The Dark Tower

This is the final part of my read-through of 'The Dark Tower'. Part 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is here, Part 4 is here, Part 5 is here, Part 6 is here and Part 7 is here. Once again, here be spoilers.  

So I'm finally done. Roland has reached the tower, after all the years and miles. Was it worth it?

Well, yes and no. Unfortunately I think this is one of the weakest books in the series, which is a real shame; you always expect a series like this to go out with a bang, and it doesn't. But, in the context of the ending, that sort of makes sense and sort of works, dissatisfying as it is. We'll get to that, though.

Throughout the other books - particularly from Wolves onwards - there's a feeling that the world, all the worlds, and growing tired and slowing down. With this one, though, I got the sense that King himself had grown tired of the story and wanted to be done with it. I can't point to any examples of why I felt this, but especially in the middle section of the book I felt like the prose dragged and the pace slowed to a near crawl. I also spotted King using deus ex machina to move the plot along, whereas in previous volumes he has made use of things that showed up earlier in the series. You could argue - and you'd be right - that this is how he used Sheemie, but what about Patrick Danville? He plays a major role - you could say the most important role in the series - and yet he only shows up in this book, with only two purposes; to remove Susannah from the story, and to defeat the Crimson King.

I didn't feel much tension reading this book, either. Even when Mordred is stalking the ka-tet - and later Roland, Susannah and Oy - there is no sense that he may catch up to them. It never feels like they are in any real danger, and that turned the book into a bit of a slog.

Let's talk about death. King handled the deaths of Eddie, Jake and Oy beautifully. Each of them is deeply moving in its own way, and we finally see some emotional depth to Roland. There's a real sense of loss surrounding each of the deaths, and King allows Susannah to grieve in a way that is emotionally resonant and seems true to the character. He lets the characters wallow and feel helpless in their grief, and that's something that I don't feel is shown enough in epic fantasy. Characters die, and the rest move on without a thought. Not so here.

On the other hand, let's talk about death. Specifically Walter o'Dim/Randall Flagg and the Crimson King. King delivered with the deaths of the gunslingers, but here I felt cheated. Flagg's death in particular annoyed me. Here is Roland's mortal enemy, the man in black, a character introduced in the series even before Roland arrived - The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed, remember? He's set up as nearly omnipotent, canny, intelligent, almost impossible to outwit. Yet when we see him facing Mordred he seems a different character completely. He appears as a tittering fool, a man of little intellect, and Mordred fools him easily. I feel like King robs us of seeing Flagg get what he deserved, and he robs Flagg of a death befitting of his place in the series.

The same goes, to some extent, for the Crimson King. In the last few books the King takes on an aspect almost as terrible as that of Walter. I don't mind the way the King was portrayed at the end - we've been told that he's a lunatic, that he's lost his mind, and he behaves in a way that fits with that. But we've been robbed of a final showdown with Walter, and now King robs us of one with the King as well. Roland cowers behind a rock, shooting sneetches out of the air, while a character who has only been in the book for about a hundred pages destroys on of the series' main protagonists with a pencil and a rubber. I felt cheated, and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

Still, the ending itself - love it or hate it, and I love it - is perfect, and I like the fact that there are still unanswered questions. For example, what exactly happened at Jericho Hill? What is the significance of the horn, and how will Roland's quest be different this time around now that he has it? More importantly, why is Roland destined to spend his life questing for the Tower? That last one has, in fairness, been answered throughout the series - ka is a wheel, after all. But still...why Roland, and why this quest? One thing I'm particularly interested in - and I think this is because I'm interested in the craft of writing - is to see whether or not that moment of remembrance Roland has after first reappearing in the desert is present in the opening pages of The Gunslinger. I would love it if it is - if King had already showed us how this series would end - but I have a feeling, based on knowing sort of how King writes, that it isn't.

But anyway. Thus ends my read-through of The Dark Tower. If you haven't read them yourself, I highly recommend them. Despite the shortcomings I've touched at in these reviews, they are hugely enjoyable and, for all their flaws, I think they stand as one of King's best works.

