The Gunslinger by Stephen King

Pages: 300

This heroic fantasy is set in a world of ominous landscape and macabre menace that is a dark mirror of our own.  A spellbinding tale of good versus evil, it features one of Stephen King's most powerful creations- The Gunslinger, a haunting figure who embodies the qualities of the lone hero through the ages from ancient myth to frontier western legend.  His pursuit of The Man In Black, his liaison with the sexually ravenous Alice, his friendship with the kid from Earth Jake, are part of the drama that is both grippingly realistic and eerily dreamlike, an alchemy of storytelling sorcery.  Complete in itself, THE GUNSLINGER is the first novel in an epic series. 

Review:

The characters in this book are The Gunslinger, The Man In Black, Jake, and Alice. Alice is The Gunslinger's lover, she helps him through sex, odd I know but you have to read it in order to get it. Jake is this adorable little 11-year-old.  He helps The Gunslinger through several situations and the Gunslinger  develops a soft-spot for him which could be dangerous.  The Man In Black is the person that the Gunslinger is after.  He is this creepy man, who wears a black robe which covers his face.  He turns people to his side, brings people back from the dead, your average creeper.  The Gunslinger is the main character (obviously his name is on the cover) He is very closed, even though he's the main character we don't know much about him other than the fact that he got to be the Gunslinger by killing his old mentor, (which was the passage from boys to men back then) and he is on a journey to find the dark tower, (Not sure why yet).

The plot of this book was kind of confusing actually, I wasn't exactly sure what he was doing till I got about halfway through it. It kind of switched back and forth from his childhood to the present.  You had to be careful or you'd miss the switch and be sitting there with this blank "wtf" look on your face. (trust me, I know, I did it.) But the plot is basically about the Gunslinger following the Man in Black to get answers, and hopefully to kill him.  But when he finally catches him, he finds out that what he wants to know isn't exactly what he wants to hear. Good plot, can't wait for the next book.

It took me about a day and a half to read this book because it was quite short (300 pages????), and it wasn't too deep.  Which is quite odd for Stephen King.  This is such a good book, kinda boring at first, but don't let that stop you. I would definitely recommend starting this series!

~C~