| Title | : | The Drawing of the Three (The Dark Tower, #2) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0451210859 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780451210852 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 463 |
| Publication | : | First published May 1, 1987 |
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.
The Drawing of the Three (The Dark Tower, #2) Reviews
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(B-) 71% | Satisfactory
Notes: It plays tunes of discomfort by pulses and shrieks, sagging for lengths in its middle but picking up pace near the end. -
English (
The Drawing of the Three) / ItalianoThe story resumes exactly where it ended up with
The Gunslinger: on a beach. Roland wakes up after a sleep that maybe lasted years, with the only aim of recruiting the Three, without whom the journey to the Dark Tower cannot continue...I was right to say in my review to the first chapter of the "Dark Tower" that there would be a turning point in subsequent volumes, and that "The Gunslinger" represented a sort of introduction in which nothing was clearly revealed. And in fact, with "The Drawing of the Three", the genius move arrives right on time like a clockwork. Nay, the "eureka" moments, which I don't want to spoiler here, are nunmerous. The scenario changes radically... really radically! Believe me, after just about thirty pages you will have such a boost that you will realize what kind of genius is the author of the book you have in your hands (if you have not yet realized it).
Every time I ask myself the usual question: Stephen... how on earth your writing comes into your head? We are going to see incredible things.
Vote: 8
La storia riprende esattamente da dove si era conclusa con
L'ultimo cavaliere: su una spiaggia. Il pistolero si sveglia dopo un sonno che forse è durato anni con l'unico scopo di reclutare i tre, senza i quali il viaggio verso la Torre Nera non potrà continuare...Avevo ragione a sostenere nella mia recensione al primo capitolo della serie "La Torre Nera" che nei volumi successivi ci sarebbe stata una svolta, che "L'Ultimo cavaliere" rappresentava una sorta di introduzione nella quale nulla veniva rivelato apertamente. E difatti con "La Chiamata dei Tre, puntuale come un orologio svizzero, arriva la genialata. Anzi, i lampi di genio, che non sto qui a spoilerare per non rovinare il gusto al lettore, sono molteplici. L'ambientazione cambia radicalmente... ma radicalmente proprio! Credetemi sulla parola se dico che dopo appena una trentina di pagine subirete una tale botta da far maturare in voi la consapevolezza di che razza di genio sia l'autore del libro che avete per le mani (se ancora non ne eravate consapevoli, s'intende).
E niente, ogni volta finisco per farmi la solita domanda: Stephen... come cavolo ti viene in mente quello che scrivi? Ne vedremo delle belle.
Voto: 8
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The Drawing of Three is a stunning literary accomplishment; even the second time around. Truly reread GOLD!
Earlier:
I know at the beginning of the year I said I wasn't going to reread the same Stephen King books over and over again.
What can I say? I'm a Tower Junkie and I need my fix.
Original:
The Drawing of Three, the second installment of King's Epic Adult Fantasy, The Dark Tower series, blew me away.
From start to finish, I was drawn in with these characters and felt their worlds falling into place around me.
We meet Eddie and Susannah within these pages, who will journey with Roland on his epic quest to reach the Dark Tower with the hopes of being able to save the worlds.
The format of this book, the way the different parts and chapters were organized, the way we are introduced to and learn about the new characters is absolutely brilliant and classic King.
I am very glad that I began this book immediately after finishing The Gunslinger as it literally picks up directly where that book left off.
There are countless fine details in these books, I feel it is almost necessary to read them back-to-back in order to keep track of everything.
As for me, I have already begun the next book in the series, The Waste Lands, and it is proving thus far to be equal in the epic scope of its prose as the first two books.
My journey to the tower continues. Have you started yours?
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Characterizationality at it´s best prepares the stage for entering the masters´ universe.
It has more of stories surrounding the 2 main protagonists, whose paths continually come closer, than a plot driven horror novel, but how we get to meet them shows Kings´ ingenuity. Years have passed since I´ve read it and I can still vividly remember them, feel and fear with them.
Mental illness is both a difficult to describe and to deal with topic and King uses the full potential by switching between different personalities that seem so vivid and different that it creeps the hell out of the reader.
Addiction is another topic King is often referring to due to his experiences and the shivering cold turkey character is one of the closest manifestations of King himself who used to integrate much of his personal life in his novels. He wrote this piece at the height of his multidrug alcohol cocaine prescription drug phase that nearly destroyed his life, health, and marriage and the credible and realistic description of cold turkey and the craving for more was part of his real life. I´ve just quit smoking, but I immediately found myself again in one of the best anti-drug commercials ever.
One of the reasons one doesn´t often read detailed descriptions of this topics is how hard they must to describe, the balance between exaggeration and downplaying, unwanted satire and belittling, or just not generating credibility for the character switches, cravings, and especially the performing of the protagonist fitting to the personal circumstances.
Roland, of course, is , but it´s more the novel of the junkie and the schizophrenic than the one of the revolver man, leaving him in the second row, leaving much room for the presentation of the trinity of the desperate.
The switching between reality and the alternate universe adds dynamic to the setting and prepares for entering the land of messed up, weird fantasy and terrors, and King is playing around with to give the partly eventless exposition more kicks, something he mostly stopped in his later works. These elements of elder literature that strongly influenced him, the use of allegories, mostly vanished due to using more general MacGuffins´ and Chekhovs´ and mostly just characters. That´s not bad, he evolved, but I
sometimes miss this classy old storytelling style that has a more unique touch than the still great, but more disposable newer works.
Lucky you, you are not just still looking forward to meeting some pretty weird fellows, but have the whole Dark Tower series, that is lifting at exactly this moment, before you. But I can reread too, ha! Not as if that would be close to the magic of the first time, especially as I am so selfless and altruistic of remembering much of it to motivate you to read it and lose even more of this feeling that way, a thank you would be really appropriate, but please leave me the illusion.
Tropes show how literature is conceptualized and created and which mixture of elements makes works and genres unique:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph... -
What the hell did I just read?
The Drawing of the Three is as far as I can tell, a unique literary experience.
The second book in King’s The Dark Tower series, published 5 years after
The Gunslinger, this really begins The Dark Tower series. From my limited experience at having ready two of these, and myself more than two years in between, The Gunslinger seems like a prologue, a table setting. Maybe, just maybe, The Gunslinger is to The Dark Tower series as The Hobbit is to The Lord of the Rings. I don’t know yet, I’ve just read through the first two and I’m still processing what I’ve experienced.
Processing what has just been read is an imperative as the book is set down. Stephen King has created a singular narrative, told with alternating perspectives, diverse language structures and rich in metaphor, allegory and symbolism. King’s wildly fantastic world building is in The Drawing of the Three more connected to our world than the largely disconnected and more purely imaginary setting of the first book.
King’s second work then gains definition along with the connection to our world, as a framing device or a boundary that more strictly delineates what is fantastic and what is mundane. And King chooses as his “mundane” a series of grotesques: a junkie, a mentally unstable victim, and a monstrous sociopath, and Roland is the fulcrum about which these levers and torques join the fantastic to the real.
King’s narrative and characterization powers are in full display in The Drawing of the Three. The reader encounters a mature writer seeking to expand his already broad horizons.
I’ll accept King’s invitation to discover The Dark Tower in the world that has moved on.
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2020 review: “What we like to think of ourselves and what we really are rarely have much in common...” ― Stephen King, The Drawing of the Three
After the rather off-key, disjointed but ultimately the warm-up that was the '
The Gunslinger' readers had to wait for years for part two, and boy were they rewarded! King goes full dark fantasy mode with excerpts of very well crafted horror in this, the most insane, exhilarating, ground-breaking walk down a beach ever!
King holds nothing back in regards to Roland's single-mindedness and the devastation that he leaves in his wake; the supporting cast is like nothing you've seen before, all multi-dimensional and highly intriguing from the off. But, it is the story, that drives this and makes it a special book, even on third reading, the twists, the shocks, the reveals were a joy to rediscover. Onwards to the Tower. 10 out of 12. >Five Star Read<
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The Drawing of the Three (The Dark Tower, #2), Stephen King
The Drawing of the Three is a fantasy novel by American writer Stephen King, the second book in The Dark Tower series, published by Grant in 1987.
The book begins less than seven hours after the end of The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger after The Man in Black has described The Gunslinger's fate using tarot cards.
Roland wakes up on a beach, and he is suddenly attacked by a strange, lobster-like creature, which he dubs a "lobstrosity." He kills the creature, but not before losing the index and middle fingers of his right hand and most of his right big toe. His untreated wounds soon become infected.
