At a crossroads in rural Maine in early 1970, a young Stephen King meets with The Dark Man and discusses his future in writing and specifically a forthcoming book called Wizard and Glass.

DM: So we gonna close this deal or what? I got people waiting –

SK: I dunno, Mr. – what do I call you again?

DM: Friend, you call me friend, right? Come on Stevie, I thought we’d been through this, you came to meet with me and I’m acting in good faith here, you got some other agenda? Something I should know about? Can’t I trust you? Are you not trustworthy?

SK: Yes, yes, I just – my eternal soul seems like a high price –

DM: An investment is what this is, don’t think in terms of price, think investment. I see big things for us, Stevie, and I’m investing in you, and this partnership. We’re gonna be partners right?

SK: Um, yeah, just, you know, this is a little, a little scary.

DM: Hahahaha! I LOVE that about you. Listen, I’m a humanist, OK? I’m into what’s right for you, and listen, Stevie, baby, you and me are going to DEFINE scary for the next few decades, OK?

SK: OK.

DM: Alright, so you’re going to have some success with those ideas I gave you, you’re going to get established, you’re going to be HUGE. But that’s just a start, you’re going to publish a little book called The Gunslinger in a few years.

SK: A western?

DM: Ha! You’re quick kid, you’re keeping up. Yes … aaaaaand, no … it’s so much MORE than a western, an American fantasy, but also more than that, a western CIVILZATION fantasy. This has deep roots, babe, and you’re going to be my front man.

SK: Cool.

DM: It is cool, isn’t it? OK, The Gunslinger is going to start the Dark Tower series, like the name?

SK: Yeah –

DM: Awesome, OK, and the FOURTH book, is going to be called Wizard and Glass, you following me –

SK: Wizard and Glass, fourth book –

DM: Mind like a steel trap, this one, OK, Stevie, Wizard and Glass is going to be about a storytelling, about a multiverse and about the origins of our hero.

SK: Who’ll be the hero?

DM: Roland of Gilead, but all in good time, my friend, but trust me, readers, YOUR readers, will love the way this continues the Dark Tower story and provides some background. We learn about the protagonist’s heraldic past (and this will be the best part of the book, all about the world where Roland comes from, tying this story to the other Dark Tower books and also building on much of your other writing) and a lot more about the other characters and your world building, which is intricate and brilliant, this will be your masterwork. And remember this, that there are other worlds than these.

SK: But what about the protagonist? What other characters? My world building? The world of the Dark Tower?

DM: Ha! All in good time, and we’re going to throw in some connections to the Wizard of Oz, more multiverse stuff you’ll like.

SK: Baum? Wizard of Oz, really?

DM: Baum’s an old colleague of ours, you’ll get to meet him, you’ll like him.

SK: I get to meet L. Frank Baum … but he’s dead.

DM: You’re getting ahead of yourself, Slick, we’ve got some business first, now, just a little pinprick and –

SK: Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

DM: - but you may feel a little sick. Can you stand up? Good, I do believe it’s working, you ready?

SK: Ready for the Dark Tower and the fourth book Wizard and Glass. But what’s Mid-World?

Story 5/5
Narration 5/5

I loved it!
Wizard And Glass takes us to Roland’s tragic youth.
We meet Cuthbert and Alain, his first Ka-Tet. We also meet Susan and Sheemie, two complex and lovable characters. Unfortunately for them SK also created very good evil characters too.
I’m saying the obvious, but as always, Stephen King characters development is perfect. I wanted to meet them, except for the evil ones, they are too cruel and insane. That’s how realistic they seemed to me.
The story is very well written, very interesting and so captivating!
I highly recommend this fourth story of the Dark Tower saga.

It hurt a bit to say that this one is probably one of my least favourite book in The Dark Tower series. With King, I have come to expect the flood of backstories. So yes, I was very much prepared when I picked this up.

