Halloween Bingo 2022
Finally, cullies, I have seen the Black Tower. It has been a long journey and I'm as tired of it as Roland seems to be, may it do ya. It is typical King, being longer than I feel it needed to be and filled with references to his other works. It also includes a number of scenes which convinced me early on that there would be no snacking during this reading—he managed to gross me out on a number of occasions.
But it was not without its charms. I was especially fond of the very meta sections, where the author inserts himself into the action, requiring his characters to rescue him from otherwise certain death, the real-life accident that laid him low in 1999. Roland and his ka-tet realize they must keep their author alive if they want to finish their quest. These folk dodge from one reality to another to achieve their goals and the fate of all worlds hangs in the balance.
The ending may not appeal to everyone, but it made sense to me. It echoed the King Arthur mythos as I'm certain it was meant to. For me, the quest is over, but I understand those that choose to repeat the cycle. The ending almost demands it. Just like LOTR, there is a scattering of the Fellowship, a melancholy feeling.
I was fortunate to be able to double-dip with this novel, reading it for the Dark Fantasy square of my Bingo card and as part of my Science Fiction and Fantasy Reading Project. If it didn't do double duty, I'm not sure I could have afforded to tackle a book of over 800 pages just for Bingo, where one needs to read fast and change focus nimbly!
Book number 473 of my Science Fiction and Fantasy Reading Project
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