Feverish and losing strength, Roland continues north along the beach, where he eventually encounters three doors.
Each door opens onto New York City at different periods in time (1987, 1964 and 1977, respectively). As Roland passes through these doors, he brings back the companions who will join him on his quest to the Dark Tower.
The first door (labeled "The Prisoner") brings Eddie Dean, a young heroin addict in the process of smuggling cocaine into New York for the drug lord Enrico Balazar.
Roland brings Eddie back through the door so Eddie can hide the cocaine and get through a customs inspection, but the agents become suspicious and subject him to a lengthy interrogation and surveillance.
Balazar learns of these events and kidnaps Eddie's heavily addicted older brother Henry to force Eddie to deliver the drugs.
At Balazar's bar, Eddie claims he can produce the drugs from the bathroom. Eddie is strip-searched and the bathroom torn apart, and no drugs are found.
Eddie is eventually allowed to enter the bathroom completely naked and accompanied by one of Balazar's henchmen.
In the bathroom, Eddie forcibly drags the henchman into the Gunslinger's world.
During the brief scuffle, the henchman is injured by Roland and then eaten alive by the lobstrosities.
Eddie and Roland re-enter the bathroom and, overhearing that Henry has died from an accidental heroin overdose given by Balazar's men, engage in a lengthy but victorious shootout.
While still mourning the death of his brother, Eddie decides to throw his lot in with Roland.
Before the pair return through the door, they acquire some antibiotics Balazar kept in his bathroom for addicts who have acquired infections from IV needle use.
With Eddie tending to him, Roland slowly recovers from his infection. ...
عنوانهای چاپ شده در ایران: «انتخاب سوم»؛ «انتخاب سه در جادویی»؛ اثر: استیون کینگ؛ تاریخ نخستین خوانش: روز بیست و هفتم ماه سپتامبر سال2012میلادی
عنوان: انتخاب سوم - کتاب دوم از هفتگانه برج تاریک؛ نویسنده: استیون کینگ؛ برگردان: ندا شادنظر؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، افراز، سال1388، در496ص، شابک9789642432059؛ موضوع داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده20م
عنوان: انتخاب سه در جادویی؛ اثر: استیون کینگ؛ برگردان: فرانک محمدی؛ مشخصات نشر تهران، عقیل، 1389، در447ص، شابک9786001630088؛ کتاب دوم از هفتگانه برج تاریک؛
انتخاب سوم، جلد دوم از سری هفتگانه ی داستان «برج تاریک» است؛ جلد نخست مجموعه با عنوانهای: «تفنگدار»، و «هفت تیر کش»؛ ترجمه شده؛ داستانی برگرفته از شعر روایی: «رابرت برانینگ»، «رولند نجیب زاده قدم به برج تاریک نهاد» است؛ در جلد نخست این داستان، «رولند»، آخرین بازمانده ی هفتتیرکشها، در حال سفر و جستجوست، و سرانجام مرد سیاهپوش را مییابد؛ جادوگری که مدتهاست تعقیبش میکند، و خوانشگر هنوز نمیداند او کیست؛ مرد سیاهپوش به شکل مردی به نام «والتر» درآمده است؛ کسی که به دروغ ادعا میکرد، مدتها قبل، پیش از آنکه دنیا تغییر کند، دوست پدر «رولند» بوده است؛ هدف «رولند»، رسیدن به این موجود انساننما نیست، بلکه او میخواهد به «برج تاریک» برسد؛ رسیدن به مرد سیاهپوش، و آگاهی از آنچه او میداند، نخستین گام او، در راه رسیدن به مکان مرموز است؛ «رولند» کیست؟ دنیای او پیش از آنکه تغییر کند، چگونه بوده است؟ برج تاریک چیست، و چرا او به دنبالش است؟ هنوز پاسخی برای این پرسشها نداریم؛ «رولند»، هفتتیرکش و نجیب زاده است، و به خاطر دارد، دنیایش پیش از دگرگونی، «پر از عشق و نور» بوده است، و او میخواهد از دگرگونی دنیایش، جلوگیری شود؛ آخرین دیدار «رولند» و «والتر»، در گورستانی غبارآلود، و پر از استخوانهای پوسیده، رخ میدهد؛ مرد سیاهپوش با کارتهای «تاروت»، آینده ی «رولند» را پیش بینی میکند؛ این کارتها مردی به نام «زندانی»، زنی به نام «بانوی سایه ها»، و تصویر تاریکی را نشان میدهند، که نشاندهنده ی مرگ است (البته مرد سیاهپوش به «رولند» میگوید: «مرگ برای تو نیست.») و این پیشگوییها، موضوع اصلی جلد دوم داستان، و گام دوم «رولند»، در راه رسیدن به برج تاریک است؛
جلد نخست چگونه تمام میشود؟ «رولند» نشسته بر ساحل دریای غربی، غروب آفتاب را تماشا میکند؛ مرد سیاهپوش مرده، و آینده ی هفتتیرکش نامعلوم است؛ ماجرای کتاب: انتخاب سوم، از همان ساحل، کمتر از هفت ساعت بعد آغاز میشود؛
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 26/01/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ 11/09/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی -
When a very close friend lists a book as an ALL-TIME FAVORITE!!...the pressure to love it, and give it a review deserving of its fabulous-ness, is immense...when that very close friend is the gloooooorious Stepheny- the pressure is OFF THE CHARTS!!!! Anyone familiar with her- will know EXACTLY what I mean. ;)
...So here goes nothing *deep breath*...
THE DRAWING OF THE THREE- the second book in The Dark Tower series- takes place seven hours after we last left Roland Deschain in
The Gunslinger. The Man in Black had laid his cards on the table (so to speak)...and trust him or not, Roland is going to follow his lead...
Roland wakes up on the beach, and immediately knows he has a BIG problem! Lobster-like creatures are attacking him...and before he can react to the strangeness of the situation- he has lost two of his fingers and a big toe. Now he has to worry about tending to his wounds before infection sets in. And now he has to worry about dying- before he can follow through with THE DRAWING OF THE THREE...
First Door (1987)- The Prisoner: Eddie Dean- Eddie is a young heroin addict who is traveling by air, attempting to smuggle cocaine into New York for the drug lord Enrico Balazar...but the flight attendants are becoming a little bit suspicious of him, and Roland is going to have to step in to get Eddie out of some veeeeeeery hot water.
Second Door (1964)- The Lady of Shadows: Odetta Holmes- Odetta is a wealthy, wheelchair-bound black woman, missing her legs below the knees- after being pushed in front of a subway train. Odetta is completely unaware that she has an alternate personality "Detta Walker" who is veeeeeeeeeeeery different from the normal, kind, sweet, Odetta- in fact Detta is downright dangerous.
Third Door (1977)- The Pusher: Jack Mort (Mort meaning "death" in French)- Jack is a sociopath...who's relevance becomes clear- as soon as Roland sees what Jack has been up to in his evil little demented life.
Each door- brings a new person into Roland's world..and each person brings a new set of problems Roland must overcome. Let the good times begin!!
For all you GOOD-Readers that were less than over-joyed with The Gunslinger...please please please- just try to get past that hurdle, because what is in store for you in- THE DRAWING OF THE THREE, is sooooooo worth the ride!!!
...And...Thank you! Thank you! Thank you...to
Quick Draw Stepheny- and my other fellow buddy-reading pals-
Calamity Bev,
Jumpin' Jeff, and
Straight Shootin' Susan -for making this journey soooooooo much more fun than it would have ever been alone. -
Unlike the dry
Book One which was following one man in an endless desert;
Here are Three doing so..The More the Merrier indeed.