Roland Deschain's recollections of his past did not bother me (I've always been curious about his Life Before) so it's not the backstories that made me knock out the stars, but rather it is the missing ka-tet I am more familiar with. I missed Eddie, Susannah, Jake and Oy - they were hardly there in the story and it just didn't  feel the same with the new company I found myself in.  Something else I need to admit is that throughout Roland's storytelling of his green days, I longed for the 'older' him - the aged gunslinger who I know I can rely on and who is also more steady on his feet. That man is a much, much more reassuring presence.  Reading about his younger self made me feel nervous. Young people tend to be full of surprises and my reading process felt like waiting for a horrible accident to happen. I almost didn't want to continue for a long time. I did continue after a few days of not reading a single words and look what happened . . .

Aside from causing me severe heartbreaks and nervous breakdowns, King still managed to knock me off when he added more interconnections to his other books. He even went beyond as to add a parallel connection with the classical book  The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Something tells me the surprises won't end here.

More is to come and I'm not entirely sure I'll be ready. I'm damned to continue the rest and I've been damned from the start of this series.

Actual rating: (a very high) 3.5 stars.

As Rhea of Coos hobbled over to her table, she gave Musty, her foul smelling mutant cat, a swift kick.

"I'll give ya a tongue bath later"!

Rhea was anxious to examine the contents of the bag the silver headed stranger had just dropped off. In the bag were two glass balls; both the size of grapefruits. One was shaded pink, the other a bright purple. She grasped the pink orb and immediately felt a warm tingling between her legs. Ermot dropped down the floor from beneath her skirt and crawled over to the garbage heap.

“Hehehe”, she cackled. “Let’s see what forspecial things I can see whilst looking at this marvelous ball.”

She picked up the orb and felt a current of energy go through her tired and creaky limbs. She saw that wretched Susan Delgado and that young pup from Gilead. And nothing else but for hours upon hours. It seemed that nothing else mattered and the courtship and mating dance would go on for eons. Her head felt like a sack of potatoes and she fell asleep.

She woke finding Musty, its extra lags dangling, licking the drool that had collected on the table. Rhea chased the cat off the table and looked for the bag with the other orb. The purple one. She picked it up and it went from a royal purple to hideous neon grape color. The purple enveloped her and her face took an even more gaunt and skeletal countenance; what was left of her hair dangled in her face.

She saw another ka-tet, a different one, but she couldn’t name the place they inhabited. She watched as two blonde female gunslingers dragged another tall, muscular fellow off a horse and dragged him over to a cellar door. He was hog-tied, so the women had to struggle to move him.

The taller of the two blondes opened the door and said, “Got someone here to keep you company, Stephen.”

She turned to the other one and said, "Pistol Packin’ Rootin’ Tootin, best we fetch the sledge hammer ‘n make sure this big fellow don’t decide to wander off.”

“It’ll be my pleasure, Quick Draw”, said the other. And both howled with laughter.

Rhea grinned as the two got to work.

I see that the ratings on this book vary among my friends. Some gave it an enthusiastic five stars, others, two or three resentful stars. I am reading this book years after original publication, so I am not a victim of the anguish suffered by those who did endure the wait. I can imagine their disappointment, though. Even without my emotions and anticipation raised to a fever pitch by years of waiting, I was disappointed.

*** SPOILERS AHEAD ***

Okay, so SK felt that the story of Roland's past needed to be told--I get that. But this is so LONG! And so little happens! I think this book could have been condensed to the page count of The Gunslinger and nothing significant would have been left out. Hell, I could sum up the entire story in a paragraph!

"Roland and his friends go to Hambry to get them out of harm's way. There they discover the town government is corrupt and traitorous. They pretend to know nothing while watching the government officials. The government officials pretend to know nothing while watching Roland and his friends. Roland falls in love and begins a passionate affair with Susan Delgado. Roland and his friends destroy the resources intended for the Good Man and kill the traitors. Susan is murdered. Roland and his friends go on their way."

