That’s it. It’s done. It took me two weeks and about half a day to read all seven books in Steven King’s Dark Tower.

Again, like before, “Wizard & Glass” was achingly sad and heartbreaking, “Song of Susannah” deeply disturbing, and the immense, phenomenal “The Dark Tower” did what no book has no other has ever made me do. There are very few stories I read that move me deeply, but this story does that and I am glad to have read it all these many times.

Pages 374 through 392 of The Dark Tower brought me to tears. Not slight weeping either. My heart ached as I read.

I will likely have another stab at re-reading it later this year, because I’ve been reading the ones I have twice a year since I first read The Gunslinger six years ago.

Now that it is done, I am sad, I am glad… it has done to me what all good stories should do to it’s readers… made me feel. King’s ability to characterise is quite astounding.

Funnily enough, I am unmoved in any way to read anything else he has written other than The Stand, which I think is his only other really brilliant piece of writing. (Although I thought IT was amazing too, but I NEVER want to read IT again, that shit frightened the bejesus out of me!) None of his other writing even tickles me into wanting to read.

Two weeks of steady immersion in Roland of Gilead’s world has kind of cast a light over everything. I don’t know how else to describe it. Not even The Lord Of The Rings ever made me cry, but those passages between 374 and 392 did it both times I read them.

I don’t know if I can describe this story as pleasant; it’s much to grim for that. Masterfully managed by Sai King, the story has a sense reality to it. You are there. You experience the characters fears and victories. And pleasant or unpleasant, the story rings true in an odd way, and King manages to make it real in some vital way.

It’s a story with a satisfying crunch.

Say thank ya, big big!

I tried to resist a while and could not. Got up, cleaned my flat and then dived right into “The Dark Tower”.

On page 121 this morning. I’m terrible… At any rate, the ka-tet are together again, and plotting their final push towards The Dark Tower.

The print is just so damn small… for an almost life-long wearer of glasses, it is difficult work.

Let’s just say, reading this series is often like a quest in itself, oui?

While the world has gone Potter mad, Big Mami knuckles down to the grim story that is The Dark Tower.

Alright mates, back into the fray. Chin up, grit the teeth… the story pulls one on. I’d like to finish by Friday… then I’d have read all seven books in two weeks.

I just finished “Song of Susannah”. I feel beat up. More than any of the others, that one kept me up until a ridiculous hour this morning. I just couldnt put the thing down. It’s when I realised I was falling asleep no matter how hard I had fought that I gave in.

“Susannah-Mio, divided girl of mine. Parked her rig, in the Dixie Pig in the year of 1999.”

I understand what people say about King writing himself into the story, but for some reason I understand why he did it. As a literary device, I find it’s so jarring as to be brilliant.

Because where were my brother and I when we found out Stephen King had been hit by the white van and in critical condition, not expected to survive?

I think we were at home, but we looked at each other and the first thing either of us said, and I now forget who said it, was, “That’s it. He’ll never get to finish The Dark Tower.” I remember the heart hurt, because I was horrified to think that this story was going to remain undone.

It’s amazing that he survived, and it’s funny, but it made reading the remaining three books richer for knowing that he came back from that and finished the story.

In “Song of Susannah”, when King shows up in the story, and clearly becomes part of the quest to reach the Dark Tower, as odd as it was, it seemed right to read it.

Say what, Sai King has me along for the duration.

Now though, I’ve been eyeing up the Dark Tower, the final ‘chapter’ in this story, and having put down “Song of Susannah” mere minutes ago… I feel beat up. I’ve read the first six books of this series in just under two weeks, and “The Dark Tower” dwarfs the other six. More than that, the print in my hardcover version is small…

I am sure the sun will not go down in London tonight before I pick it up and start to read, but right now… my mind is completely swirling with King’s story so far.

I think I am going to clean my flat, before I start the next leg of this little run of book lunacy I’ve engaged in over the last week.

I just finished “The Wolves Of Calla”, and I am about to go dig “Song Of Susannah” out of the box it’s packed in (in preparation for my eighth move in a year).

It’s kind of weird how fast I’m reading these books. It’s like re-reading makes them go faster.

I have to stop with the chapters, because it’s all confusing man.

I’m on page 523 of “The Wolves of Calla”. It’s just before the Wolves come…. Eddie goes back to New York… Susannah’s about to go AWOL and Jake… our boy Jake!!!

Finished Wizard and Glass last night, and started The Wolves of Calla immediately (such a pleasure).

I am on Chapter 4 of Wolves and Calla this morning.

My brother harassed me to read The Gunslinger for two years but once I did I was hooked.

I’ve read the entire series at least once, and the first four books about six or seven times. I was satisfied with the way it ended, because it makes me want to re-read it again and again.

It’s very much like Lord of The Rings, in that each re-read allows the story to resonate at deeper levels. I’m in the process of re-reading the series at the moment. I’m just about finshed Wizard and Glass. What a joy to finally have the remaining three novels for the first time (well, sorta) to add to the re-reading process. I am looking forward to tucking into The Wolves of Calla. Now that I know how the story ends, re-reading it is phenomenal, because Stephen King maanges to maintain the story’s threads right down to the end. It’s quite stunning. Well worth it. Well, well worth it indeed. Do it! Do it twice! Do it over and over!!