Stephen King Fans discussion

The Gunslinger won by one vote! I am really excited about this one... I hope those of you who are King fans who have NOT read this book pick it up! This is your chance to jump on the Dark Tower Journey!

just finished it a couple weeks ago but im on the second

The Dark Tower books are my favorite from SK--enjoy the reads :)

I havn't read any of this series, so i'll be looking forward to giving it ago =]

I finished the series a couple years ago, so am excited to start the journey again!!!

I haven't read the series since 2008... I think it's time for a re-read! I can't wait!

I'm a Dark Tower noob so I'm very excited about this one.

DT is one of my favorite series ever, Felina, along with Harry Potter. :D

I read The Gunslinger about a year ago and didn't really like it, so I'm counting on you folks to help me 'see the light' this time around. No pressure ;p

The Gunslinger is a bit hard to get into on its own, Stacie. The rest of the series is very different from it. I hope you'll give it another chance, and at least try the 2nd book, which is much more Kingish, and exciting. :)

Becky wrote: "The Gunslinger is a bit hard to get into on its own, Stacie. The rest of the series is very different from it. I hope you'll give it another chance, and at least try the 2nd book, which is much mor..."

I have the second and third books and am just trying to build up the interest to dive in. I trust King as a writer, and knowing his tendency towards loooooong buildups I looked at the series as a whole and figured that it might take that long for the hook to set! I don't want to force myself to start the next one though, because I know I won't be giving it a fair chance. I figure that October's discussion will give me the momentum I need to start in on the series again :)

The first time that I read The Gunslinger, I was a bit lost. It pretty much starts in the middle of the story and you are there wondering "What happened?" and "How did I get here?" After my second reading I went right into the 2nd book, and I am so glad I did. You learn so much more in the next book. I strongly recommend a reread of The Gunslinger, though. It's worth it!

Absolutely, Kathy. It makes all the difference. I'm SO excited about this re-read!

I've been meaning to reread the whole series for awhile now and with my reread now of The Stand, I'm all geared up for it! :)

The first time I read The Gunslinger, I thought it was ok, but weird and very un-King-like. It made me hesitate when Drawing of the Three was released (no comments about the age), long enough for the mass market paperback release to come out. I broke down and read it and was blown away.

After subsequent re-reads (2 or 3), I've gone back and decided that The Gunslinger is one of my absolute favorites in the series. The other books were better, but they made Gunslinger better too. Does that make any sense?

Yes, it does. On it's own, The Gunslinger was a bit confusing. It wasn't until I read it a second time that I was ready to move on....and once I did, I could appreciate it so much more. It's kind of hard to look at the books as 7 individual books. It's like 7 parts of a whole. (Now I can ask....does that make sense?)

Yes! They are 7 parts of a whole. That's why I can't really understand stopping in the middle. It's just like stopping in the middle of a single book - you may have read to the end of a chapter, but the story isn't finished.

Thanks, Becky. I was so afraid I wasn't making any sense. lol

I have The Gunslinger and have been putting off reading it because, knowing me, I know I won't be able to stop until I finish the series, maybe continue with The Stand. I guess I better hurry up and finish what I want to read first before October :)

I recently finished the Dark Tower series... I had the Gunslinger for years and years and picked it up a few times to read it and couldn't get into it. It seems to me that I had to "ready" to go on the journey, just like King had to "ready" to finish all the books. Once I got through the first couple of chapters of the Gunslinger, I was hooked. I hope everyone enjoys the read as much as I did!! :) :)

I read the series as the books came out, so it's been a while. But I loved the first one. Very atmospheric; wonderful characters. I've reread The Gunslinger once since then, but it's been a while. Maybe I'll give it another gander for the October discussion.

The rest of the books were Alice-in-Wonderland-ish in their continuation of the story, but I have to agree with the comments that King has become quite enamored of loooong description in his later work, and I guess no one dares edit him these days. But the series is definitely worth reading, especially for King fans.

I love King's descriptions. He brings his books to life for me like no other author ever has.

Oh, I agree -- he's one of my favorite storytellers! I'm just agreeing that he's become a bit let compact with description than he started out -- it sometimes rambles almost like stream-of-consciousness writing! But I'll always be a fan. :)

It's so easy to imagine him sitting there just telling you a story. For me, his books always have such a conversational tone. Love him! :)

I would so love to meet him. Someone I know did, and said he's just kind of goofy in person -- I love that! It would be fun to see the Rock Bottom Remainders play too!

That would be so cool! :)

I have read the series twice, the second time less than a year ago. But I am still considering reading it again. I have a stack of books by my bed, but this is one of my favorites. And the idea of discussing it with other people at the same time! I am a serious nerd, but this excites me.

Hey all! So we are officially starting The Gunslinger today! I hope you're all ready! I love this series and I cannot wait to re-read it.

Angie and I have also talked, and we've decided that this is a great time to read through the series, so each month we'll be doing a book from the Dark Tower series until they are done.

At the rate of one per month, it's easily doable, and I can't wait to see what everyone has to say about the series.

If you haven't read it, welcome to Mid-world. If you have, welcome back! :D

Remember to mark all spoilers, both book and series!

Thanks!

I'll be jumping in. I never read the series and being a King fan finally might be the time to do this. ;)

I'll be reading. It'll be my fourth time thru The Gunslinger, though only the second time on the revised edition.

I've been reading lots of DT related King this year, so it's good to go back and see how it all fits with the base series.

I can't wait to give this a re-read this month!

To Walk in Mid-World again ...what a superb idea, to have the entire series re-read, one a month. Brilliant!! I say this because, at least for me, once I'm inside these amazing books, it's almost a physical wrench to leave one.