There you go--the whole flashback. The problem for me, as a reader, was that by the end of this book, so little movement had been made on the plot graph. The book starts with our ka-tet being saved from Blaine, the murderous monorail, and then they disappear for about 500 pages while we learn detailed accounts of people who are already dead and gone by this time in the story, people whom we will never meet again. Why spend so much time developing Jonas and his sidekicks? Cordelia Delgado? Coral Thorin? They all die back in that long-ago. If the purpose of this travel in time is to reveal to us the events that caused Roland to become who he is, aren't the effects of those events more important than the events themselves? Do we really need to know every word that was said, every detail of every move every person made, in order to understand the impact on Roland? I don't think so. SK tells the story of Roland's mother's fate in just a couple of pages, but that, to me, was more impactful than that whole drawn-out story of Hambry and Susan.

The ending--well, the ending was kind of embarrassing, actually. I get that it is a reference to a cultural icon they all share, but I just don't think SK quite pulled it off. It came off cheesy and over-the-top, especially the part with the dog shoes.

In the end, after 668 pages (in my edition), they get off of Blaine, the monorail, and are back on the Path of the Beam. That's it. That's all the progress they make. I think even people who really liked this book would have to agree--that's not much!

“If it’s ka it’ll come like a wind, and your plans will stand before it no more than a barn before a cyclone.”

The fourth book in the Dark Tower series finds Roland telling his ka-tet the story of the first time he encountered a thinny, and also his first love, Susan Delgado.

Sadie and Jake of 11/22/63 have been my favourite King love story since forever, but I’ve got a new favourite - Roland and Susan. “If you love me, then love me.” Okay, yes. They’re teenagers and it might get a bit icky if you think about it for too long. But I think King perfectly portrays the intensity and naivety of first love. I love Susan as a character, I find her incredibly relatable, and I’ve cried with her as she mourns the loss of her father.

It honestly crushes my heart to see Roland laugh and smile with such carefree abandon. I feel like this book is CRUCIAL to understanding Roland’s past and his obsession with the tower - we finally get to see the more human side of Roland, and appreciate why he is so haunted.

Outside of the love story, I absolutely adore Alain and Cuthbert. I love the bond between the three of them, it gives me warm fuzzy feelings... and SHEEMIE. What an unsung hero. Even the villains are fucking badass. Jonas and the Big Coffin Hunters are a formidable force and that scene in the bar is just epic. And the showdown in Eyebolt Canon!! I LOVE IT. Rhea the Coös is another character that I should hate, but she steals the show anytime she pops up - although she makes my skin crawl *shudders*

I just noticed I haven’t even acknowledged the parts that bookend Roland’s tale. They’re great too, and the tie-ins to The Stand will have any Constant Reader flailing!! And the writing. My god. Some of King’s best work in here. So many parts I just reread over and over. I truly feel like this is one of King’s best pieces of work.

My fangirling is over. For the time being. 5 stars.

This book is most interesting and gripping when it actually moves the story of 'The Dark Tower' forward, something the insanely long flashback does not do at all for the majority of the book. The flashback isn't a bad story in itself, I just wish it had been published as a separate side story that fans could dig into later. The short and sweet flashbacks in the first 'Dark Tower' novel offer far more insight into Roland's character than King is able to cover in almost 500 pages here. Is the flashback a good story? Sure it is, it's full of great action, memorable scenes, and stunning mental scenery, but its bloated and repetitive nature keep it from being a truly worthy distraction from the main narrative. If I were reading these books as they came out I would have been furious after waiting five years for the fourth installment only to find that the story barely moves forward. Despite this, the final part of the book (after the flashback) kicks so much ass it makes the book worth reading all the way through. While I didn't hate this book, it feels like a hiccup in the series. I wouldn't say it isn't worth reading, but it's the only book in the series that I found genuinely frustrating at times.

In the immortal words of The Queen
n  n
Simply…the…BEST.

And yet I seem to be the only person who feels that way about this 4th installment of the Dark Tower series. Can you please riddle me why that is, sais? It’s not that fans of the series dislike this novel, but I often see it cited as their least favorite. I find that stunning and I don’t ken it. I don’t ken it a bit.

