Dark Tower Cringe

[ColGray]

I just finished listening to The Dark Tower (first book in the series) and it was good-ish, but holy moly the cringe.

I feel like I now know the ur-book everyone refers to when they talk about male authors being unable to write female characters. There are three female characters and each time they appear on the page or enter a scene, the first description of each entrance relates to either chest size or nipples or both. It is bonkers.

It was written in the 80's but my gosh. She boobily boobed down the boob to tit while boobing in the boobenhaus. just... wth my guy.

 

[Le Panda du Mal]

I haven't really read much King. I tried reading The Shining recently and I found the prose painfully overwrought and not in an evocative Weird Tales kind of way.

 

[Glaysher]

I've always thought that the first book is by far the weakest of the series, with King building up his skills over time.

 

[ColGray]

I've always thought that the first book is by far the weakest of the series, with King building up his skills over time.

Is that to say he expands into describing female characters by more than simply their chest size? Book 2 includes areola color and a Janka scale rating for nipples?

The book was interesting but there wasn't much that makes me want to pick up book 2. It felt like a B- Western and the ending made me think the entire thing was an overgrown prologue to the actual story. Does that change?

 

[HareBrain]

The book was interesting but there wasn't much that makes me want to pick up book 2. It felt like a B- Western and the ending made me think the entire thing was an overgrown prologue to the actual story. Does that change?

I'd say book 1 was actually better than the two following (even though those were not really like a Western at all), but book 4 (Wizard and Glass, Roland's backstory) was a big step up altogether. A brief look at book 5 suggested it was more like books 2/3 so I gave up.

 

[ColGray]

I'd say book 1 was actually better than the two following (even though those were not really like a Western at all), but book 4 (Wizard and Glass, Roland's backstory) was a big step up altogether. A brief look at book 5 suggested it was more like books 2/3 so I gave up.

You just saved me a bunch of time! Thanks!

 

[Dave]

I'm currently reading the Wind Through the Keyhole which is #4.5 in the series. It's going to take me a while to finish them all, but I do enjoy the earlier stories of Roland when he recalls them in his later life. As I've said in the monthly reading thread, I prefer those 'gunslinger' stories to the later quest with it's talking trains, robot bears, and underground post-apocalyptic mutants, because those kind of stories have been done better elsewhere, and quite done to death too. However, these books are very wordy and the final book #7, which I have bough second-hand as a hardback is a very weighty tome, as are #5 and #6.

So, I agree with @HareBrain that I found the first book better than the following two, and #4 Wizard and Glass was easily the best so far. However, as far as the writing skill, he wrote the parts of the first book very early in his career. #4 was written in the noughties while #5,6 and 7 didn't come until 2011-12. The one I'm reading currently came last of all. Yes, he does become a better writer with age as you would expect.

I think I'm going to read them all, but I have mixed them up with reading other books, and I will continue to do so. I even stopped reading #2 half-way through. The second half was much better than the first when I got back to it.

For some reason he is too close to this series to have a very good focus. He somehow thinks that 'more' is better even if it isn't very good. What he needs is an editor to go through the whole lot as happened with The Stand and remove all the unnecessary stuff to make it a better read. If you have time to also read the forewords, he somehow sees it as his Lord of the Rings, but written in the style of a spaghetti western. He has done a great deal of world-building, but it can never be Lord of the Rings.

 

[nixie]

It's a long time since I read Dark Tower, what I do remember is I really loved it. It's that long I queued outside WH Smith waiting for it to open so I could get my hands on book 7 on̈ the day of release.

 

[Ursa major]

book 4 (Wizard and Glass, Roland's backstory) was a big step up altogether

I found that to be the worst book in the series.

 

[Dave]

I found that to be the worst book in the series.

I do find it interesting that everyone likes and dislike different parts.

Maybe is because I like linear-told stories, but the other really odd thing about these books is the way the back-story is inserted. I'm reading book #4.5 now and this is an additional story inserted between books #4 and #5. Very quickly in, as they shelter from a storm, Roland tells the group another story from his past. Inside that story, Roland rescues a child, and when he can't sleep, he tells him another story that his mother had told him. It is this story which takes up the majority of the book and gives the book it's title. So, here we have a story, within a story, within a story, within a story! Even the film Inception didn't get that complicated! A character in that story even mentions another story, and I thought for one paragraph that... but no.

 

[Matteo]

I liked the first and thought the next two were OK. But after that they got progressively worse. A huge disappointment.

But...many would strongly disagree.

 

[AE35Unit]

I just finished listening to The Dark Tower (first book in the series) and it was good-ish, but holy moly the cringe.

I feel like I now know the ur-book everyone refers to when they talk about male authors being unable to write female characters. There are three female characters and each time they appear on the page or enter a scene, the first description of each entrance relates to either chest size or nipples or both. It is bonkers.

It was written in the 80's but my gosh. She boobily boobed down the boob to tit while boobing in the boobenhaus. just... wth my guy.

You should try reading early James Herbert, where every woman who isnt the character's wife is called a girl. Why do authors insist on calling women girls, but men are called...men?

 

[Ursa major]

Why do authors insist on calling women girls, but men are called...men?

Because boys will be boys...?

 

[Toby Frost]

The thing that really throws me is when men call women "females". It sounds like a nature documentary.

And I cringe at "cringe".

 

[Droflet]

I am saddened by the comments above. I'm a long time fan of King. I do inot disagree with the comments as I have never read this book. I am sad to learn that even a genius can have an off day/ week/ year/ years. Shrugs and walks toward the setting sun.

 

[Toby Frost]

I agree, especially since everything I've seen about King suggests that he's a pretty decent guy - hardly a sex criminal or anything. I do slightly wonder if writing primes us for this sort of thing. I read a paragraph in Black Man by Richard Morgan this morning, where a character looks at herself in a mirror just after her arrival in the novel, and thought "Uhoh, that's something the writing books tell you not to do".

 

[AE35Unit]

The thing that really throws me is when men call women "females". It sounds like a nature documentary.

Always makes me think of Ferengi