Continuing my The Dark Tower series read, The Drawing of the Three is even weirder than The Gunslinger! I imagine the conversation when planning this book went something like –
King: I want to write about the gangs of NY and schizophrenics
Tabitha: yeah well you started with a weird horror fantasy western
King: I’ll incorporate interdimensional travel into the story, it’ll be fine
Tabitha: impossible
King: hold my beer
Ha .. ha… Ha… Actually …. KA
Ka?
“Kaka,” Eddie said, and laughed. “Come on Roland. Let’s take a hike”
Alright alright most joking aside, let’s talk a bit about this wonderfully weird book
Bookish Quick Facts:
- Title: The Drawing of the Three
- Series: The Dark Tower #2
- Author: Stephen King
- Publisher & Release: 1987, I read the Signet edition
- Length: 463 pages
- Rate & Recommend: ⭐⭐⭐⭐ yes for those who can stomach the typical King level of vulgarity
Here’s the Synopsis:
While pursuing his quest for the Dark Tower through a world that is a nightmarishly distorted mirror image of our own, Roland, the last gunslinger, encounters three mysterious doorways on the beach. Each one enters into the life of a different person living in contemporary New York.
Here he links forces with the defiant young Eddie Dean and the beautiful, brilliant, and brave Odetta Holmes, in a savage struggle against underworld evil and otherworldly enemies.
Once again, Stephen King has masterfully interwoven dark, evocative fantasy and icy realism.
Ah gosh it’s hard to review these kinds of books because I know I’m not adding anything to the Canon, so I just talk about my experience.
The Gunslinger was weird and wild and this book utterly surpassed it in that regard. Roland has parlayed with the man in black, apparently for 10 years, so this installment picks up afterward on the beach with a pile of bones and the remnants of a tarot reading
I still think King just tossed a bunch of random ass ideas together to create Roland’s ka-tet. Gangs, sure why not. A crazy schizophrenic lady, sure why not. Gotta get a serial killer in there too… and the funny thing is that at the end of the day, it worked
The Odette/Detta character annoyed me senseless, probably because of how accurately King portrayed schizophrenia/multiple personality disorder. Props, props, I just found her to be way too vulgar and had me thinking about excessively vulgar patients I’ve dealt with, and yeah, no thanks. Her back story is great though.
I loved Eddie, and I’m glad he arrived first in the text. He’s like a lost boy with a rough family history and bad decisions. The whole storyline with Balazar and the drugs was pretty entertaining, then you toss in the Eddie & Roland dynamic and you get wonderful madness Roland trying to make sense of NYC was equally amazing, I think King nailed the entire WTF of the experience and created a fully wild novel
Seeing as how Roland had no freaking idea what was going on in the modern world, he took it in incredible stride. Definitely my favorite part was how he kept misinterpreting the words and having to think on his feet
The journey from the terror of the beginning to the camaraderie at the end was a wild one.
What does the lobstrosity say? Well – you should listen to the audio to find out. I listened to a few hours. Frank Muller took over this narration (through Simon & Schuster audio) and the whole thing is about 13 hours if you go that route.
There are lobstrosity tshirts… That’s all
The Dark Tower Series reviews:
OneReadingNurse.com 