Yes, I have recently been going through a Stephen King obsession. I blame my dad, who a few months ago wheeled two huge piles (up to my hip!) of SK books out of the attic, put them in my room and told me to get on with it. He recommended books, starting with Needful Things. Some of those recommendations, I actually read. Most of the books though, have been sitting in my room, gathering dust.
Yes, I admit it, I’m ashamed. But the blurbs on those things look so damn UNINTERESTING.
Still, I was drawn to the daunting pile of really thick hard-backs that weighed more each than I probably did as a baby. These were the Dark Towers books. I’d encountered them before, in the spare room when I was about eight. They were on the top shelf of the bookshelf, away from my curious fingers. My dad told me I was too young to read them. I plotted dastardly plans to kidnap those books and read them. He found out and banished them to the attic.
It’s probably just as well. I took the first book, The Gunslinger on holiday with me last year. It was a short book, and I could kind of see where it was going… but it was dull. Still, my dad told me to keep on with them. So I reluctantly picked up the next, The Drawing of the Three.
And HOLY FUCK! It’s BRILLIANT!
Okay, so, as the series goes on, I understand less and less of it. But seriously? King’s managed to make allusions to almost every writer I actually like, from J.K. Rowling to T.S. Eliot and of course, Robert Browning. The way he does it is no short of genius either. And the characters are so flawed that they seem to peel themselves away from the pages. Right, Kking’s still got some pacing issues, but come on! The guy puts himself into his own book and then proceeds to screw around with concepts of reality. It’s like the Matrix, crossed with a Spaghetti Western.
Seriously, pick it up and risk your mind being totally and utterly blown away.
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