Although quite an avid reader of Stephen King stories over the years I have to admit, like others, I was a late arrival to the Dark Tower epic. I'm not really sure why I kind of avoided this story either. I think it may have been a combination of things including thinking that King had started to lose his touch, I thought I would never find the time to commit my time to reading and continue reading such an epic and quite simply at the time it just didn't appeal to me. About 6 months ago or thereabouts however, Waterstones were having one of their regular 3 for 2 offers and as I was lacking in inspiration or motivation to read anything else I decided to buy ...  Read the complete review

In a world that is a shadow of our own, Roland has managed to survive rebellions, wars, near total destruction of the world itself... he is the last gunslinger, the last of a rare breed of men who were raised to keep the world from changing, to keep order... a symbol of all that was good. In this dark twin to our own world, priests dressed in black do not always stand for good, nor do they bring the peace the surviving population are praying for. In this dark world of endless deserts and tumbleweed towns, water is scarce, paper is more valuable than gold, and conscience is a thing that idiots possess. If you want to survive here, you need lots of luck on ...  Read the complete review

I feel that any comments about me being Stephen King’s number one fan would be inappropriate right now, seeing as I’ve only just read this book. Oops! Better late than never, though, eh? With no further ado... The first line tells the story: “The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed.” There was something in those few words that drew me in as soon as I’d read them; maybe it was as if the very simplicity of the statement implied something huge hidden behind it. It raised immediate questions like: Who are these people? Why is the man in black fleeing? Is the gunslinger the man in black’s friend or his ...  Read the complete review

First published in 1982, The Gunslinger is the first novel in the epic "Dark Tower" series by Stephen King. Inspired by stories of the Wild West combined with Tolkein's "Lord of the Rings", the book follows the adventures of Roland Deshain as he chases his nemesis, the enigmatic man in black, across the barren desert wilderness of King's imagination. King is often written off as a shlock-horror writer but that is to overlook his prowess as a story teller and as a builder of characters. This book sets the scene magnificently for the series that is to follow, revealing fragments of the plot fleetingly whilst giving an insight into ...  Read the complete review

The Gunslinger is the first part of Stephen King's attempt at epic fantasy with the Dark Tower series. Written way back in 1978, it is the gritty, tight Stephen King of his earlier days, rather than the overblown melodrama he spends most of his time writing now. Set in a world that might be our distant future, or might be a parallel world only part based on our own, The Gunslinger follows Roland of Gilead, the last Gunslinger, on his trek across a bleak desert in search of The Man in Black. At 296 pages it is minute for a Stephen King novel, but the writing is tight and sparse and a lot is packed into those pages, probably more than in a lot of his 800-page ...  Read the complete review