Jukepop Serials

I'm very happy to announce that Jukepop Serials have picked up the first chapter of my as-yet untitled and as-yet unwritten novel. The working title has always been A Cure For The Itch, so we'll see if that sticks.

Here's a little bit about Jukepop:

Jukepop Serials is a new, community website for authors and readers of genre serial fiction. We love the literary tradition of serial writing that was massively popular in the 19th century, the type of writing where chapters are written and read in installments, benefitting both the writers and readers. We want to capture everything that is great about serial writing - only in a modern format for today's audience. We give our readers coins to tip the stories they like, and our writers receive real money for their serial start, if accepted, followed by the potential for monthly cash prizes for the top thirty serials based on reader tips.


The site looks fantastic, and I can't wait to see what the story section of it will look like when it goes live!

Here's the extract from my first chapter that they posted to Tumblr:

“He spat again and smiled. Another job come to an end, and right on cue he was getting nostalgic. It always went this way, didn’t it? Too long spent up in the air, noticing the things that were different about the airship, the things that weren’t right, even after all this time. Like how he couldn’t read the sky like he’d read the sea, didn’t know when a pocket of rough air was going to dump him on his arse, or how the ship sailed too smooth in calm air, didn’t roll with the waves like a boat would.”

I'm very excited about this, and interested to see what the experience of writing a serialized novel will be like. It's tempting to get the whole thing written in advance, but that's cheating - or, if not, it's certainly not in the spirit of the thing. So I'll plot and work on characters, but I won't do any writing until August when the site goes live. Watch this space!

A Proposal

I had an idea earlier today. It may pan out; it may not. It may well have been done before, and if so I'd love to know about it. But I thought I'd run it by you anyway.

Artists take commissions. We all know that. They craft wonderful one-off paintings, or sculptures, or trinket boxes, or pieces of needle-point, or whatever. And the person who commissioned it gets to own that one-off piece; gets to touch it and look and it and love it and say, "I'm the only person in the world with something like this."

I've never heard of writers doing this. (This is the part where you tell me if somebody is already doing this, because I'd love to see how they've made it work.) And the more I thought about it, the more I thought why not me?

So, here's the proposal. You send me £30*. In return, I'll write you a story of at least 1,500 words about whatever you want - and there won't be an upper limit imposed on this; the story will be as long as the story needs to be - which I will have made into a wonderful one-of-a-kind chapbook. I'll post it to you. You will own the book (though I'll retain copyright on the story, of course) and nobody else will. That's it. Nice and simple.

What do you think? Let me know in the comments, or drop me an email at c.bissette[no-spam]@hotmail.co.uk (removing the [no-spam] thing first, obviously).



*For anybody wondering where I got £30 from, let me explain. £30 covers a semi-pro rate of pay for a 1,500 word story - and chances are you'll be getting a longer piece than that - plus the cost of producing the book and posting it to you, wherever you are in the world. It feels fair to me. If you disagree, please do get in touch!

Song of Susannah

This is the penultimate part of my read-through of 'The Dark Tower'.  Part 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is here, Part 4 is here, Part 5 is here, Part 6 is here and Part 8 is here. . Once again, here be spoilers.  


I remember Song of Susannah as being one of the weaker books in this series, and that certainly seems to be the consensus among other Dark Tower fans who I've spoken to. I think I've revised my opinion, though.


I absolutely flew through this book, and that's due in no small part to the fact that once the action gets going it doesn't let up at all. The earlier books are punctuated with lulls in the action, calm moments before the storm, or they build inevitably (as with Wolves) towards a massive conflict at the end.


That isn't the case with Susannah. From the moment that Jake forces the door in Doorway Cave open to the point where Mia's chap is finally born it's non-stop. And even in and amongst the constant conflict, we're still building towards one final showdown at the Dixie Pig - a showdown that King, the bastard, leaves until the final book. I'd say that this is a cliffhanger on a par with that at the end of The Waste Lands - Blaine the mono rocketing the ka-tet across Mid-World, and the riddle competition beginning.