The Drawing of Three
Oh and it's endless beach this time..with monstrous crabs.. so much fun, trust me :)
لا أنكر أن الفيلم هو سببا رئيسيا لمتابعتي للسلسلة رغم انه كان مبسطا جدا ودون مستوي عمق روايات ستيفين كينج عاما
لكن الفيلم وضح قليلا من فكرة "برج الظلام" المبني عليها أحداث الرواية ، ويعدك بأن السلسلة بها ثغرات تؤدي لعوالم موازية، ازمنة مختلفة، وحوش متنكرة بيننا ، وشيطان كلاسيكي يسعى لدمار العالم
لتعرف المزيد عن الفيلم
بالرغم من أن الجزء الاول من الرواية كان مملا جدا... حيث نتابع رحلة حامل السلاح، رولاند، عبر الصحراء ليلحق بالشيطان...الرجل المتشح بالسواد (والتر) والذي لا نعرف لماذا... وليذهب لبرج الظلام الي لا يعلم أين...ولا لماذا
في اثناء الرحلة يقابل البعض، يقتل الكثيرين بالاخص بسبب الرجل المتشح بالسواد... يقابل فتي تائها في اللاعالم الذي يسير به ليكتشف أنه من عالمنا وأحدهم قام بالتسبب في مصرعه تحت سيارة -بالطبع لنلق اللوم علي الرجل المتشح بالسواد-... ثم يقابل في النهاية الرجل نفسه... اوراق تاروت وقراءة طالع وثلاثة يعده الرجل بمقابلتهم
الجزء الثاني يختلف تماما
يبدأ بعد غفوة حامل السلاح (رولاند)بعد أن قرأ له الرجل المتشح بالسواد الطالع..ليكتشف انه صار هيكلا عظميا..وأنه نام ستة عشر عاما!!!! (ستيفين كينج نفسه بين كتابته ازء الاول والثاني استغرق 16 عاما )، ثم يبدأ رولاند فورا استكمال مسيرته نحو برجه...برج الظلام
ولكنه مقدر له ان يقابل 3 اشخاص... من خلال ثلاث ابواب ستظهر له في هذا الشاطئ اللانهائي
وأن يحذر من السلطعونات الضخمة وأسئلتها العجيبةDad-a-chack? Did-a-chick? Dum-a-chum? Dod-a-chock?
والتي ستتسبب في اصابته
لكن الثلاثة الذين سيقابلهم أكثر خطرا
مدمن هرويين ومهرب كوكايين
امرأة مصابة بانفصام في الشخصية
وشخصية سيكوباتية تقوم بدفع الناس لمقتلها أو جرحها بشكل خطير
ولكن ماذا بعد؟
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ستتوقف الرواية بعد الكثير من الاحداث المثيرة بحق هذه المرة -لا انكر هذا هنا، يبدو أنه فعلا كلما زاد العدد زادت الصحبة، كلما صار الوقت اكثر مرحا - نهاية مفتوحة
مازال رولاند...ومع أثنان اخران هذه المرة في طريقهم ألي يرج الظلام
لم يجيب لنا السيد كينج عن كل الاسئلة هنا مرة اخري
ماهو البرج؟ وإلام يرمز؟
من هو الرجل المتشح بالسواد؟ وما هذا ال��الم الذي تدور به الاحداث وثغراته التي تؤدي إلي عالمنا في ازمنة مختلفة؟
وما معني أن "العالم قد مضي لسبيله"؟ الذي يرددها حامل السلاح علي عالمه المقفر؟ولماذا عالمنا لم يمض لذلك؟
لكنه يعترف في المقدمة وفي كل مرة يتحدث فيها عن سلسلته الاثيرة تلك أن السبع كتب ماهم إلا كتاب واحد..
لذا لنتحمل قليلا
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*الاشارات الدينية والاجتماعية*
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كالعادة السيد كينج يعشق الرمز للدين والرب بشكل لائق
هنا ستبدأ تشعر ان فكرة البرج لها علاقة بالحياة
من خلال رمز رجل عصابات يهوي بناء ابراج من كروت اللعب (الكوتشينة)ورغم انه يحاول ان يجعلها اعلي ما ��ستطيع فانها دوما تهوي
وهو لايبالي
فعلي قوله ؛ أن كل أم لعنت الرب لأن ابنها سقط صريعا في الطريق، وكل أب لعن الرجل الذي تسبب في فصله من عمله ليصير عاطلا، وكل طفل ولد وهو مريضا مرضا مؤلما وتسائل 'لماذا؟'، هذه هي الإجابة. .. حيواتنا بالضبط كتلك الاشياء التي أبنيها "ابراج الكوتشينة"، أحيانا تسقط لسبب.. وأحيانا تسقط بلا سبب علي الاطلاق“You see this ’Cimi? For every mother who ever cursed God for her child dead in the road, for every father who ever cursed the man who sent him away from the factory with no job, for every child who was ever born to pain and asked why, this is the answer. Our lives are like these things I build. Sometimes they fall down for a reason, sometimes they fall down for no reason at all.”
ولكن عندما قام أحدهم بالنفخ في برج كوتشينة بناه متعمدا أسقاطه ، قام رحل العصابات هذا بقتله فورا
فعلي قوله : الانسان له حق أن يبني أشياء..، لكن لله وحده حق ان يهدمها“It’s up to men to build things, paisan. It’s up to God to blow them down. You agree?”
ربما يكون رجل العصابات مخطئا..لكن هناك فكرة ما..رمزا ربما
بل والملهي الليلي الذي يدير منه عملياته يسمي بالبرج المائل
هناك ايضا انتقادات قدمت بشكل ظريف عن المجتمع بالاخص عن عمل الصيدلي والادوية
وهناك اشارات للعنصرية ضد السود..ومصرع كينيدي الذي يشير له انه "حامل سلاح"... يبدو ان محطتي القادمة لستيفين كينج ستكون
22/11/63
كما ان هناك اشارة للساحر..راندل فلاج..تنويعة علي الرجل المتشح بالسواد ..مسيخ دجال عالم ستيفين كينج الاطول
The Stand
والذي كان لي فترة اقامة به لمدة شهر هذا العام
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*النهاية*
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شاهد الفيلم او لا تشاهده
لكن السلسة اكثر تعقيدا..وربما عندما تتضح لك الصورة اكثر ستكون اكثر امتاعا
Actual rating.. 3.5
محمد العربي
من 10 اغسطس 2017
الي 14 اغسطس 2017 -
Mid-World General Emergency Room - 9:19 PM
“Step in here, please. What’s your name?”
“Roland Deschain.”
“And do you have any allergies, Mr. Deschain?”
“No.”
“And when…..wait a second. Roland Deschain? The last gunslinger? The guy who is on a quest to find the Dark Tower?”
“That’s me.”
“Wow. This is an honor. I mean, I see a lot of scum and mutants come through here. Especially since the world has moved on and all that, but to get Roland the gunslinger in here as a patient? That’s just crazy! I can’t wait to tell everyone that I actually met you.”
“Thanks, doctor.”
“You’re looking pretty rough, Roland. I guess this questing gig must be a bitch. So what I can help you with?”
“Well, I got my hand and my foot kind of torn up.”
“Holy man Jesus, Roland! That damn hand is mangled, dude! And your foot isn’t much better. What happened? Did the man in black do this to you? Or were you jumped by demons?”
“Actually, it was a creature that came out of the ocean and attacked me on a beach.”
“Was it like some kind of giant mutant magic alligator? Because you are fucked up, son.”
“No, it was kind of a weird lobster/prawn/scorpion creature.”
“That’s nasty! How big was it? Like the size of a horse? Bigger?”
“No, like a dog.”
“Just dog sized? How big a dog?”
“Uh…I’m not sure. Like a good sized collie, maybe?”
“Well, I’ll bet there was a bunch of them, right? Like a couple of dozen?”
“No. I mean, there’s lots of them on the beach at night, but it was just one that did this.”
“One lobster monster did all this? Why didn’t you just shoot it?”
“My guns and shells got all wet and wouldn’t fire.”
“Oh, that explains it. You must have been like in the ocean fighting off a giant squid thing or sea mutants or pirate demons, right? Then your guns got all wet and when you dragged yourself out of the water, this damn lobster-whatever came up on your blind side, right?”
“Uh, not exactly. I fell asleep on the beach and then the tide came in. That’s when my guns and bullets got soaked. Then when I was trying to wake up and get out of the water, the lobster-whatsis came over and started biting me.”
“Let me get this straight. You’re Roland, the last gunslinger. The baddest mother walking Mid-World. A guy who has slaughtered entire towns and hordes of evil mutants. The man we’re counting on to get to the Dark Tower (whatever the hell it is) and save us all. But you got your ass handed to you by one dog sized creepy crawlie because you fell asleep on a beach and let your guns get wet? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Uh…yes. And I think it poisoned me.”
“Huh. Did it take your milk money, too?”
*********************************************************
After the strange introduction in The Gunslinger, this is where the series really hooked me. Roland has enough answers to get on the path to the Tower as he's reached the ocean, but he's badly injured after being attacked by a psycho lobster. Following what he was told in the last book, Roland manages to travel up the beach and locates literal doors to another world, our world. (Or at least a version pretty close to our world.)
Behind one door is Eddie Dean from the ‘80s, a heroin junkie in big trouble with the cops and the mob. The second one has Odetta Holmes, a rich black woman in the early ‘60s who doesn’t let the loss of her legs prevent her from being involved in the civil rights movement. But Odetta has a pretty big bat in her belfry. The final door unlocks a person with a sinister dark side. The increasingly sick Roland will have to hop between worlds to save the ones he’s been told will be his new companions that he’ll need to reach the Dark Tower.
