malevolent puppet master, races our friends along their ways in a limited amount of times and spaces. There are set pieces, there's great character work, there are multiple Dogans (get used to that word), and at the end ... only 900-odd pages separate the reader from finding the Tower, breaching it, and climbing to the top.
jarrodddd's review against another edition
3.0
[This review mainly covers The Dark Tower V: Wolves of the Calla (four stars) and The Dark Tower VI: Song of Susannah but does touch upon the earlier books. Mind redacted spoilers… and paragraphs ending with questions.]
Goodreads: Describe the book you’re currently reading in three words!
Jarrod: Author inserts himself.
Such is the wrong turn King made when resuming The Dark Tower after a six-year hiatus that nearly killed him. Equal time passed between the earlier third and fourth books—The Waste Lands and Wizard and Glass, respectively—but felt longer to this recent college graduate who lost interest given King’s mid-nineties output. “Try me with your questions, and let the contest begin!” Try me, indeed—has a book ever ended with the word “begin”?
Seeing Wizard and Glass in bookstores at the time, I recalled the afterword from The Waste Lands or The Drawing of the Three (the series’ second, and my favorite) projecting that volume four would be a flashback story. Yeah? This couldn’t be handled in a standalone novella à la 1998’s The Little Sisters of Eluria? You know, Kyle Katarn can’t save the universe by himself. And then Napster? And then Napster! Distractions abounded and the fates of our heroes went unread until… hey, book five’s coming out!
Catching up with an eBay-secured trade paperback from 1997 instead of the rebranded 2003 edition—“I was into these dudes before anyone”—Wizard and Glass neatly resolved Blaine and the overhyped Tick-Tock Man before settling into a (back)story within a story. It’s a good book and I’m glad to have read it—twice now—but I don’t know how necessary it is. We learn more of Roland’s history and are introduced to mechanisms (thinnies, crystal balls, pop culture) that echo later, but the six hundred-plus pages mainly succeed in getting the ka-tet off the train. Would you miss something if you skipped from chapter three to Wolves of the Calla? Of course. But how much?
If Wizard and Glass wasn’t an overt side quest then Wolves of the Calla certainly is. Almost conventional and self-contained—gone are the varied environments and encounters that come with the first three books’ adventures, even recognizing that debut The Gunslinger is a weaving of five individual stories—it exists to formalize “the enemy,” tie in five-star masterpiece ’Salem’s Lot, retcon an unutterable pregnancy… and insert the damn author. Might Father Callahan exist outside of metafiction? Could Star Wars, Harry Potter and Dr. Doom have been referenced without the damn author inserting himself? Does this plot twist torpedo the whole thing? Man, it tries.
On the plus side, Wolves of the Calla has a traditional beginning/ending structure after The Waste Lands (beginning only) and Wizard and Glass (ending, beginning, second ending). Emma Cline weeps. This doesn’t preclude a cliffhanger, for Song of Susannah picks right up in the Calla and spends a lot of time with the title character, who (no matter who’s in charge) hasn’t been interesting since The Drawing of the Three. The inserted-author BS continues and I would have enjoyed that cabin discussion much more were it repurposed as straight nonfiction for the contemporary On Writing—creative inspirations and methods are fascinating but only when heard directly and not through some dramatized… what, sketch?
That’s where the series falters. Momentum is an asset to three thousand pages but ninety percent of Wizard and Glass—dead center within the opus and therefore a strange spot to stall—looks backward, as does the bulk of Callahan’s content in Wolves of the Calla, as does all of King’s in Song of Susannah. Drag. I look forward to rereading the concluding The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower later this year, for that rights the ship if I remember correctly…. Talk about beginnings and endings!
Goodreads: Describe the book you’re currently reading in three words!
Jarrod: Author inserts himself.
Such is the wrong turn King made when resuming The Dark Tower after a six-year hiatus that nearly killed him. Equal time passed between the earlier third and fourth books—The Waste Lands and Wizard and Glass, respectively—but felt longer to this recent college graduate who lost interest given King’s mid-nineties output. “Try me with your questions, and let the contest begin!” Try me, indeed—has a book ever ended with the word “begin”?