Susannah's Dogan did turn out to be important, but I still have memories of it playing a larger role in the books. Maybe that's just me remembering wrong, or maybe it's still to come in The Dark Tower. I also wasn't annoyed by King's appearance in the book - he's only in it for a few pages, and he serves a purpose. I can't remember if he's in the final book or not - I'm going to venture a guess that he is. We'll see how I feel about that when I get to it. It would have been easy for King to paint himself in a good light, though, and I'm glad to see that he didn't - he comes across as just as much of an addict as... well, most of the other characters, in one way or another. I wonder how many drafts King went through to get that right?


I would also love to know whether the excerpts from King's diary at the end of the book are taken from his real journals or not. I'm going to venture a guess and say that they aren't, but I'd love to be enlightened on that.


Only one book left now, and that ending...

The Wolves of The Calla

This is part six of my read-through of 'The Dark Tower'.  Part 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is here, Part 4 is here, Part 5 is here, Part 7 is here and Part 8 is here. . Once again, here be spoilers. 


Somehow I didn't notice when reading Wind Through The Keyhole that the strange sat-nav thing that guides Tim through the forest cites Directive 19 as a reason for being unable to give him some information. And somehow, in reading the series, I'd completely forgotten that the books become obsessed with the number 19 in the final leg of the story. Of course, the second I opening Wolves I remembered, and that tiny little detail in Wind makes it slot into the world of The Dark Tower even more smoothly than I originally had thought.


This is the point in the series where King begins to get really meta-fictional. Don Callahan from Salem's Lot is a character of huge importance in Wolves, and we see Wolves modelled on Dr. Doom wielding lightsabers and golden snitches (or sneetches, if you prefer). I can't remember if there's anything else in the next two books - besides King appearing as a character, of course - but I'm sure there must be. In Wolves, at least, all these references are seamlessly woven into the narrative. I'm fairly sure that it's in the next book - Song of Susannah - that King makes his appearance, and I remember hating it at the time I first read the book. We'll see how I deal with it this time around.


I spent most of this book waiting for the Dogan to make an appearance, as it was the one thing I really remembered from this book, yet it's only in it for a few pages. I have the feeling it makes a reappearance in Song of Susannah, and plays quite a large role. This is also the point where King introduces the Breakers, who I had forgotten all about, and we start to learn what's happening to the world. There's a real sense that the story is drawing to a close now, that the end of the journey is in sight.


Some very brief reactions to Wolves:

• I'd forgotten that Benny dies. I was genuinely shocked when it happened.
• I have a feeling - though I'm not 100% sure - that Oy either doesn't speak again the series or that he stops speaking as much. I'd like to be wrong.
• This is still my favourite of the books so far, even though I think I'm in the minority there. 

And still the Tower draws closer...

National Flash Fiction Day

It's the first National Flash Fiction Day. Hurrah! This has been a long time in the making for everyone involved, and it's great to have watched it all come together over the last few months even if the only part I've played in it has been editing Tomorrows. As a small celebration of the day, though, I thought I'd leave a little run-down of some of the things that're going on today (though this will probably be Manchester-specific). So, without further ado!

• The official National Flash Fiction Day pop-up journal FlashFlood is live and has been publishing pieces of flash every hour or so since midnight. My piece Potency goes live at around 2PM, but you should head over there now and read the other stories. There's some really good stuff there!
• The insanely energetic guys at FlashTag are doing a tour of Manchester, popping up all over the city to perform very short stories and then vanishing again. Keep up with them on Twitter @flashtagmcr
• Bad Language are hosting an evening of flash fiction at 3-Minute Theatre in Afflecks Palace. It kicks off at 7:30pm and should be a great night. There will be loads of readings and things going on and stuff to buy, and I'll be there with copies of Tomorrows.
• Jawbreakers, the anthology produced by Calum Kerr and the rest of the organisers of NFFD, is available now, and Jen Campbell has posted a great video of herself reading words that she wrote in the form of the title story from the anthology.