While the first volume had kind of a dreamy and surreal quality to it, this second book is all tense action with a more grounded vibe thanks to the trips to a world the reader recognizes. What really stands out in this one is that we get another idea of just how committed Roland is to reaching the Tower. Injured, sick and dying, Roland pushes forward on sheer willpower and the extent of his obsession frightens the people he meets.
Even a junkie like Eddie can see that Roland is hooked worse than he is on a different kind of drug:
“There are people who need people to need them. The reason you don’t understand is because you’re not one of those people. You’d use me and toss me away like a paper bag if that’s what it came down to. God fucked you, my friend. You’re just smart enough that it would hurt you to do that, and just hard enough so you’d go ahead and do it anyway. You wouldn’t be able to help yourself. If I was lying on that beach there and screaming for help, you’d walk over me if I was between you and your goddamn Tower.“
Yes, he would, Eddie. -
Imagine this: You are the world’s last gunslinger, on the most obsessive quest one can ever think of, injured and half-dead from blood poisoning — and you see a free-standing door on a deserted lobstrosity-infested beach that seems destined to be your final resting place. The door that seems to lead to nowhere, hinged on empty space. What do you do?
Yeah, I thought so. Of course you go through.‘Well,’ Eddie said, ‘what was behind Door Number One wasn’t so hot, and what was behind Door Number Two was even worse, so now, instead of quitting like sane people, we’re going to go right on ahead and check out Door Number Three. The way things have been going, I think it’s likely to be something like Godzilla or Ghidra the Three-Headed Monster, but I’m an optimist. I’m still hoping for the stainless steel cookware.”
—————
As much as I got a kick out of bleak and feverishly surreal postapocalyptic world of
The Gunslinger, what King does in this book was way more fun. He takes the last gunslinger, the “Tower junkie” Roland of Gilead and throws him into our world, and the collision of Roland and the 20th century works quite lovely.“Here is another one ready to die for you, Roland. What great wrong did you ever do that you should inspire such terrible loyalty in so many?”
Having reached the Man in Black after a sacrifice of a young child in the relentless obsessive pursuit of that legendary Dark Tower, Roland ends up on a desolate beach, short a couple fingers and a toe and full of rapidly spreading infection thanks to a brief but memorable encounter with certain lobstrosities (did I mention how much I love King’s easy play with words and situations, combining horror and ridiculousness?) — and is about to fulfill his quest to draw three from “our world” to continue his madman’s pursuit of the Tower. And so he visits New York in 1987, 1964 and 1977 - mostly through the eyes of a young heroin addict Eddie Dean (about to be in some deep shit smuggling cocaine on the plane), Civil Rights activist Odetta Holmes (who has split personality with very unpleasant alter self - “the snakepit of hate and revulsion”), and Jack Mort (a monster in human form who has deep ties to quite a few parts of this story and a horrifyingly revolting “hobby”) — all while trying to not die from starvation, disease and Detta Walker in his reality.“He had heard of drug stores getting held up for speed, for Bennies, for half a dozen other things (including Mrs. Rathbun's precious Valium), but he thought this might be the first penicillin robbery in history.”
(Keflex is actually not penicillin, Mr. King, but I’ll let it stand.)
To those who expected more of the same feel of
The Gunslinger this can be a bit of a jolt. This is no longer written by a very young King inspired by spaghetti Westerns and being all bleakly literary. This is King as we know and love him. The tone, the language — everything is different thanks to the inclusion of the 20th century perspective and point of view. The bleak seriousness is mostly gone — instead we get King’s snappy wordings, humor, a bit of grotesqueness and overwhelming feeling of reality - strange, yes, but reality nevertheless - that replaces the surreal dreamlike feel of its predecessor.
This is King playing with the world in that instantly recognizable way that is his trademark.
This is the book where the quest for the Dark Tower really begins, the real first chapter following the extended prologue that was
The Gunslinger. And this is the book where Roland of Gilead really comes to life, leaving the enigmatic Clint Eastwood-like detached and cold antihero behind and instead feeling like an actual living person, human at his core.“There are people who need people to need them. The reason you don't understand is because you're not one of those people. You'd use me and then toss me away like a paper bag if that's what it came down to. God fucked you, my friend. You're just smart enough so it would hurt you to do that, and just hard enough so you'd go ahead and do it anyway. You wouldn't be able to help yourself. If I was lying on the beach there and screaming for help, you'd walk over me if I was between you and your goddam Tower. Isn't that pretty close to the truth?”
And the real soul of Dark Tower books as far as I am concerned is introduced. Meet Eddie Dean, a former heroin junkie who, after some toilet humor and deadly naked shootout joins Roland semi-unwillingly on this quest. Eddie, whose chapters at the beginning made me howl in laughter as I am easily entertained, proudly unsophisticated and do not turn my nose up at bathroom humor. Eddie, who is lost and scared and yet brave and loyal, resilient and adaptable, who gives much-needed reality checks and a bit of gallows humor. And that bond he forges with Roland has actually touched me. Eddie and Roland, I love the team you guys make.
The deep annoyance - more than I recalled - came this time from Odetta/Detta. I forgot how terribly annoying both of them were, and how emotionally draining and exhausting Detta’s chapters are — and forever grateful to King for . And yes, the case of insta-love between Eddie and Odetta is a bit of a misstep, as those love declarations come faster than those on “The Bachelor” — but hell, I’ll blame that all-reaching ka for it (or, as Eddie would aptly out it, “kaka”).
And yeah, all that lobstrosities talk is really putting me in the mood for seafood.
4 stars. And now on to my favorite of the series,
The Waste Lands - Shardik and Lud and Blaine the Pain.“If you have given up your heart for the Tower, Roland, you have already lost. A heartless creature is a loveless creature, and a loveless creature is a beast.”
——���—
My review of The Gunslinger:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... -
Another King reread – this time for the third time.
I was excited to get back to The Drawing of the Three as it is my favorite book of the Dark Tower series. I feel like this book came right when King was hitting the sweet spot for both the quest for the tower but as well as his other novels; around this same time he was releasing/working on Skeleton Crew, It, and Misery. Also, this is a reread as part of my working back through the King books in chronological order, so it is interesting to take them in as they were released.
The Drawing of the Three is the perfect combination of fantasy, mysticism, psychological thriller, and horror. It may be the most integrated King ever went with all the genres he has ever explored. I know I am gushing over this like a King fanboy, but it really is that good!
You may be asking yourself – I am a King fan, so should I read this? Well . . . if you read The Gunslinger and want to try more – definitely. And it is a much better book than The Gunslinger so I think you will find yourself much more invested in this one. If you read The Gunslinger and didn’t like it, it might be worth a try since it is a better and more fleshed out book but proceed with caution. If you don’t really have interest in the Dark Tower series or just like King when he is writing in a very specific genre, this may not be the book for you.
I hope you try it and you like it!
[image error] -
***The quest for the DARK TOWER continues***
Beginning mere hours after the events of the
The Gunslinger, Roland Deschain wakes from his bizarre encounter with theMen in BlackMan in Black to find himself on a strange beach. Before he can even get his bearings, he's attacked by
Killer Crabs
While trekking across the massive beach, Roland separately encounters 3 strange doors. Each door is inscribed with a different name matching tarot cards the appeared during Roland's earlier encounter with the Man in Black. The doors appear to be standing in the middle of nowhere with nothing behind them. In fact, they are each a passageway to a New York City very similar to our own.
Roland’s investigation of these doors (each leading to a different year), his introduction to 2 of the 3 members of the group that will journey with him throughout the rest of the series (i.e. his “Ka-tet”) and the events leading up to their joining Roland's gang comprise the balance of this book. I'll stop there as I think that's enough of a plot summary to give a good sense of the book...with one exception. That one exception is that I would be remiss if I did not mention that the shootout between Roland and Eddie on one side and [withheld to avoid spoiler] at [withheld to avoid spoiler] is among the best choreographed gunfights I can remember.
It's sweet, sassy and super and makes the book worth reading all by itself.
THOUGHTS:
I just want to make a few commnets on the importance of this book. As a whole, the Dark Tower is one of the most uniquely enjoyable and imaginative fantasy series I have ever read...probably the most. It's this book in which King’s truly epic vision of the rest of the series begins to form and take shape. I enjoyed the first book but it's easily my least favorite of the series and the one most disconnected from the rest of the tale. The sense of vastness was there only in hints and while I think King did an admirable job revisting "The Gunslinger" to correct some of the glaring inconsistencies between it and the later novels, it is still not up to the rest of the series.