Seeing Wizard and Glass in bookstores at the time, I recalled the afterword from The Waste Lands or The Drawing of the Three (the series’ second, and my favorite) projecting that volume four would be a flashback story. Yeah? This couldn’t be handled in a standalone novella à la 1998’s The Little Sisters of Eluria? You know, Kyle Katarn can’t save the universe by himself. And then Napster? And then Napster! Distractions abounded and the fates of our heroes went unread until… hey, book five’s coming out!
Catching up with an eBay-secured trade paperback from 1997 instead of the rebranded 2003 edition—“I was into these dudes before anyone”—Wizard and Glass neatly resolved Blaine and the overhyped Tick-Tock Man before settling into a (back)story within a story. It’s a good book and I’m glad to have read it—twice now—but I don’t know how necessary it is. We learn more of Roland’s history and are introduced to mechanisms (thinnies, crystal balls, pop culture) that echo later, but the six hundred-plus pages mainly succeed in getting the ka-tet off the train. Would you miss something if you skipped from chapter three to Wolves of the Calla? Of course. But how much?
If Wizard and Glass wasn’t an overt side quest then Wolves of the Calla certainly is. Almost conventional and self-contained—gone are the varied environments and encounters that come with the first three books’ adventures, even recognizing that debut The Gunslinger is a weaving of five individual stories—it exists to formalize “the enemy,” tie in five-star masterpiece ’Salem’s Lot, retcon an unutterable pregnancy… and insert the damn author. Might Father Callahan exist outside of metafiction? Could Star Wars, Harry Potter and Dr. Doom have been referenced without the damn author inserting himself? Does this plot twist torpedo the whole thing? Man, it tries.
On the plus side, Wolves of the Calla has a traditional beginning/ending structure after The Waste Lands (beginning only) and Wizard and Glass (ending, beginning, second ending). Emma Cline weeps. This doesn’t preclude a cliffhanger, for Song of Susannah picks right up in the Calla and spends a lot of time with the title character, who (no matter who’s in charge) hasn’t been interesting since The Drawing of the Three. The inserted-author BS continues and I would have enjoyed that cabin discussion much more were it repurposed as straight nonfiction for the contemporary On Writing—creative inspirations and methods are fascinating but only when heard directly and not through some dramatized… what, sketch?
That’s where the series falters. Momentum is an asset to three thousand pages but ninety percent of Wizard and Glass—dead center within the opus and therefore a strange spot to stall—looks backward, as does the bulk of Callahan’s content in Wolves of the Calla, as does all of King’s in Song of Susannah. Drag. I look forward to rereading the concluding The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower later this year, for that rights the ship if I remember correctly…
Spoiler
aside from everyone dyinggbweeks's review against another edition
4.0
There is a lot going on here, though it's not so clear how it all fits into the bigger picture. We still don't even know what Roland wants or expects to do once he reaches the Dark Tower. Yet this was an entertaining book that tells us a lot about the fortitude of the characters.
Of course, the big deal here is King writing himself into the novel, and not in a minor way. The end surprised me, though that was largely because I thought there was more to come. But I was reading the Kindle version, which makes the true length of the novel tricky to know, so it ended a lot quicker than I expected.
As I do with so many King novels, I have to point out how poorly he deals with race. He tries to show how characters perceive each other in a realistic way, but it really falls into stereotype. The Japanese tourists should never have been included.
Of course, the big deal here is King writing himself into the novel, and not in a minor way. The end surprised me, though that was largely because I thought there was more to come. But I was reading the Kindle version, which makes the true length of the novel tricky to know, so it ended a lot quicker than I expected.
As I do with so many King novels, I have to point out how poorly he deals with race. He tries to show how characters perceive each other in a realistic way, but it really falls into stereotype. The Japanese tourists should never have been included.
montysmith's review against another edition
1.0
Pretty bad. 400+ pages, and the only thing that happens is a baby is born. And King making himself a character is, to be as charitable as possible, competely stupid. I think this installment has ruined my appetite for this series.