Wind Through the Keyhole before Wolves of the Calla? - SK is a faggot but I need to read something on the shitter

[Internet War Criminal]

Yeah the question is pretty simple. Finally reading the Dark Tower now that I'm out of the joint that I have time for read for myself, and I'm about to finish Wizard and Glass. For the record, by far the best one in the series so far.

Next step is, what the fuck do I do next. Do I get WTTKH which is chronologically the next book but apparently more or less a stand alone, or should I go through the whole series and then read WTTKH afterwards.

I have no idea what WTTKH is about for the record, or what happens in WOTC or the rest of the Towers series so don't be a cunt and use spoiler tags and shit.

 

[dirtydeanna96]

Don't read wind through the keyhole.

But you should read insomnia and hearts in Atlantis somewhere on your journey up the tower

 

[Just A Butt]

Wizard and Glass.

best one. just stop there. you'll be happier.

eta: do read the two mentioned above. very good books.

 

[Knight of the Rose]

Yeah the question is pretty simple. Finally reading the Dark Tower now that I'm out of the joint that I have time for read for myself, and I'm about to finish Wizard and Glass. For the record, by far the best one in the series so far.

Next step is, what the fuck do I do next. Do I get WTTKH which is chronologically the next book but apparently more or less a stand alone, or should I go through the whole series and then read WTTKH afterwards.

I have no idea what WTTKH is about for the record, or what happens in WOTC or the rest of the Towers series so don't be a cunt and use spoiler tags and shit.

Read Wolves of the Calla, it's not that much of a stand alone from what I remember. Hell you could argue that Wizard and Glass is almost a stand alone. Not much overall story progression takes place outside of ya know WELCOME TO OZ BITCH and all that.

 

[Internet War Criminal]

But you should read insomnia and hearts in Atlantis somewhere on your journey up the tower

Is it because they are related, or just good books overall?

Also I'll be disappointed if Wind is shit, because honestly Wizard & Glass is fucking fantastic and I wish he'd just write about that world instead of whatever is coming up I'm at the part where Susan

Spoiler

might be getting Wicker Man'ed but I don't know yet

towards the end.

 

[Just A Butt]

Is it because they are related, or just good books overall?

They are related to the upcoming books, but are also very good on their own.

Might also want to throw in Salem's Lot if you haven't already. For the same reasons.

 

[Exorbital Columnations]

Don't read the last one.

 

[Knight of the Rose]

Don't read the last one.

Read the last one, read both endings. Then make up your own better Head Cannon ending, and that's the real one.

 

[Autumnal Equinox]

Wind Through the Keyhole feels like an afterthought to the series. You can skip it and go straight to Wolves of the Calla and save it for the end. Agreed it might be best to familiarize yourself with Salem’s Lot, Insomnia and Hearts in Atlantis however, those three tie into the Dark Tower mythos

 

[Dom Cruise]

Read the series in order, then read wind through the keyhole, wind through the keyhole is mostly it's own story not directly related to the main story of Dark Tower, just set in that same world.

Be prepared for a dip in quality although the final 3 books aren't THAT bad, they're just not as good as the first 4, but still worth reading.

Wind through the keyhole works best as a bonus, I liked it a lot but I often forget King wrote an 8th Dark Tower book, I wonder if he plans on revisiting it again?

I really wish the series had maintained a more consistent quality as he was really getting somewhere special with the first 4 novels, I get the impression he wanted the series to span his whole lifetime with the final Dark Tower book being his final novel period, but then he got cold feet and rushed them all out.

It's not too late for him to try again though, I mean they even teased the "Horn of Eld" thing in the failed movie, implying King has something in mind.

Wind Through the Keyhole feels like an afterthought to the series. You can skip it and go straight to Wolves of the Calla and save it for the end. Agreed it might be best to familiarize yourself with Salem’s Lot, Insomnia and Hearts in Atlantis however, those three tie into the Dark Tower mythos

Of those 3 I would say Insomnia is the most important one to read before finishing the series, Insomnia is in general a really underrated one, I don't know why people don't talk about it more.

 

[Meat Target]

The Waste Lands is the apex of the series. Blaine is a pain, and that is the truth.