With this story the multiverse begins to open up and the creeping hugeness of the plot begins to bloom. This story is actually my second least favorite of the entire series, but I would still need a slide rule and an abacus to calculate this book’s TOTAL NUMBER OF FUNTASTIC UNITS. It's just that the next installments are so saturated with magical awesome that they can't even be measured by existing technology and can actually cause bouts of hot flashes and tingling in the naughty bits.
Yes, they are that good.
However, it's with this book that the long, wonderful, magical, incredibly fun and wholly original journey of Roland and his Ka-tet is really born. I can not recommend this book or the series more highly and it gets my HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!!
5.0 stars.
P.S. As I mentioned in my review of the previous book, I have listened to all 7 of the Dark Tower installment on audio (the first 4 read by the late Frank Muller and the last 3 read by George Guidall). I believe that anyone who has read the books and not listened to these stories on audio is REALLY MISSING SOMETHING WONDERFUL. I think the quality of the reading truly enhances the enjoyment of the story.
-
"Control the things you can control, maggot. Let everything else take a flying fuck at you and if you must go down, go down with your guns blazing."
The Last Gunslinger, Roland Deschain, faces three mysterious doors which will lead him to different times within our world. From these, he must draw the three who will accompany him on his journey.
So it turns out that my memory of the Dark Tower series is pretty patchy - I have forgotten so many details!! However, I could never forget THAT opening scene. One of the best I’ve ever come across - I was so shocked on my first read and it’s just as impactful on the second go around!
The “drawing” of each of the characters is such a blast. Eddie is pretty likeable from the very beginning, he always brings some much-needed comedic relief to what can be a very heavy series at times. The introduction of Detta/Odetta is freakin’ explosive - she’s a firecracker! Although Detta’s dialogue does make feel quite uncomfortable at times - how I wish Roland had gagged her sooner!
One of my favourite parts of the entire series, and this book in particular, is Roland coming to grips with different things in “our world”. The observations he makes are absolutely hilarious. Like when he wonders why anyone would be addicted to cocaine or other drugs when they could have the more cost-effective and plentiful sugar instead. I’m with you, Sai.
However, one of my very minor complaints is how quickly Eddie falls for Odetta. I’m just not a fan of these romances that seem to bloom out of nowhere - even on my first read I was bit surprised when it materialised. But that’s not to say that I don’t love them as a couple because I do *hearts* they certainly grow on me! So this is really just me being incredibly nit-picky!
From here on out it’s an addictive and exhilarating journey, I’m already itching to pick up The Waste Lands! 5 stars! -
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For the sportsman: minutes from an unlimited supply of fresh jumbo lobster meat. All-you-can-catch-and-eat!! Yummy!!!
Contact Roland at Dad-A-Chuck Realtors. Tell him Odetta/Detta sent you for a freecocaine-filledballoon. -
Without thought, with the simple resolve that had made him the last of them all, the last to continue marching on and on long after Cuthbert and the others had died or given up, committed suicide or treachery or simply recanted the whole idea of the Tower; with the single-minded and incurious resolve that had driven him across the desert and all the years before the desert in the wake of the man in black, the gunslinger stepped through the doorway.
The journey to the Dark Tower continues, and the gunslinger marches on. But the wonderful desert setting is gone, and so is the eerily mysterious man in black.
The Drawing of the Three feels like a spin-off. You realise while reading that the book has a purpose that fits into the overarching story of the series, but it feels like taking a break from the actually interesting part. Roland winds up on a beach in the middle of nowhere, and has to step through a doorway leading into the unknown, to find and recruit three rather unwilling companions for his journey.
I’ve read several reviews and opinions saying that The Gunslinger is a weak start to the series, and that this book takes it up to another level. And I couldn’t disagree more. I thought the first book was way better. Everything about it was much more interesting than this space-filler second volume.
The only thing that actually is better in my eyes, is the writing. Stephen King visibly improved between these two instalments, and some of his passages are a joy to read.
From the dead serious...
The sun was down. Darkness had come.
To the hilarious...
This screaming, writhing thing could not have just undergone inpromptu surgery by subway train half an hour ago.
In the end, this book was not particularly good. It added nothing, and it didn’t make me feel anything. I can't for the life of me understand why anyone would consider this outrageously boring side quest better than the adventures of Roland in the ruins of Midworld, but that's individual opinion for you. I am, however, looking very much forward to reading the next book in the series.
Onward to the Tower!
"We are going to go, Eddie. We are going to fight. We are going to be hurt. And in the end we will stand."
Dark Tower reviews:
#1
The Gunslinger
#2
The Drawing of the Three
#3
The Waste Lands
#4
Wizard and Glass
#5
Wolves of the Calla
#6
Song of Susannah
#7
The Dark Tower -
Time for a re-read. I have forgotten the face of my father! ....O.K., It was Oy and Jake, but dang, it does sound dramatic doesn't it?😁😀
-
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA! OK, the resolution to #3 (and thus #2) was really cool!
This is the second installment of the Dark Tower series and we once again follow a very strange hero. After not being talked to death by Walter at the end of the last book, Roland is trying to find out what the three cards drawn from the Tarot meant. Though why he believes in a Tarot laid out by Walter of all people, I don't really know.
In any case, Roland finds a door, opens it - and finds himself in the body of another person in another world. It's our New York City it the 80s. Actually, I think all three doors opened up to the same reality, just at different points in time (no spoiler, don't worry). The body he co-inhabits is that of a junkie currently delivering one hell of a lot of drugs on an airplane. Imagine a guy like Roland looking out of a plane's window. *lol* Yep, his look at our world was priceless.
After quite the adventure with Italo-American mobsters and taking Eddie (the junkie) to the other world (where the door appeared), he goes back again through a second door and the second prophesized person is - a woman. A black woman from NYC in the 60s. Oh, and she's in a wheelchair and there is another, greater, problem with her.
Eventually, Roland goes through a third door and finds the last person - a murderer and pervert.
So yeah, the choices are ... weird at best. Especially considering that he's trying to creature more/new Gunslingers! But what are you to do when you try to get together a Ka-Tet and destiny throws these into your path?! Right, you work with what you got and boy, did Roland work here - and despite a physical disability too!
Aside from the coming together of the prophesy, I highly enjoyed Roland's romp through different versions of NYC in our reality. Gun shops, pharmacies, planes and airports, police stations, the towering buildings, food ... nearly everything is disorienting to him and his view on anything (even cabs) is hilarious for the reader.
We also got to see a parallel world different from the one in book #1 and the creatures there were very interesting (I always like exploring new worlds and their faunas and floras).
Not too much happens here, really, except for the problems that come with Roland entering the bodies of these three people and the people's lives having events that impact Roland and his quest to assemble his new Ka-Tet. Might sound trivial, but I think it was important as it made us see more of who these people were so as to better understand who they'll become.
Furthermore, while all narrators of King's books have been very good so far, Frank Muller was VERY good with the different accents. His interpretation of the characters was spot-on for me so that made for an additional level of enjoyment.
I also very much enjoyed how King kept me on my toes, kept me guessing right up until the end if all three would survive, if/how they might change, what the Tarot actually said and what it could mean (prophesies have always been fickle beasts at best). Storytelling at its best.
P.S.: Oh! And there was a mention of Dennis and Thomas from my previous book (
The Eyes of the Dragon) so as much as it pains me to say, Paul was (sort of) correct and yes, it did make me smile to recognize the names mentioned in the flashback. -
Roland Deschain, fresh from the events of the Gunslinger, lies exhausted and poisoned on the shores of the ocean. In his delirium, he finds three doorways leading to our world and his new ka-tet. Will Roland survive long enough to bring his new ka-tet?
This is when the Dark Tower really started coming together. The first thing that happens really shocked the crap out of me. Damn lobstrosities! I had no idea what Roland was going to go through when I first opened this one.
The new characters are interesting, as are Roland's relationships with them. Eddie Dean, funnyman and heroin addict, is pretty codependent at first, while Detta/Odetta, a multiple personality in a wheelchair, really causes some havoc. Jack Mort, well... you just better read it.
The action in this one is great. The gunfight in Andolini's is one of my favorite Stephen King scenes of all time. While the Gunslinger got me interested in the Dark Tower, this one grabbed me for the long haul.
Thoughts from the April 2011 reread:
Upon yet another re-reading, it seems really illogical that Roland let himself fall asleep so close to the ocean. The battle between Roland and Eddie and Balazar's goons remains one of my favorite gunfights in the series. Susannah is still my least favorite of the ka-tet.
