Short Changed

[altie230]

Am I the only "Fan" that thinks Mr. King has been short changing his fans since the "accident'. I feel as if his writings have been watered down and he is only in it now for the marketing value. I have issues with the "finish" of the gunslinger series, i have been waiting for the REAL finish for several years now. I hope for a revised addition to the last 2 books, I can understand that a life changing accident can alter the way a person thinks from that point forward, but if it caused a loss of perpective the stories should have been put on hold. many of us would have waited a few years more for the real story. We stood by for years at a time for the series to develope only to be short changed.

[JohnDalglish]

Hi,

Welcome to the MB, but I couldn't disagree with you more.

I think the ending of DT was perfect, the only one possible, and that Lisey's Story and Duma Key are superb too, not to mention Dreamcatcher, Everything's Eventual, Blaze, Black House, Just After Sunset..... need I go on?

Sorry.

Long days and pleasant nights

[Cowboy]

Sorry, I have to disagree, I don't feel short-changed at all. I feel that his writing is getting better with age and I enjoy it more as we all age.:smile2:

[All Hail The Crimson King]

Why would King be in it for the marketing value? Do you think he's poor now? He could have retired from writing years ago and still be amazingly rich. As far as your opinion of the end of the series, no I don't agree anyone has been short changed. I loved it. A lot of folk loved it.
Seems like there is very little grey area in regards to the end. You either loved it or hated it. I guess he is still planning on re-writing most of the series so you might just get your wish afterall.

[All Hail The Crimson King]

Sorry, I have to disagree, I don't feel short-changed at all. I feel that his writing is getting better with age and I enjoy it more as we all age.:smile2:

Oh yeah. I could not agree more. King's writing has gotten better with age. DT 7 is my favorite of the Dark Tower Series, which are my favorite books altogether. I think it's possible he could have ended it other ways but they wouldn't have been true to the spirit of the series.

[Doc Wilson]

To be fair, SK has admitted that he was way off his game with the last two volumes of DT and that he considers it a published first draft.

But like JD says, the rest of his later work has been as good as anything he's written.

[rjt65]

AWJDS

awesome writing has continued and gotten better in some ways as well IMO

cheers



Hi,

Welcome to the MB, but I couldn't disagree with you more.

I think the ending of DT was perfect, the only one possible, and that Lisey's Story and Duma Key are superb too, not to mention Dreamcatcher, Everything's Eventual, Blaze, Black House, Just After Sunset..... need I go on?

Sorry.

Long days and pleasant nights

[Bryan James]

He's just distilled the essence. That's why I don't recommend that New Readers start in on his Newer Stuff. The newer works start off accessible, but then King strips the myelin sheath...and if you're not already attenuated, there could be a slight WTF effect.

~BJS

[aptpupil]

You've got guts to come on here and say that, my friend. I don't believe that you expected for one minute to gather any support for your assertion, but all viewpoints are welcomed here at the SKMB.

I'd stop well short of agreeing with you, but I have said in the past that SK's golden period for me was the late 1970's and 1980's, and that it's largely been a slow decline since then with the occasional high point. That's not an attack on the guy in any way. He's still the best that the genre has to offer, but he has never repeated the genius of "The Stand" or "It", IMO. :eyebrow:

[Amalfitano]

***SPOILERS***

i was very disappointed with the last three books, especially volume seven. flagg, who was so menacing and cool in his first few appearances in the earlier books, became a parody of himself in the final volume. same goes for the crimson king. his and roland's final confrontation was silly. it seemed to me that king rushed to finish the last three books, which turned out to have been the case. but really my main disappointment in the final three books was the disregard of information and developments in the novels outside of the main series that were connected to the dark tower. i read the first three books in the spring of 2002. by the time summer arrived and as i began the fourth book, i was obsessed. really, i was a little obsessed with the dark tower. during the year connecting those two summers of 2003 and 2002, i probably thought of the dark tower at least once a minute. it was such a vital story, and the characters and their actions, along with the epic scenery they were traveling through, had such authenticity that i couldn't help but immerse myself. which brings me to my point: in that year and a half when the series was yet unfinished, i read all of his other books that had connections to the series precisely because they were connected to the series! this was a huge story he was writing, and, it seems to me, in his rush to finish the series off he made the mistake of changing some of plot developments of the dark tower story in the non series books, and completely ignoring others. i know there's a line in book seven when roland says, basically, that 'king would write about this story even when he wasn't writing it, and some of what he wrote was gibberish.' i was so disappointed! most all of the dark tower bearing elements in black house were diluted and ignored. and no mention of ralph roberts in the entire series. if roland was written into existence then ralph roberts was too. if patrick danville was supposed to rescue someone in 2012 or whenever then he should have done so! those are my main complaints, black house and insomnia. but i love this series, i wouldn't trade a moment of reading them ( especially the first five) for anything. that being said, in regards to his new books: i loved cell, couldn't stomach lisey's story, and didn't finish duma key, but i am very excited for under the dome. i just hope there aren't any child-idiot psychics or paintings that hold secret powers.

