REVIEW | THE GUNSLINGER

                                                                                                      ★★★

***All spoilers are at the end of the review in the section labeled “SPOILERS.” If you wish to read full review, follow the citations within the review to their corresponding numbers in the “SPOILER” section. If you wish to avoid spoilers, reading the review without following the citations will protect you! Thanks for reading!

"The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.”

I liked it but didn’t love it. As a first time reader of The Gunslinger I found this introduction to the series beautiful and very capable of holding my attention. I think it was quite different than Kings other books in term of prose (stunning) and it didn’t sound like his voice to me. It wasn’t disappointing to see another side of King. In fact, I really enjoyed this different writing style and feel that I’m getting to know King all over again. After all, most times when I read one of his novels I can accurately predict the ending and always know which character will die next- as I am sure many constant readers can. I feel that King is typically very down to earth and, for me, this just wasn’t like that. I think the difference in The Gunslinger from his other novels is that King fancies himself Roland, the main character, and I felt that made the novel a little bit more pretentious than if King would not have based the character off of himself. Don’t get me wrong- I don’t necessarily think a pretentious book is a bad book. After all, other than King my favorite author is Kurt Vonnegut. That is just the way this novel read to me. Perhaps pretentious isn’t exactly the right word but I am finding it difficult to think of a better one to explain the feel of this novel.

I also couldn’t predict the ending of this novel, which was very exciting for me, but I didn’t find the story line all that confusing as so many people warned me I would. Sure, he uses some made up words but using context clues you can figure most of them out easily. It’s also unclear where the novel takes place; however, that was more thought provoking than it was confusing (1). It feels a little bit like gate-keeping… like people are saying ‘if you aren’t a die-hard Stephen King fan with a big brain to boot, keep out.’ Basically, I want to make the point that this novel isn’t as complex a read as everyone says it is and if you want to read it then you should just go for it!

So I guess there are a few questions that really interests me is: what happened to Roland to end up here (2)? What is the significance to using the biblical name Gilead, for the country Roland comes from? In The Handmaids Tale it makes since that this is what their country is called because their tyrannical government is run my far-right-wing religious nuts! I look forward to finding out why King used this name! I also found the conversation in this novel about religious in general very interesting and that presented many more questions (3).

Lastly, there is the question of whether or not Roland is a hero. To that I have to say Hell-fucking-no (4). Regardless, it seems like this entire mission is a personal vendetta, not a heroic epic so I feel that the answer is obvious.

All in all, I am actually very excited to continue the series. Yes, I had a lot of complaints but I had many more questions than I have complaints!

SPOILERS:

(1) It seems like the setting is some type of afterlife, maybe purgatory, set in the distant future, probably post-Apocalypse. It also seems like Jake, one of Roland’s sidekicks, is definitely from New York City around modern day (or at least modern day to when The Gunslinger was written in 1983) and when he dies he just showed up in this new place. Therefore, I think he has probably been here the longest because Roland appears to come from a post-apocalyptic world that existed after our time- he knows the song Hey Jude after all and the memory of this song clearly dates back to his childhood in Gilead. Nort, an accessory character, has also clearly died before he died and was brought back to life in Tull.

(2) I assume that he died like the others and there seems to be some possible foreshadowing to that when he is having his flashbacks to Gilead.

(3) Specifically, the conversations between the gunslinger and the man in black. When Roland stated that God had made it to the top of the tower I wondered if this was true, and if so, how did he know this for sure? Maybe there is no God to make it up the top. Is Roland a faithful man? Are there multiple Gods who have made their way up the tower? If Roland makes his way up The Tower does he become God? Does the tower make gods or can only gods climb it? This conversation presented so many questions for me.

(4) He rapes a woman, he kills his girlfriend (which I believe he would have done even if she didn't consent to it because he is a cold blooded killer), he kills a whole town of people including children, he kills a his small companion Jake who Roland even states that he loved. Additionally, can I just say how gross it is to insult a woman appearance and then sleep with her repeatedly. The feminist in me is just a little disappointed. None of these actions are the actions of a hero. Typically when Stephen King creates a gross sexist character he makes that guy the bad guy- yet this whole book was about Roland’s journey. Again, this was so unlike King’s other novels.