Thoughts from the April 2014 reread:
The beginning is still shocking. While I was pissed the first time I read it, it goes a long way toward the rest of the katet being necessary additions to the series. While the idea of Roland assaulting the Tower with both hands intact sounds awesome, I don't think it would be as good.
Detta gets my goat every time. While Susannah has some measure of redemption near the end of this book and in future books, I still look at her as the woman who did everything she could to sabotage the trip to the third door.
The gun fight at Balazar's is still great. -
What have I just read? Is this written by the same author that put The Gunslinger on paper? It does not seem so at all. If the name of the main characters hadn’t been Roland, I wouldn’t have known that the two books are from the same series. That’s how different thee 2 books are in writing style. Notwithstanding, I’ve enjoyed both of them just as much.
The Drawing of the Three starts where the previous instalment left us, on the beach. The beginning is abrupt and unexpected with Roland having a 3rd degree meeting with a Lobstrosity, a creature similar with a huge lobster. I could not help myself but feeling quite hungry for some crustacean meat while reading about these monsters. After the encounter, Roland is left with 2 missing fingers in one of his hands and with an aggravating infection. While dragging himself on the beach he encounters a door, who opens in the past/another world and here begins the adventure to build his team in order to tackle the Dark Tower. In total there will be three doors, as you might expect from the title, but the drawing will not be as straight forward as one would hope.
The plot is a lot more coherent, linear and less abstract than in The Gunslinger with a much faster pace, especially in the first part, when we meet Eddie. Obviously, is still contains a vast amount of strangeness and interesting characters.
There was one expect that was a letdown for me. It seems that King let himself fall for one of the most an annoying plot clichés that I can think of, besides love triangles, namely Instalove. I believe in Instalust but love at first sight makes me gag, especially in books where I do not expect this.
All in all, a worthy sequel and I am looking forward to the 3rd one. -
Drawing, in any sense of the word, is more difficult when you are down two fingers. On a desolate beach, three doorways will appear, one by one. Three doorways representing three cards - The Prisoner, The Lady of the Shadows, and The Pusher. All with myriad meanings, some literal, some figurative. All instrumental in Roland's quest for The Dark Tower. Worlds other than this, indeed.
This is probably my fifth reading of The Drawing of the Three. The lobstrosities are just as terrifying. They come from the sea at high tide, giant claws held high, but ready to slice and dice. They remain ravenous, and still have so many plaintive questions. "Did-a-chick?" "Dod-a-chock?" "Dum-a-chum?"
The Tower awaits, what does destiny hold for our wayfarers? -
Hey, I have a booktube channel (youtube for book reviews, etc.), and I include
The Drawing of the Three in my Dark Tower Ranking list here. Please subscribe if I've earned it!
"...There's going to be shooting."
"There is?"
"Yes." The gunslinger looked serenely at Eddie. "Quite a lot of it, I think."
And so begins the coolest, most intense gun fight I've ever read.
Ever since I put down The Stand 300 pages in, I thought I'd never read another Stephen King novel. You could say I was even proud of the fact. Everyone seems to love King and I'm the only one who doesn't. I'm unique... I also don't like Katy Perry.
Well, then he had to go and write The Dark Tower series. The premise sounded way too interesting to pass by. The Gunslinger (
my review) was decent. It was interesting and made me curious, but I still wasn't too impressed. I continued to believe I was a Stephen King Elitist (SKE).
After reading The Drawing of the Three, I can no longer deny it. I'm no longer an SKE. Sorry world, I'm not that cool anymore. I like Stephen King. The Drawing of the Three blew my mind. I still don't like Katy Perry though.
It's been a while since I've been this into a book. I had a hard time not ditching all my classes and just finishing the book. I wanted to spend every waking hour reading and that's a great feeling to have.
***Spoilers (for The Gunslinger only)***
The Drawing of the Three picks up right after The Gunslinger left off. Roland, the gunslinger himself, wakes up on a beach and almost immediately attacked by huge lobster-like creatures, lovingly called "lobstrosities". He loses two fingers and a toe and coupled with the fact that he's running out of food as well, this does not bode well.
Roland becomes very sick, but there's a reason he's the last gunslinger, he's the very definition of one of my favorite words - indefatigable. (Thought I was gonna go with another did you?)
Roland has been given some cryptic information (from the end of The Gunslinger) after finally catching up with "the man in black". He must now find the Prisoner, the Lady of Shadows, and the Pusher.
Luckily, it becomes apparent how this will work when the gunslinger finds a door in the middle of nowhere that also leads to nowhere, at least as far as he can tell without opening it.
***End Spoilers (for The Gunslinger)***
With The Drawing of the Three, we are also slowly given more information into the Gunslinger's mysterious past as he remembers the advice of his trainer. I always love these memories; many of which are filled with these kind of lines:
"Fault always lies in the same place...with him weak enough to lay blame."
I'm looking forward to finding out more about the Gunslinger's mysterious past.
As a final note, let me just say, Eddie Dean is awesome, Detta and Odetta are crazy/insane, and Jack, well, not much to say except read it. I will say no more.
Why Read The Drawing of the Three?
If you were a little dissatisfied with The Gunslinger, don't give up on The Dark Tower series yet. The Drawing of the Three takes everything up a notch (or 10). I couldn't have stopped reading even if I wanted to. It is an amazingly well-plotted, well-paced, and incredible book...and I no longer claim SKE status.
4.5 out of 5 Stars
Just remember:
"Fault always lies in the same place...with him weak enough to lay blame." -
“Did-a-chick? Dum-a-chum? Dad-a-cham? Ded-a-check?”
This bit of nonsense is likely to send shivers down the spine of Dark Tower fans, it is one of the most memorable scenes in the entire series which spans seven books (originally). The bizarre “questions” are constantly asked by the “lobstrosity” creatures even while they are munching on people.
The above picture—lifted from the graphic novel edition—is not quite to scale as the lobstrosity is described in The Drawing of the Three as “four feet long and a foot high”, but the creepiness is about right!
The Drawing of the Three is volume two of Stephen King’s epic Dark Tower series. If my memory serves me correctly it is my favorite book of the series. This book is all about Roland Deschain recruiting three characters from our world to help him in his quest for the Dark Tower. As foretold by The Man in Black in the previous book these three are represented on Tarot cards as The Prisoner, The Lady of Shadows, and Death. Roland is to go through three doors which are portals into our world at different times.
The first of the three doors
The first person to be drawn to our world is “The Prisoner” Eddie Dean. Eddie is not imprisoned anywhere, but he is a heroin addict. The “drawing” of Eddie Dean involves drug smuggling, gangsters, a shootout au naturel, and more lobstrosities; never a dull moment.
Odetta / Detta by
LadyFiszi.
The second “drawing” is of a black lady called Odetta Holmes who suffers fromdissociative identity disorderschizophrenia with multiple personalities (see Stephanie's message 10 in the comments section) and has an evil secondary personality called Detta Walker who takes control of her body from time to time (usually when it is the most inexpedient for our heroes). Odetta is kindly and soft-spoken, while Detta is evil, cunning, and deadly, she talks like “a cartoon black woman, Butterfly McQueen gone Loony Tunes”. Even though she is missing legs below her knees Detta is very capable of killing both Roland and Eddie who she charmingly calls “honky mahfahs”.
The last drawing of The Three is not at all who I was expecting*, it involves a character even more psychotic than Detta. Without going into details it involves possession, crazy hyperkinetic shootouts, more lobstrosities and a unique way of dispatching a villain.
Art by Phil Hale
Phew! What a book! I hope I have not spoiled anything so far, if you think I did please let me know in the comments. The Drawing of the Three is a fabulous, riveting and thrilling read. The writing style here is much more typically Stephen King than the previous volume,
The Gunslinger, where King takes a stab at some lyrical writing in the early chapters that confused my young mind when I first read it. I have to admit this is how I like my King. Screw “literature”, just tell the story so vividly that the reader is transported into Roland’s world (even though it has “moved on”). King’s accessible writing style is one of his chief weapons, it is the most effective way of conveying his outlandish narrative. Even with all the carnage going on the book is occasionally hilarious, with pop culture references and an almost “TMI” rectal examination scene. The “Roland in New York City” part is particularly amusing, with his bemusement by the city life and his failed attempt to avoid violence. Imagine Clint Eastwood’s The Man with No Name in modern day New York and you will have an inkling. The book does not end on a cliffhanger yet it does make you want to commit to the series, to follow Roland and his friends on the quest for the Tower, to see what happens next. As Roland would say, “it’s ka”.
Notes:
* I thought it was going to be poor Jake Chambers from
The Gunslinger, but poor Jake only makes a quick cameo in this volume.