While I love the entire series, this one is easily my favorite. My gushing was so torrential when I read this that I was on an IV drip for a week afterwards just to restore proper kidney function. Even worse, the literary priapism took over a fortnight to subside which seriously roont my work schedule and ability to engage in public activities. I note for the record that all charges for lewd behavior were eventually dropped.

Now I admit I had the benefit of reading the Dark Tower novels back to back and was not one of those unfortunate souls who read this series when it first came out. For those people who had to wait years between installments, I can sympathize with their less than enthusiastic reception for a book that is almost all flashback and barely advances the main quest.

Point taken and understood.

I might have been hackled up and a bit frothy if I’d been unable to move on immediately to Wolves of the Calla
after finishing this so I will issue a partial pass for this group.

But still...there is so much…SO MUCH…awesomefuckingsauce crammed into these pages that it seems almost preternatural. Methinks there is much of magic in the pen of Sai King and this was his finest creation.

Thinking about favorite aspects of the story, I couldn’t even limit it to ten raves. It’s just too stacked with superiority. Therefore, here are (in no particular order) 10 reasons 14 reasons why

Wizard & Glass is the Pinnacle of the Dark Tower series:

1. Easily the most important Roland story of the series and it provides the raison d'être for his entire obsession with the Dark Tower. From that standpoint of understanding the quest for the Dark Tower, this is the most critical piece of the puzzle. The journey that Roland goes through in this novel from young, talented, naive 14 year old gunslinger to the jaded, cold and solitary figure readers have known throughout the series is essential for allowing us to finally see Roland as the truly tragic hero that he is.

2. We finally get to meet Alain Johns and Cuthbert Allgood.
n  n

Now I love Eddie, Sussanah and Jake, but Alain and Cuthbert completely won me over in the bar scene (see item 12). I loved finally beign able to spend some page time with them.

3. We get to see the conclusion of the Blaine the Mono ride, which had to feel even better for those left stranded for years following the cliffhanger ending of The Waste Lands. Nice to finally scratch that itch.

4. Rhea of the Coos (what a great name)
n  n

The nastiest, foulest, most sadistic, most unwanted-finger-probingest grandma of them all. King must have had nightmares while he was writing about her.

5. The tie-in to the Stand and Randall Flagg and nice jaunty detour through not-quite-Topeka, Kansas.

6. A mighty fine riff on the Wizard of Oz…yes, that’s right, it was sweet so you may cease all your hemming, hawing and harrumphing. How can you not love King’s ability to create a canvas with this much color? Where anything goes and you have no idea what the next page will bring.

7. Sheemie Ruiz
n  n

Ah...Sheemie. Hard not to love this guy, especially given the role he ends up playing. King has a gift for creating characters like this and Sheemie brings a sense of urgency and danger to the story because you know that he is just never safe.

8. Susan Delgado and an absolutely superb love story. I had never known King to write a romance/courtship/love story before this and he pulled it off with surprising skill. No clumsiness or groan-inducing dialogue. Even the sex scenes were well-written. The mind boggles at the man’s mastery over the story-telling craft.

9. The introduction of the concept of the Wizard’s Glass that will play such a pivotal role in the remaining books of the series. Plus, as a plot device it was terrific and I really enjoyed the back story.

10. The Thinny. Another wonderful plot device that ties in the breakdown of the Tower and impresses on the reader that time is running out. King’s description of the effect of the Thinny are like nails on a chalkboard uncomfortable…which is exactly as they should be.

11. The Big Coffin hunters led by Eldred Jonas

n  n

Finally a villain that Roland can truly take on in a traditional sense and I thought they were expertly drawn. Mean, nasty but human which made their vileness all the more compelling.

12. The Bar scene. IMHO, the greatest single scene in all of the Dark Tower series, was the bar scene when Roland, Cuthbert and Alain confront the Big Coffin Hunters in defense of Sheemie. It was a microcosm of everything that Roland and the champions of the White stand for and everything that they oppose in the form of the minions of the Red (and Black).

13. If I had to choose a second greatest scene in all of the Dark Tower series, it would be the final showdown between the Ka-Tet and the Big Coffin Hunters in Eyebolt Canyon. Again, King’s ability to grab you by the throat and rally your emotions is superb.

