The Dark Tower. All 3000+ Pages Of It.

What can I say, really? I have no idea where to start. I've been submerged...somewhere, Roland's *where*, plus sundry other wheres and whens for such a long long time now...

Of course, it hasn't been a long time at all. Less than 5 weeks, probably. Why wasn't it a long time given it was certainly a long *read*? (And not fogetting the break I took to read the latest DWJ, too) Because I have gorged myself on Roland's quest, do it please ya. Absolutely binged myself silly. As addicted as Eddie Cantor Dean used to be to heroin. Lovely Eddie (say sorry). As addicted as Roland was to the Tower itself. Poor Roland. (Again, say sorry).

I started my own quest ( to finish the dam things) mainly because I wanted to mine all the parallels to Lost. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Someting to fill the deadspace between the Xmas/new year Dr Who extravaganza and emotional burnout, and the return of Lost at the beginning of February. Something to help with all the travel I'd be doing. Something to mini blog on tumblr.

Well. We seldom get what we expect (and the Sox'll never win the series). I did get all those things. More Lost stuff than you can shake a stick at, say thanks. An addictive time filler. A tumblr subject line. I also got - surprisingly - a series that I loved more than The Gap. So - in other words a new favourite book series. And probably, in Waste Lands, or maybe Wolves of the Calla, an individual book I love more than Ghost Written, or Deep Secret, or even Jane Eyre. And it has nothing to do with Lost, actually, and everything to do with Roland and Jake and Eddie and Susannah and Oy and the Pere. And Stephen King.

Oh, but to begin with it was hard work. Very hard. I wasn't feeling it at all. I almost bailed so many times. The Lobstrocities at the start of The Drawing of the Three nearly finished me (as well as Roland). And I didn't like him, not one bit (cos, you don't kill kids, right Sayid? Or let them die, Jack). But then...then the door opened. And it wasn't that thing anymore, that Tom Bombadil thing, that Real Story thing. It was this thing. This thing that had reached Rivendell. This thing that had boarded Captain's Fancy. This thing I could suddenly love. This thing I could adore. So, I did. And Jake came back. Hooray. Such a neat way to deal with bifurcated timelines ( operating in a many worlds scenario also). I wonder if any TV writers have taken note...

My favourite moments Reading these books include *cheering* the appearance of Captain Trips (cos everyone just loves plague, right); rooting for Randall Flagg when he was confronting Mordred (poor old ageless stranger, uttering nothing but lies) just cos I hate spiders; and the whole demolition of the fourt wall. Which of course was what made it art. (I so want to add 'basically' there but I'm not sure how well West Wing references would sit in this piece).

And what do I say, after it all? After the tears and the 'ending' and the hope and despair? I say thankee sai. I say I loved every minute of it. I say I'm happy to go back jack and do it again. Although I worry about the variables. I say that when I watched the Lost series 6 premiere in the wee small hours of Wednesday morning, I was looking for Dark Tower links in homage to *that*. I say The Dark Tower is an incredible work of narrative and emotion and I love it to bits.

I say true.


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