I've read the first two books in the DT series and loved them both. Gunslinger was my 2nd King experience and made me an instant fan.

This is perfect. I had the Gunslinger on my shelf for a couple of years but didn't really get into it. And I'm a slow reader so just looking at the amount of pages I would have to read to get through the whole series was almost intimidating. But then I got the series on audiobook instead and I've been going through it over the past six months, I just started the final book. I've been on my journey so far on my own, but there are so many things worth talking about, that I'm really looking forward to sharing the experience with all of you.

I just finished reading this book for the second time. Thought I love the DT series, I can see how people are turned off by it. SK jumps around in time a lot in this book--flashbacks mainly--and it can be hard to place all the events in some sort of timeline. Still, well worth the time investment. Try the audio book if you've already read it once. It's great!

I read Gunslinger a couple months ago this year. I already bought the next 5 ones; I'm juste waiting for time to read them. I won't be able to continue before December, because of college.

Okay, don't stone me. I didn't love Gunslinger and have the second book but have never bothered to pick it up. I'm willing to do a re-read to see if I get more out of it this time but I basically just felt like I didn't get it. Maybe some of this stuff is cleared up in later books but I just felt lost. Any suggestions?

Joanie wrote: "Okay, don't stone me. I didn't love Gunslinger and have the second book but have never bothered to pick it up. I'm willing to do a re-read to see if I get more out of it this time but I basically..."

Joanie, you are definitely not alone here... I usually tell people that they should start with the second book in the series because The Gunslinger can be hard to get into.

I really enjoy the book, but the flavor of the rest of the series isn't at all like the flavor of The Gunslinger, so don't let that discourage you! It gets much more Kinglike with the second book, and then some. :P

Becky, it's funny that you should say that about "Gunslinger" -- To think that a book I really didn't care for, and found confusing, would be the foundation of Stephen King's magnum opus just blows me away. "The Gunslinger" had me confused almost from the start (although I will say that the opening line still gets my vote for best EVER)

But I had a truly hard time following it. Of course I finished it -- I've never NOT finished any King books!! But I did have to go back and re-read this one after I'd read through the entire series. IMO, the last three books are on a completely separate level. They draw all of the others in the series into a coherent whole and the fact that King wrote them one after the other - (instead of writing other books in between) makes the last three books so very similar in tone and voice.

But, in short, I do agree ... "The Gunslinger" is a hard one to get into. I've always HATED Westerns as a genre, and I was so curious as to why my favorite writer would be interested in a gunslinger...well, let's just say confusion was my first reaction.

I've never really liked Westerns either B, which is why I never was tempted to read these, but after a friend lent them to me, and after reading them, I was converted... at least to King's brand of Western. :P

I really enjoyed The Gunslinger. King adapted a voice completely unique to his other works - he's mostly known for being an "everyman" writer, not that there's anything wrong with that - rather the opposite. Not so with The Gunslinger - it's a Western movie on acid, written in Southern style, hugely reminiscent of Faulkner and McCarthy, of course with King's trademark flair. Was he still doing drugs back then? He must have.
I've read the original version - my paperback is from the eighties - I've yet to read the updated one. However, it's an excellent start to a compelling series. I've already read the second volume and will be reading the third sometime soon.

I first read the Gunslinger over 10 yrs ago, and I was enchanted. I fell in love with the sparse writing style and Roland himself especially. I rushed to read 2, 3 and 4, b/c the rest weren't out yet. I've since re-read the first 4 DT books 3 other times, and 5, 6, and 7 twice each. I've only read the revised Gunslinger once though. I liked it, because it elaborated and corrected some things, but in a way, I didn't like it, because that sparse kind of style was gone, replaced with more flowing writing like SKs later books (which are excellent don't get me wrong). I talked my bf into reading Gunslinger b/c he likes western movies and I was trying to convince him that reading is good lol, and he liked it, but won't read the rest of the series b/c they're "too big". If I can get my copy back from a lady at his work who borrowed it, I'll give it another go.

That drives me absolutely nuts when someone refuses to read a book because it's "too big" -- Needless to say, that's been a problem when trying to convince a friend to try a King book. But it's nothing but an excuse because once one is "in" a book of any kind, the size truly doesn't even enter into the equation - if you're in an author's world, you usually are going to want to stay there.

That is rather ridiculous... it's along the same lines of "I don't have time to read". No, you just don't want to make time to read, or don't care to. Two different things.

I hate when people don't return borrowed books. I have lost quite a few that way. NEVER a King though. There would be hell to pay for that.

I lost my hardback Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows that way loaned it to a friend and haven't seen 'em since. Very sad... and a long time ago I lent my brother a book and when he gave it back, the end of every chapter was illustrated! I coulda killed him.

It only takes one lost book to enforce THAT situation. To this day, my copy of "Nightmares & Dreamscapes" is still with the person I loaned it to-- who moved away about 6 years ago. Never, ever again!

Yeah, I’m irked at my mom right now for borrowing my copy of Different Seasons. That was at least a month ago, and she “hasn’t had time” to start it yet, although she has time for stupid Youtube videos. Mom likes the idea of reading lots more than actually doing it. If I don’t see a bookmark in that book when I visit her at Thanksgiving, I’m taking it back!

Do it, DB - You don't want to join the ranks of those of us with sob stories about missing King books - even if it IS your Mum.

My sister's a Junior High teacher... she tells her students that 'big' books are no different than 'small' books- you read them both one page at a time :)

On topic... I'm re-reading Gunslinger right now but it's like pulling teeth for me :( I just don't identify with Roland... I can't seem to care about him. I voluntarily put the book down to go wash dishes! I hate washing dishes.

Stacie, the first book is the hardest to get into... Once you get to Drawing of the Three, it picks up quite a bit and is much easier to read. :)