[guido tkp]

when it comes to dt 5, 6 &7: i, for one, could not agree more with the original query...
moreover, i don't think it takes 'guts' to suggest such a thing...
rather, a real honesty about how far he slipped...at least on those 3 books...

it's just the most faithful, loyal thing to do: the emporers' (...erm..the Kings ?!?) new clothes be not so pleasant as some would have him believe

when he was prepping dt 4 , he kept mentioning in interviews and such that the average fan would not like 4 because it would not resolve 3..had nothing to do with it...

yet when it arrived (imho; the middle section is just about the best writing he has ever done anywhere..anytime) it came with that sucky preamble, and worse post...
it felt to me that he was clearly NOT into telling that part of the tale (which made the completion of the standoff w/blaine utterly anticlimactic: just like the end of flagg...and so many others in the last 3)...and it showed

dt 5, 6 & 7 read exactly like that preamble/ending: no heart, no inventiveness...
none of the wild, seat of your pants writing where just about anything could, and often did, happen.

those 3 bored me to tears: each took forever for me to wade thru

they were king-by-rote...he hasn't been that off since insomnia and/or tommyknockers..

for the record, i've liked all the rest of the stuff: lisey, duma etc, it felt like he was actually in the groove

if he has actually stated that the current, published versions are more of a first draft...i'm betting the pedantic, connect the dot versions of today will get alot more updating than, say, the stand ( or blaze...or under the dome..)did..

as for the ending of dt 7 being the perfect, only true ending...

not for me...

everything about was as anticlimactic as one could ever have worried such an epic could possibly sink to: i guess the world never really did move on...it's just stuck in some aimless repeat season

[JRM]

I've JUST RECENTLY (Sometime this year) become a fan, after reading "Bag of Bones" -- considered one of his new novels, right? Most of my favorite King novels are actually his newest novels (with the exception of Dreamcatcher). I think it's all a matter of opinion.

[eaglpaul]

I want to say thank you to all of you that disagreed with the initial post of this thread. I personally loved the last three DT books, they took up right where the fourth left off, and it was like there hadn't even been a break there. For those people who think that a person can just "get over" a life changing event by waiting, they have obviously never experienced anything like that in their life. I personally was in Iraq for a year doing security for resupply convoys, due to that I can't even get close to a semi truck on the freeway without experience anxiety attacks and flash backs of being shot at or trucks getting hit with road side bombs. I either have to drop back so I can't see them, or I have to pull off the road until I can calm down.

When a person comes face to face with his or her own mortality it changes that person, in most cases forever. SK felt that he was capable of writing that last three DT books, and that is what he did. I felt that the writing was superb, ad that it could have not ended in any other way than it did. It didn't end the way that I had envisioned it, and for that I was sad. I wanted to see the whole Ka-Tet reach the Dark Tower, but Roland started the series alone, that is how he needed to enter the Dark Tower.

As for his other books, Dreamcatcher is one of my favorites because it feels so much like IT. I would not trade SKs stories for anything else in the world. He doesn't need to write, he has said many times that the reason that he continues to write is because he loves it, and he does it as much for himself as for the fans. If SK was really worried about money, do you think that he would sell the rights to his books for $1? No way. He does it for the fans. SK is one f the greatest writers out there, and I will continue to read his work, and enjoy it, as long as he keeps writing it.