The Gunslinger (Stephen King)
I just read this book for the second time.
The book is certainly solid ad it captures your attention. The Gunslinger is the beginning of SK’s explanation of his universe. If you haven’t read much SK, you’ll miss a lot in the Dark Tower series. If you have it’s incredibly rich.
That being said, The Gunslinger doesn’t make many (any?) outside references because he wrote it while he was still in college. It’s basically a solid stand-alone fantasy book.
It takes you to a parallel universe where Roland, a cold man with absurd precision and efficiency (notably in killing), is the last representative of an order of (basically) knights. It tells the story of his search for a man (the servant of the servant to the Tower’s guard) who will bring him closer to his ultimate goal the Dark Tower. The book, and actually the series, has a lot of story-telling involved - stories about what once was and what will be. At the end you get a little teaser of what’s to come. There will be three others. And death but not for Roland. And life but not for Roland.
Cute. Exciting. The series is great. But it is far, far greater with some good background in SK. For dark tower background go for The Stand, Insomnia, Salem’s Lot, Eyes of the Dragon and Desperation. I tried to keep that list short. I have a lot of SK…