So, there are some of the ways you can get involved with the first National Flash Fiction Day. If nothing else you should definitely come down to the Bad Language event in the evening, and pop on the FlashFlood and check out some of the great stories there.

All that's left to say is a massive congratulations to Calum Kerr for thinking up and organising the whole thing!

Cutaway Magazine

I received my contributor's copy of Cutaway yesterday. Words can't quite describe how good this thing looks in the flesh.

The bad picture doesn't do it justice either, but there you go. This is also the first time that one of my stories has had any kind of illustration with it. There are two photos alongside my words, provided by the wonderful Shelly Sometimes. I won't post pictures of them here, though - if you want to see them you'll have to buy the magazine. Which you'll be doing anyway, because you want to read Marionette, right?

As for the story itself, it's one that I was happy with the moment I wrote it. It came from three words provided over Twitter by Emma Reynolds some time last year. I scribbled it on pieces of till roll in between serving customers at my old job, typed it up without really changing anything and started submitting it. The story as it appears in Cutaway is, I think, exactly the same as the story I initially drafted onto scraps of paper. I certainly have no memory of ever re-drafting it. That isn't my normal way of working - although the scraps of till roll are fairly usual for me - but it seems to have worked this time, if I do say so myself. 

Flash 365

I've just finished my first week of writing a story a day for a year (you can see my efforts over here). It may seem a little soon to start talking about what I'm learning from the experience, but that's exactly what I'm going to do.

I've had writing routines before. I've tried to write an arbitrary number of words per day - 1000, 2000, at one point I was on 4k words a day - and I've always ended up coming to hate the time where I sat down to write. That may be because I've always tried to write novels this way, and when you're writing a novel it feels like there's no end in sight. Especially once you hit what I like to call the scary middle bit - which is where I've been floundering on The Gibbet's Cross for the last few months - and you get bogged down in characters who feel flat and plots that don't seem to be going anywhere. I know from experience that once you get out on the other side of the scary middle bit it turns into smooth sailing as all your plots come together and the end rockets in to sight, but it's hard to tell yourself that when you're struggling to make the middle section work.

So, what's this got to do with Flash 365? Every time I've tried to get into a routine of writing, I've got about a week in before I stopped enjoying it. That hasn't happened this time. I'm already finding myself looking forward to sitting down and writing every day - and, crucially, I've already stopped worrying about whether or not what I'm writing is any good or not, and instead I'm just writing for the sheer fun of it. It feels like writing used to feel when I was 9 or 10 years old, writing purely for me and not caring if other people thought what I was putting out was rubbish.

That may seem a weird thing to say, when I'm writing for an audience, but that's what seems to be working for me. And I've already produced a couple of stories that I'm pretty happy with - Cactus, for example (which netted me my first ever piece of hate mail), and Wunderkammer. The titles may be terrible, but I like the stories and they came out pretty much as I wanted them to, which I can't say for a lot of the things I've written this year.

Crucially, I'm writing again. I haven't written properly for a few months now, and it feels good to be putting pen to page again. I may only be 2% of the way through this experiment, but it feels good. Here's the to other 98%.

The Wind Through The Keyhole

This is part five (or 4.5, if you prefer) of my read-through of 'The Dark Tower'.  Part 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is here, Part 4 is here, Part 6 is here, Part 7 is here and Part 8 is here. Once again, here be spoilers.


I'd originally hoped to get this entry up to coincide with the release of Wind Through The Keyhole, but unfortunately life got in the way and I didn't manage to finish the book in time. Oh well. Still, I'm grateful to the folks at Hodder for sending me a review copy in advance of publication, even if I didn't get to use it in time. That said...

I really enjoyed this new addition to the Dark Tower series, even if it doesn't really add anything to the story. This new book takes the form of a story within a story within a story - that is, 'The Wind Through The Keyhole' is a story told by a younger Roland within the framework of 'The Skin-man', a story the older Roland tells to his ka-tet while they are waiting out a storm. All of the publicity for the book claimed that this could work perfectly well as a standalone novel - i.e. as a book for people who haven't read the other Dark Tower books.