14. Roland’s Mom… The fatal meeting between Rhea, Roland and Lady Deschain was heart-breaking. King’s mile-wide range on display once again.

Overall, I just found so much in the story. It was filled with growth and pain and discovery and love and friendship and predestination vs. free will and badass bullet-filled battles and betrayal and heart-ache and good and evil…

I just find this to be the high water mark of the series. I love them all..but I love this one best.

6.0 stars. HIGHEST POSSIBLE RECOMMENDATION!!

Nominee: Locus Award for best Fantasy Novel.

`El corazón le dio un vuelco en el pecho y, aunque entonces aún no lo sabía, así la recordaría siempre, la encantadora Susan, la chica de la ventana. Así pasamos por delante de los fantasmas que más adelante nos persiguen en la vida; los vemos, si es que llegamos a verlos por el rabillo del ojo, sentados sin el menor dramatismo al borde del camino como pobres pordioseros. Raras veces se nos pasa por la cabeza la idea de que nos hayan estado esperando allí. Pero ellos esperan y, cuando ya hemos pasado, recogen sus fardos de recuerdos y siguen nuestros pasos, acortando poco a poco la distancia que los separa de nosotros.´

`Oirá su voz en inquietantes sueños durante todo el resto de su vida, jamás dejará de recordar lo que ha soñado y solo sabrá que los sueños le producen una extraña sensación de enfermedad... Caminará presa de una profunda inquietud, enderezará los cuadros de estancias abandonadas y escuchará la llamada del almuédano en extrañas plazas.´

Hasta ahora, sin lugar a dudas ha sido el mejor volumen de la torre oscura, y eso que con las tierras baldías me pareció que el listón estaba muy alto.
Esta entrega tiene el trasfondo que da sentido a la vida de Roland, un trasfondo que, realmente justifica todo este arduo viaje que es la torre oscura. Un viaje, que para mí pasa por las diferentes etapas que podemos pasar en la vida, en muchas ocasiones son tierras baldías donde la esperanza pierde un sentido, en otros perseguimos demonios de nuestro pasado para justificar nuestro presente y en otra, no obstante, la vida nos puede sorprender con el poder que tiene el amor, un amor que al fin y al cabo es casual, sutil y que se construye poco a poco a lo largo de nuestras diferentes etapas.

Es la lectura que saco yo, de lo que llevo leído de la torre oscura. Una obra maestra esta entrega, por la sutileza y los guiños no ya de obras del autor, sino guiños a nuestra propia existencia.

Agradezco mucho esta lectura, algún día puede que salga de esas tierras baldías para buscar mi torre y encontrarle un sentido a lo que solemos llamar vida

Wizard and Glass (The Dark Tower #4), Stephen King

The novel begins where The Waste Lands ended. After Jake, Eddie, Susannah and Roland fruitlessly riddle Blaine the Mono for several hours, Eddie defeats the mad computer by telling childish jokes. Blaine is unable to handle Eddie's "illogical" riddles and short-circuits.

The four gunslingers and Oy the billy-bumbler disembark at the Topeka railway station, which to their surprise is located in the Topeka, Kansas, of the 1980's.

The city is deserted, as this version of the world has been depopulated by the influenza of King's novel The Stand.

Links between these books also include the following reference to The Walkin' Dude from The Stand on page 95, "Someone had spray-painted over both signs marking the ramp's ascending curve. On the one reading St. Louis 215, someone had slashed watch out for the walking dude", among others.

The world also has some other minor differences with the one (or more) known to Eddie, Jake and Susannah; for instance, the Kansas City baseball team is the Monarchs (as opposed to the Royals), and Nozz-A-La is a popular soft drink.

The ka-tet leaves the city via the Kansas Turnpike, and as they camp one night next to an eerie dimensional hole which Roland calls a "thinny", the gunslinger tells his apprentices of his past, and his first encounter with a thinny.