• Idris Elba is unlikely to be called “honky mahfah” in the forthcoming Dark Tower movie. Here is King's
comment about the casting.
• Roland’s classic “ka-tet”, the crew of his quest, is not fully formed in this book, awaiting a couple more members. So this picture below, from the graphic novel edition, is a little misleading.
Quotes:
“There is an umbilicus which somehow connects our world to the world of the gunslinger.”
“The first is dark-haired. He stands on the brink of robbery and murder. A demon has infested him. The name of the demon is HEROIN.”
“Which demon is that? I know it not, even from nursery stories.”
“He walked out of nowhere toward nowhere, a man from another time who, it seemed, had reached a point of pointless ending.”
“Not his eyes but those of a stranger. Not hazel but a blue the color of fading Levis. Eyes that were chilly, precise, unexpected marvels of calibration. Bombardier’s eyes.” -
I thoroughly enjoyed my re-read of this, like i said it's been years since I've re-read the series and it feels like im rediscovering it.
The Dark Tower series is so detailed, like every time i read it I'm always noticing something else; that i missed on my last read.
The aim here was to take my time with this re-read because I wanted to live in it longer and soak it up but I'm taking longer than expected because I've got my newborn son who needs my attention as well now.
Anyway, I'm glad to be back and with a fresh review!
•
The Drawing of the Three, the second book of The Dark Tower series.
This one gets a top rating from me, it's full of action, atmospheric, it introduces a new interesting characters and we see another side of Roland as we progress further to the elusive tower.
This is where Roland gets his Ka-tet (a group bound by fate/destiny)
First we have [The Prisoner] a junkie named Eddie Dean, who's running drugs when Roland meets him; might seem like a despicable character but he's one of my favourites of the series.
Second is [The Lady of the Shadows] a woman with multiple personality disorder and one of those is a maniac out to cause mayhem in whatever form possible, whether it be murder or theft.
Third is [The Pusher] who is a serial killer called Jack Mort.
These people are supposed to be 'drawn', they're part of Rolands destiny and they're part of his journey to The Dark Tower.
Will he draw all three of these people?
Or will some otherworldly evil bring an end to Roland's quest?
Or will something extraordinary come of it?
Anyway, go read this series; if you haven't already.
...the Tower is closer.... -
I’ve read the Dark Tower Series several times over the years. It is a series I hold very close to my heart, one that draws me in and whispers in my ear; begs to be read again.
So, when
Calamity Bev,
Rootin’ Tootin’ Pistol Packin’ Delee,
Jumpin’ Jeff and
Straight Shootin' Susan asked me to join them along the Path of the Beam on a most noble quest to the Dark Tower I said yes without a moment’s hesitation.
The Drawing of the Three is a book that on its own is in my list of top 10 books ever written. This is one of those books that left my brains splattered on the wall behind me. I was completely blown away by this book. It is nearly impossible to put down. The writing is impeccable, it’s very fast paced and the storyline is captivating.
Roland wakes up on a beach-a beach from hell, but a beach nonetheless.
He must draw three people into his world to accompany him on his quest. Along this beach he finds 3 doors.
Behind the first door, marked “The Prisoner”, he meets my literary soulmate, Eddie Dean. Eddie has a monkey on his back and that monkey’s name is Heroine.
Door number two is marked, the Lady of Shadows and it is from that door that Roland draws Odetta Holmes/Detta Walker. She has lost her legs in a horrifying accident but that is only the tip of the iceberg as the old saying goes.
As Roland, Detta and Eddie travel up the beach in search of Door Number 3 they encounter a few obstacles. And as Eddie points out so politely to Detta, “Well,what was behind Door Number One wasn’t so hot, and what was behind Door Number Two was even worse, so now, instead of quitting like sane people, we’re going to go right on ahead and check out Door Number Three. The way things have been going, I think it’s likely to be something like Godzilla or Ghidra the Three-Headed Monster, but I’m an optimist. I’m still hoping for the stainless steel cookware."
So what does Door Number 3 bring?
The Pusher . Jack Mort. The Man in Black foretold who would be behind these doors and when he got to the third door he told Roland “Death. But not for you, Gunslinger.” Jack Mort. The pusher of objects. Will he be drawn into this world as Eddie and Odetta/Detta were?
Will Roland get his Keflex in time?
Will the lobstrosities ever satisfy their hunger?
All these questions will be answered.
The Drawing of the Three will not disappoint you. I personally guarantee your satisfaction.
Ps. If you click the names of posse you'll get to read their most excellent reviews! -
As King opens up the world and cast of his tale the book gets that much better.
"Control the things you can control, maggot. Let everything else take a flying fuck at you, and if you must go down, go down with your guns blazing."
There are quite a few on your feet moments in this book. You can see them happening, vividly, in your mind. It's enough to make you beg for a HBO or Netflix series to treat this series right and do 5+ seasons of it.
"She could only hope. But is there anything else? she asked herself, and drew. And suddenly her brown hands were full of thunder."
The twist towards the end, the revelation, and the introspective examination of Roland combined with the above make this an intense ride. More than once I had chills of excitement reading and seeing the story play out in my head.
As always, long days and pleasant nights Roland and crew, until the next volume! -
Hablemos de ABISMOS.
El sabio Google, entre tantas otras, ofrece la siguiente definición del concepto abismo: "diferencia u oposición muy grande entre cosas, personas o ideas de modo que no hay conexión entre ellas". Esa fue mi impresión al leer esto.
A pesar de haber leído El pistolero y quedar completamente desconcertado, decidí seguir dándole una oportunidad a esta saga que, seamos honestos, si no fuera del gran King, la hubiese abandonado. Pero luego llega este libro, que se ubica siete horas después de su predecesor, aparentemente, tiempo suficiente para hacer que cada componente que odié del primer libro se transforme y me haga amar este segundo. ES QUE SON COMO EL AGUA Y EL ACEITE:
1. La narración poética del primer libro parecía muy profesional y todo, pero no entendía absolutamente nada (tenía que releer muchas frases y hacía de un libro corto extremadamente pesado); en cambio, en este libro, volvemos a una narración clara, fresca y llevadera.
2. La trama en esta novela está completamente definida: entendía lo que leía y cuáles eran los objetivos, además de ser increíblemente interesante… pero en El Pistolero nada de eso pasaba, trama indefinida, demasiado corto como para dejar algo en claro y muchas más preguntas que respuestas.
3. Los personajes son QUERIBLES. Cuando leí el primero, me costaba visualizar a Roland como protagonista, pero en esta entrega su desarrollo es mucho más efectivo, del rechazo pasó hasta a generar risas. Ni hablar de sus peculiares compañeros.
Por si no quedó claro>>>> La llegada de los tres SÍ funciona como un inicio prometedor a La Torre Oscura.
➤ "No cometas el error de poner tu corazón al alcance de su mano."
Los nuevos personajes son INCREÍBLES: la historia que cargan, la complejidad de sus características, y su oscuridad (que es bastante en todos los casos), fueron clave a la hora de enriquecer la historia. Ni siquiera me imaginaba que iba a reír tanto con este libro, en especial por las palabras de Detta y la interacción de Roland en nuestro mundo. Si me pongo a pensar, en realidad, no hubo nada de trama respecto a la búsqueda de la torre, pero la estructura de la novela es eficiente, mantiene el entretenimiento: la idea de las puertas y sus conexiones a otros mundos/épocas es interesante.
➤ "Hay gente que necesita gente que la necesite."
Muy entretenida y dinámica, la segunda entrega de La Torre Oscura promete y anuncia lo que será un recorrido interesante, un recorrido, al cual, estoy dispuesto a transitar. Siendo sinceros, hasta hace unas horas estaba entre 4 o 4.5 estrellas, pero cada vez que pienso en la historia, me gusta más y más, ¿¡o acaso estoy manifestando inconscientemente mi odio/decepción con el primer libro y quiero marcar una diferencia!? ¿Acaso…? Paren, ¿en qué momento la reseña se convirtió en un psicoanálisis? Lo que sea, pero este libro no será el último que lea de esta saga. -
Stephen King gets back to his old self and Stephen Kings all over the second book of the Dark Tower series. This one is written more in the King style we have all come to know and love. It’s much more what you would expect from picking up a King novel, but it still has that western fantasy vibe pulsing throughout its pages.
And, again, the book is pretty good. I’ve read half of the series before, I know the next two books are really good, especially Wizard and Glass. I keep saying that. I’ll probably just always remind people of how much I enjoyed that book. Anyway...
