The Road to The Dark Tower (64 page)
Read The Road to The Dark Tower Online
Authors: Bev Vincent
Rich Chizmar was the first person to tell me he thought the idea for this book was sound, and encouraged me to take it on. Rich has been a great friend for several years, and I’m one of only a few people who can claim to have seen him wearing a tuxedo. He cleans up
good.
Thanks to Peter Straub and Edward Bryant for allowing me to quote from their essays, interviews and reviews in this work.
Susan Moldow at Scribner encouraged me to pursue this project, which helped boost my confidence in the early stages of the process.
There’s a group of people whom I’ve taken to calling the triumvirate of Stephen King webmasters. It’s composed of Hans-Ake Lilja (Lilja’s Library), Rosandra Montequin (Needful Things) and Kev Quigley (Charnel House). If you’re looking for all the news that’s fit to e-print, check out one of these sites. See appendix IV for links.
Robin Furth’s
Concordance
was an invaluable reference tool while I worked on this book, as were our e-mail exchanges as we delved into esoteric details of Roland’s world. Thanks also to Chuck Verrill, who answered my questions when I tried to spread them around so as to not be too much of a pest to any one person.
Rocky Wood, David Rawsthorne and Norma Blackburn are the authors of the CD-ROM encyclopedia
The Complete Guide to the Works of Stephen King.
There will never be a more exhaustive and thorough tool for anyone working on a project related to Stephen King’s fiction. When I needed to track down some detail for my research, this is where I turned first.
For the better part of a year, I watched discussions of the series at The Dark Tower dot Net and on SKEMERs, as well as on my own message board. Comments made in these forums inspired me to think about some
Dark Tower
concepts that I might not have considered otherwise. I’ve especially enjoyed watching fans of the series guess what might happen in the as-yet-unpublished books, and it’s been hard to keep from confirming or denying their speculations.
Finally, my wife and daughter have had to deal with the crazy schedule of a writer who also has a day job during this whole process since I started
The Road to the Dark Tower
in late 2002. They’ve both been incredibly supportive and put up with me when I was less than available, especially during deadline periods. To Mary Anne, thank you for encouraging me to reach higher when I might otherwise have let opportunity pass me by. I love you and I promise to always love you! To Ginny, I love you, and I’m very proud of the young woman you’ve become. The world, your quest, still lies before you.
I would like to thank Stephen King for giving permission to quote from his published works in this book. The following abbreviations are used in the text to identify the source of quoted material, all of which are copyright Stephen King. Quotes from
Song of Susannah
and
The Dark Tower
come from prerelease manuscripts and may be different from what appears in the final versions.
DT1:
The Gunslinger
, Donald M. Grant, 1982. Revised and expanded version, Viking, 2003. Individual stories originally published in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction
between 1978 and 1981.
DT2:
The Drawing of the Three
, Donald M. Grant, 1987.
DT3:
The Waste Lands
, Donald M. Grant, 1991.
DT4:
Wizard and Glass
, Donald M. Grant, 1997.
DT5:
Wolves of the Calla
, Donald M. Grant and Scribner, 2003.
DT6:
Song of Susannah
, Donald M. Grant and Scribner, 2004.
DT7:
The Dark Tower
, Donald M. Grant and Scribner, 2004.
SL:
’Salem’s Lot
, Doubleday, 1975.
TS:
The Stand
, Doubleday, 1978. Revised and expanded edition, Doubleday, 1990.
DS:
Different Seasons
, Viking, 1982.
TT:
The Talisman
, with Peter Straub, Viking, 1984.
ED:
The Eyes of the Dragon
, Philtrum Press, 1984. Revised edition, Viking, 1987.
TK:
The Tommyknockers
, G. P. Putnam & Sons, 1987.
INS:
Insomnia
, Viking, 1994.
RM:
Rose Madder
, Viking, 1995.
LS: “The Little Sisters of Eluria,” in
Legends: Short Novels by the Masters of Modern Fantasy
, edited by Robert Silverberg, Tor, 1998. Collected in
Everything’s Eventual
, Scribner, 2002.
HA:
Hearts in Atlantis
, Scribner, 1999.
OW:
On Writing
, Scribner, 2000.
BH:
Black House
, with Peter Straub, Random House, 2001.
EE:
Everything’s Eventual
, Scribner, 2002. The novella of the same name first appeared in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction
, 1997.
FB8:
From a Buick 8
, Scribner, 2002.
Bev Vincent
is the author of more than two dozen short stories and the Stephen King column “News from the Dead Zone,” featured in
Cemetery Dance
magazine. He lives in Texas with his wife and teenage daughter.
Photo by Tom Richardson, SouthernExposure.Biz
*
Note: These URLs were valid as of March 2004.
INTRODUCTION: MORE WORLDS THAN THESE
CHAPTER 1: THE LONG JOURNEY TO THE TOWER
CHAPTER 2: THE GUNSLINGER (RESUMPTION)
CHAPTER 3: THE DRAWING OF THE THREE (RENEWAL)
CHAPTER 4: THE WASTE LANDS (REDEMPTION)
CHAPTER 5: WIZARD AND GLASS (REGARD)
CHAPTER 6: WOLVES OF THE CALLA (RESISTANCE)
CHAPTER 7: SONG OF SUSANNAH (REPRODUCTION)
CHAPTER 8: THE DARK TOWER (RESUMPTION)
CHAPTER 11: EPICS, INFLUENCES AND KA
CHAPTER 12: ART AND THE ART OF CREATION
APPENDIX II:
TIMELINE (FICTION)
APPENDIX III:
MID-WORLD GLOSSARY
APPENDIX IV: THE DARK TOWER ON THE WEB
APPENDIX V: SYNOPSES AND NOTES FROM
THE MAGAZINE OF FANTASY AND SCIENCE FICTION
APPENDIX VI: “CHILDE ROWLAND TO THE DARK TOWER CAME”
REFERENCES AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
New American Library
Published by New American Library, a division of
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Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published by New American Library, a division of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
First Electronic edition, November 2004
Copyright © Bev Vincent, 2004
All rights reserved
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ref-1
for author permissions.)
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AEB ISBN 0 7865 5234 4
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