At the beginning of the story-within-the-story, Roland (age fourteen) earns his guns—an episode retold in the inaugural issue of The Gunslinger Born—and becomes the youngest gunslinger in memory. He did it because he discovered his father's trusted counsellor, the sorcerer Marten Broadcloak, having an affair with his mother, Gabrielle Deschain.

In anger, Roland challenges his mentor, Cort, to a duel to earn his guns. Roland bests his teacher, and his father sends him east, away from Gilead, for his own protection. Roland leaves with two companions, Cuthbert Allgood and Alain Johns. ...

تاریخ نخستین خوانش روز ششم ماه ژانویه سال 2015میلادی

عنوان: جادوگر و گوی شیشه ‌ای (جام)؛ نویسنده استفین (استیون) کینگ؛ مترجم سهیلا الله‌دوستی؛ تهران، افراز، 1399؛ در 955ص؛ شابک 9786003266124؛ موضوع: داستانهای نویسندگان ایالات متحده آمریکا - سده 20م

کتابهای این سری، کتاب نخست با عنوان «هفت تیر کش (با عنوان تفنگدار نیز به فارسی ترجمه شده)»؛ کتاب دوم با عنوان «انتخاب سوم»؛ کتاب سوم با عنوان «سرزمین (سرزمینهای) متروک»؛ کتاب چهارم «جادوگر و گوی شیشه ای (جام)»؛ به فارسی ترجمه و منتشر شده اند؛ کتاب پنجم با عنوان «گرگهای کالا»؛ کتاب ششم با عنوان «ترانه ی سوزانا»؛ کتاب هفتم با عنوان «برج تاریک»؛ کتاب هشتم با عنوان «نسیمی از میان سوراخ کلید»، البته این عنوان قطعی نیست؛

سری «برج تاریک» از هشت کتاب، و دو داستان کوتاه برساخته شده، که در آن‌ها یک داستان یگانه، در باره ی یک «هفت تیرکش» و سفر ناباورانه ی او، به سوی «برج تاریک» بازگو می‌شوند؛ کتابهای این سری شامل ژانرهای گوناگون هستند و عناصری از جمله ترس، فانتزی علمی و فانتزی تاریکی را در بر می‌گیرند؛ گویا کینگ برای نوشتن این رمان، از فیلم «خوب، بد، زشت» و کتاب «ارباب حلقه‌ها» الهام گرفته اند؛

رمان از جایی آغاز میشود که رمان سرزمینهای متروک پایان مییابد؛ پس از اینکه «جیک»، «ادی»، «سوزانا» و «رولاند» برای چندین ساعت سر به سر گذاشتن معمایی با «بلین»، «ادی» با گفتن جوکهای کودکانه، کامپیوتر دیوانه را، شکست میدهد؛ «بلین» قادر به کنار آمدن با معماهای «غیرمنطقی» نیست

تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 03/12/1399هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی

Definitely the series is picking back up again. Wouldn't call it the best ever, but it was good. Was surprised that the story within the story took up so much of the novel. BUT that story itself was very good too.

I’m reluctant to say too much about the book as it would contain spoilers so I’ll just give a vague idea and say how I felt about it..

Another beautifully written story continuing on from the last which is set in a post-apocalyptic world. Through the eyes of Roland and his ka-tet the book further explores the concept of ‘ka’ the very essence of a being, a central theme in the series.

”Ka is a wheel, he thought. Or as Eddie Dean liked to say, whatever went around came around.“

King's work is a masterpiece that stands as a testament to his genius in storytelling. His writing style is unparalleled, filled with vivid imagery and deep emotional depth. The characters in this story are beautiful, complex and multi dimensional, with their stories and motivations driving the book forward, heroes and villains alike. The world building is detailed and immersive drawing you into other worlds with ease.

”If it’s ka, it’ll come like a wind, and your plans will stand before it no more.” - Susan Delago

The ending, while leaving room for further exploration, provides a satisfying conclusion, making it a must read for anyone who appreciates a well crafted story that blends elements of science fiction, fantasy, and horror. Again my fourth read through and I’m still finding sections pulling on my heart strings an emotional roller coaster for sure. I love this series more every time I read it..