Some people love the series from the beginning, some people love this book, some people hate the series, some people hate Stephen King. Isn’t that what makes life so great? We get to all have different opinions and lifestyles and stuff. And sometimes those opinions and views change, right? Like, sometimes I really like King and sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I want tacos every day, all the time, and sometimes I... well, no... that doesn’t work here. Tacos are God’s gift to humans. A little piece of heaven we get to enjoy here during our short time on earth.
And, I won’t say anything else here, but, man... would the whole Detta stuff fly in this day and age? Some of that mixed in with a lot of homophobic stuff just seemed very dated and very distracting. As Roland would say, the world has moved on.
Looking forward to continuing the series. I’ve been listening to it at work so it’s been a different experience than last time. Here’s hoping I can make it to the Tower... and that it is filled with delicious tacos. -
4.5 ⭐
”Did-a-chick? Dum-a-chum? Dad-a-cham? Ded-a-check?”
- Lobstrosity #1 (Wanted for Digit Theft)
The Drawing of The Three maintains the high standard set for ‘The Dark Tower’ series, by King in ‘The Gunslinger’. While it remains a unique and compelling story, this entry felt much more conventional in both prose and storytelling than the first. However, what it lacks in further hallucinatory mind-fuckery, dreamy abstraction, and thoughtful, at times verging on philosophical, reflection; it makes up for with fantastic characterisation, thematic diversity and significant consequentiality.
I’m not entirely sure if King had any idea where he was going with this. I would presume not given the period of time over which it was written, but I feel, so far, that this has given the series an exciting unpredictability that you couldn’t possibly achieve in a well-planned, logically thought-out saga. This path, of course, usually leads to problems further down the track like lack of foreshadowing, inconsistencies in tone and inaccuracies in recalled events, but only time will tell.
This particular entry felt like a bunch of mismatched ingredients that my fiancé might throw into her nutri-bullet, that really shouldn’t work but, I’ll be a monkey’s perverted, alcoholic Uncle, they do!! It’s a mashup of 80s gangster films, monster horror (Prawn+Lobster+Spider = Lobstrosity…WTF?!), Portal Fantasies, Time-Travel and Character Studies ranging from well-informed examination of drug addiction, to less well-informed examination of Dissociative Identity Disorder (Schizophrenia) and Antisocial Personality Disorder.
”The Gunslinger drew left-handed, and his draw was as it had always been, sick or well, wide awake or still half asleep: faster than a streak of blue summer lightning.”
The number one thing I feel compelled to talk about is the prose!. It’s serviceable, fine, decent, good even… But it was sooo much better in ‘The Gunslinger’. It irritates me just a wee bit because in A LOT of the reviews I read for the first book, people commented on how incomprehensible and pretentious the writing was and that the plot was too abstract with not enough tangibility to anchor oneself to, or clutch as one would the defined glutes of an old lover. It all seemed a little bit dumbed down here and it can’t be a mere coincidence that King’s retrospective foreword, preceding the beginning of ‘The Gunslinger’, mentioned and defended this exact pretentiousness as the attempts of a misguided young author to impress his peers and would-be fans alike. Since when did wordcraft, building aesthetically pleasing phrases and using your vocabulary to its fullest, become wanky?... When Lionel Messi could simply pass the ball to any number of teammates but instead pedals up the right-wing leaving an opponent in the dust, nutmegging another, pirouetting around a third, rainbow-flicking a fourth and sending it past the Keeper into the top right corner 5-6mm from the top and right posts, is this wanky? No! It’s fucking brilliant! When John Coltrane forgot about the rest of the band and went off on a 27-minute solo during the track ‘One Down, One Up’ on the album ‘Live at the Half Note’, was this wanky… Well, yeah, a little bit, but ultimately it was fucking awesome! Why? Because these guys were the best at what they did and we should never cave in to our inherent ‘Tall Poppy Syndrome’ and tear down those who try to excel at what they do and produce something that transcends the typical Vanilla mierda that we’re fed every other day. Moving on.
”Fault always lies in the same place, my fine babies: with him weak enough to lay blame.”
A high percentage of the enjoyment to be had in this instalment is owed to the introduction of a couple of excellent characters.
Eddie is a 21-year-old, living in the 80s. He’s a junkie consumed with guilt, a residual effect of the emotional fuckery dealt him by an emotionally abusive mother and brother, the latter of which he loves deeply, making it all the more disturbing. His first appearance is the aforementioned gangsterish portion of the book. Tense, action-packed, funny and moving, it’s all of the above and you grow to really love the guy. Roland and Eddie bounce off of each other very well, their opposing personalities making for a highly entertaining partnership. Eddie’s inner-monologue, particularly early on, is gold!
Odetta/Detta is a legless (No, she’s not perpetually wasted, nor was she a pointy-eared heartthrob in LOTR. She’s… Got no legs.), wheelchair-bound black woman with dissociative identity disorder living in America in the 60s. Talk about drawing the short straw, am I right?! Odetta is a lovely, well-spoken woman who happens to be part of the civil rights movement. Detta, on the other hand, is a cruel, hateful kleptomaniac with a propensity for violence, particularly against White Honky Mahfahs. Roland describes the inside of her mind as "the snakepit of hate and revulsion.”
***MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD***
Independently, these two new characters are very interesting and each endearing in their own ways. When placed together, they are two members of the worst case of Insta-love I have ever witnessed! Bar none. King really forgot the face of his Father here! I mean, what in the legitimate fuck was he thinking?! Eddie was “falling in love” with Odetta after a single day. You could argue that he had simply become infatuated with her overnight which is entirely possible in the case of a particularly beautiful woman. Add to this the fact that he had just gone through an incredibly traumatic experience and was possibly in need of a comforting relationship, you might have a half decent explanation on your hands. But NOTHING can explain why Odetta would have any reason whatsoever to reciprocate those feelings! To the extent that they would share ”An act of love… so sweet, so full” only days after meeting and with barely any meaningful interaction. Get outta here!
Guns were slung, Three were drawn and, ultimately, this was a book with a large number of positives and just a few negatives. The general consensus is that the standard remains high for the next book and then tapers off and falls over like an elderly fella with an ear infection and a fractured walking stick. Can’t wait! -
Roland continues with his quest for The Dark Tower. While he was alone at first, he decides to have some company. He decides to have a drawing of the three. Three more people to be involved in his obsessive quest for the tower. Will he compromise the lives of the chosen ones, or will he make them better? The amazing quest continues in this second installment of the series.
Once again King introduced amazing characters. Right from the start I knew I was going to like Eddie Dean. He was this drug dealer who was unlucky enough to be chosen by The Gunslinger. He was not as difficult as Roland thought he would be. Honestly I'm shocked that he didn't feel weird about someone talking inside his head. The mere fact that paranormal things were happening and he didn't freak out made him a bit cooler than he already was. The plane scene and the one with Balazar are some of the few unforgettable scenes in this novel involving Eddie. Even his life story with his brother Henry was a really fun thing to read. I can't wait to read more of him in the next novels. There is something about drug dealers that aren't that cocky that I really seem to like. I guess they seem more realistic than drastically flawless characters. Eddie was flawed, but so was The Gunslinger. I think most people would agree that flawed characters are way better than the perfect ones.
Odetta Holmes was my second least favorite of the 4 main characters in this novel. She had no legs, but she was described as this sweet lady. Or maybe Detta Holmes was my second least favorite? Detta was this evil character that kept complaining and finding ways to make sure the quest would end up a failure. I'm rooting for Roland to succeed, so Detta was a pain in the ass. I didn't like her that much, but not enough to hate her. Jack Mort was my least favorite of them all. He was undeveloped in the end, and it felt like King didn't really make him likeable at all. He had the least appearances, so there was no room to like him. He wasn't unlikeable, but not enough information were given for him to be likeable. I guess this is my only complaint regarding the novel.
The plot was mainly about Roland discovering about contemporary America. His world was so different from ours that he was so confused about everything. It was fun reading about his struggles. Aside from the struggles though, it was even better reading about the way Roland managed to perform the "drawing of the three". It just further proved how amazing of an epic this is turning out to be. It's a mixture of Fantasy and Sci-Fi, and that was what King promised. It was more than adequate to satisfy my Fantasy/epic needs. While King will always be regarded as the king of horror, this series just proves that he can do so much more. In short, King is an amazing writer.
The opening scene, or also known as the lobster scene, will always be remembered. Perfect way to begin the novel.
5/5 stars and will definitely be one of my rereads in the future. I haven't even finished the series yet but I'm tempted to read the first book again already. This second novel was really great, and it makes me even want to finish the series already, so that I could reread it all over again, multiple times.
