A great summary not only of each of the 7 books and other novels about the tower, but a nice complement to the series as a whole. Vincent provides his summary, but then also reflects on ka and King's committment to the story as a whole and as his magnum opus.

A well written book. Enjoyed reading it.

I don't re-read books very often, so when I like to revisit a world--I'd rather have a handy guide like this, than perhaps go through 4,000+ pages King's works to illuminate foibles that may or may not be there.

This is a pretty straightforward guide and often lifts the examples straight from the text, rather than giving some sort of abstract criticism. And that's fine! It's nice to have a relatively brisk summary of why this series is the "St. Elsewhere" of King's fiction.

While I'm not a HUGE fan of King, I respect him and his opinions greatly. He's a consummate craftsman/workhorse, and this is probably his magnum opus.

Overall, this is an excellent companion, probably most helpful after one has read the Dark Tower series. The strengths of the book are its demonstrations of ways the series (inter-)connects with King's other writings and its character studies near the end. The weak part is that some of the book is merely a streamlined retelling of the series, although I do admit it's helpful to get a bird's view and the author makes keen observations in the process.

This book would probably only be valuable to those who (a) have read the series, and (b) really enjoyed it. Skip if you haven't read it, didn't like it, or only kinda sorta liked it; but, if you're a major fan of the series, this is very enjoyable---and I would personally suggest read it after having read the series.

This rating is probably more due to my being a Dark Tower fan more than anything else. The book itself is fine, but not outstanding. It plays well to my favorite aspect of the DT series: the world King built and the carryover between the Tower books and his others works. I wouldn't say that there's much in the way of criticism here, more summary of books and characters. But it was fun to dip back into the DT world after reading a few of the prequel comics.

What is Stephen King's Magnum Opus?

I've long thought Stephen King is much like the hero of the Dark Tower saga, Roland Deschain. Roland is self-described as light on imagination. Then he proceeds to defy that description with his cunning and creativity. King is similarly self-effacing, and I buy it from him even less. Methinks Stephen King is the preeminent literary genius of our time, even if he is popular. Someday school kids will study him no less than Edgar Allen Poe. I agree with Bev Vincent. This is his magnum opus.

The Road to the Dark Tower serves more as a summary than an analysis. I wanted to delve deeper into the tower, but I'll take what I can get. The Dark Tower adventure is my adventure. I have a claim that feels unique, even while I'm forced to admit that many feel the same way about the gunslinger. If you haven’t read those books, you won't read this book. But dude. Go read The Dark Tower.

One of the first purchases I made on my kindle. Love King. Love The Dark Tower books. This is a fabulous read, which I recommend highly if you are a fan.

A well written book. Enjoyed reading it.

I loved this book. Bev Vincent is a brilliant author and his research is impeccable.

What it's about: This book provides a comprehensive overview and analysis of Stephen King's Dark Tower series and related works.

What I thought: I had hoped to read this and come away with some new insights or understandings about King's work. I have enjoyed reading the Dark Tower books over the years, and I am always interested in getting some additional "inside information" about things I enjoy. This review didn't really do that. This may be because it was written at the same time the final books of the series were being prepared for release, so there was not a chance for the author to marinate and ruminate.

Mostly, this is a book that summarizes. There are summaries of each book of the series. There are summaries of the main characters. There are timelines that summarize the real and fictional order of events surrounding these books. There are summaries of other books and stories that are connected to the central series. But the analysis feels very superficial.

Also, there is a lot of repetition of phrases and sentences throughout this work. It feels more like it's meant to be referenced like a dictionary. It feels like the author did not expect people to read from beginning to end, but rather to access certain portions on an as-needed basis. But I'm not sure what the need is.

Why I rated it like I did: In addition to not providing much insight into the titular series, the writing could have been polished a bit. There was a LOT of pronoun ambiguity that had me re-reading sentences and paragraphs to try to unravel who, exactly, was being discussed at the end of the bit, 'cause it was often not the same person mentioned at the beginning.

The dark tower and gunslinger books are quite deep but, very good.

Like many others, I am a great fan of the Dark Tower series and was expecting that this book would include some substantive discussion of themes, connections, and other tidbits throughout the books that I had missed. Instead, it's basically just a book report of each of the volumes with bland bios of the main characters. There are a few chapters of "analysis" at the end, but don't bother. I'd recommend this book to a middle schooler writing a report about the Dark Tower books.