 

[Internet War Criminal]

I guess I'll have to read Insomnia and Heart in Atlantis first then

The Waste Lands is the apex of the series. Blaine is a pain, and that is the truth.

Nah to me the Young Roland stuff was him at this best, I actually didn't see where he was going with most of the story, nice twists and all.

I really wish he'd just write a bunch of books about Gilead and Young Roland or his father or whatever. Just go full GRRM in terms of writing tons of extra material that doesn't touch the main story

 

[dirtydeanna96]

Wizard & Glass is fucking fantastic and I wish he'd just write about that world

Have you not read "The Stand"?
the ka tet visit post superflu Stand world

 

[Internet War Criminal]

Have you not read "The Stand"?
the ka tet visit post superflu Stand world

1) from what I understand, not the actual Stand world but a different one where something similar happened
2) I'm talking about Gilead and shit

 

[Knight of the Rose]

1) from what I understand, not the actual Stand world but a different one where something similar happened
2) I'm talking about Gilead and shit

I very much Agree that Gilead and its history should be further explored.

 

[Kosher Dill]

I very much Agree that Gilead and its history should be further explored.

They did explore it in some of the side material like comics - including the story of Arthur Eld himself - and it was absolutely terrible.

 

[Internet War Criminal]

Yeah I ain't gonna read fucking comics, there's just literally hundreds of years of Roland as a gunslinger that could be explored, or his father, or the civil war with Farson, etc etc

There's a fuckton that could be explored that doesn't need to have anything to do with Maerlyn or Arthur or any of that shit, just the stuff he fleshed out in the first place. It's a fucking Western with some horror/fantasy elements in it it ain't hard.

 

[TaimuRadiu]

Spoiler

They don't talk about Oz ever again.

WTTK is actually... ok. It's good for a gaiden.

 

[Kosher Dill]

Yeah I ain't gonna read fucking comics, there's just literally hundreds of years of Roland as a gunslinger that could be explored, or his father, or the civil war with Farson, etc etc

Yeah, they did some Farson/fall of Gilead material too - also lousy. Longtime King assistant Robin Furth seems to have been the main driver behind a lot of this "Dark Tower Expanded Universe" stuff - I'm not sure if she and Stephen King are truly of one mind when it comes to the series, but I don't really have any confidence in future attempts to flesh out the setting.
A big issue for me is how over-the-top the proposed new material was. Roland's childhood was portrayed as way more high-tech than the books suggested - in the books Gilead was special for having electric light at all, in the new material he grew up in a shiny castle full of still-working defensive tech from the Old Ones, and the only reason Gilead was able to fall was sabotage from within. And while magic has always been a part of "Dark Tower", the proposed backstory for the setting goes all in on faeries and fairyland, and makes everyone and everything tie in indirectly to the primordial conflict between faeries and humans. Lame.

 

[Internet War Criminal]

Yeah, they did some Farson/fall of Gilead material too - also lousy. Longtime King assistant Robin Furth seems to have been the main driver behind a lot of this "Dark Tower Expanded Universe" stuff - I'm not sure if she and Stephen King are truly of one mind when it comes to the series, but I don't really have any confidence in future attempts to flesh out the setting.
A big issue for me is how over-the-top the proposed new material was. Roland's childhood was portrayed as way more high-tech than the books suggested - in the books Gilead was special for having electric light at all, in the new material he grew up in a shiny castle full of still-working defensive tech from the Old Ones, and the only reason Gilead was able to fall was sabotage from within. And while magic has always been a part of "Dark Tower", the proposed backstory for the setting goes all in on faeries and fairyland, and makes everyone and everything tie in indirectly to the primordial conflict between faeries and humans. Lame.

Well that's fucking depressing.

The whole thing that made Gilead and shit feel special was the fact that it was all olden time western shit with the occasional out-of-sync relic that still kinda worked, but the world had started to move on a long time before Roland was born and it was just getting worse.

The whole point of the central conflict in WAG is

Spoiler

the fact that if Farson is able to get some gas and refine it he might get *some* old people machines that will allow him to mow down people, even machine guns are seen as weird and unfamiliar and only something they learned about but never really toyed with and all the other types of guns are so old you're more likely to blow your face off than kill someone else.

Making Gilead all techy goes against every single description up to this point

Also fairies and humans? What the fuck is that shit, True Blood?