Frankly, it isn't. I'm sure you could read it and enjoy it, but so much of the story would be lost on you that it wouldn't really make much sense, and I don't think new readers would necessarily read this and immediately want to go back to The Gunslinger and start the series on the back of having read Keyhole. The stories are entertaining, particularly the 'Wind Through The Keyhole' section, but they contain so many things that are specific to the Dark Tower series - references to ka, to the Path of the Beam, to the Tower itself - that I think the uninitiated would simply be confused. A large portion of the enjoyment I got out of it was knowing that the Covenant Man in the 'Wind Through The Keyhole' section was actually Flagg/The Man In Black - I enjoyed seeing how he had been active for so long, and in so much of the world, and that would be lost on people who haven't read the other books.

One thing that bothered me - and I think this is the reason I though the 'Wind' section was so much stronger than 'The Skin-man' - was that King chose to narrate the 'Skin-man' part of the book in the first person. To be quite blunt, I didn't think it worked. Roland's voice and character didn't come across anywhere near as well as though in the third-person narrative of the rest of the books. I also felt that it jarred with the style of the rest of the series - every time Roland talks of his past in length, such as in Wizard and Glass, we're shown it through third person. This is the first time in the series that we've been told a story in Roland's voice, and I didn't think it worked.

That said, I did really enjoy this as an addition to the series. It doesn't get the ka-tet any closer to the Tower - how could it, given that it has to take place between two other books? - but it fleshed out some of Roland's history and added some more depth to the world. Aslan as one of the Guardians of the Beam was a nice touch, and it paves the way somewhat for the meta-fictional elements that I know appear later in the series. The starkblast is an interesting invention, too, and King makes good use of it as a framing device for the stories he tells here.

So, it worked, but didn't work as intended (in my opinion). I'd love to see some more novellas like this set in the world of the Dark Tower, though - and as King has hinted that the original seven books only form the first part of the much longer story, I hope we'll see more of them.

Next stop, Wolves of The Calla - from what I remember, my favourite of the series. I'm looking forward to this one.

Integrity

As some of you know, I'm currently studying English Literature & Creative Writing as a mature student. I've written before about some of the issues I've found with my course, but there's one big one that has been bothering me for a while now. It comes down to one basic thing: How much do the people teaching the course actually know about writing, and how qualified are they to be teaching it?

I've said previously that creative writing courses shouldn't just focus on how to write, but also on how to manage the business side of being a writer. I firmly believe we should be being taught things like how to write proper covering letters when submitting, the importance of following submission guidelines, standard manuscript formatting and why it is so important, what to look for in contracts and how to know what rights you're giving up when you sell work and what that means, etc. (Obviously all these examples apply mostly to writing fiction, but that is where my interests lie). None of these are taught, unfortunately, and I really believe they should be.

The other thing I thing should be covered - and out of all of those things I listed, I think this is one of the most important - is how to conduct yourself with integrity as a writer. This has been touched on briefly on my course - we had a very, very short discussion of the drama surrounded James Frey's A Million Little Pieces - but I don't think it's been enough. We should be looking at things like Jacqueline Howett's spectacular example of how not to respond to criticism, and how situations like this could potentially ruin your career before you've even begun - how not to conduct yourself, in other words.

For a long while now I've had my doubts about the so-called "expertise" of one of my tutors, who will remain nameless. We regularly receive lists of publishing "opportunities", which inevitably turn out to be fee-charging markets or markets with such limited exposure that we'd be better off self-publishing (which isn't a dig at those people who choose to self-publish). The big red flag came when we were encouraged to attend a conference/workshop run by a small press who have connections with a very dodgy agent - an agent who we were also encouraged to meet up with and pitch to.

I was going to write this post then, but I thought I'd let it slide. I know enough to research opportunities before I commit time and money to them, and these "opportunity" emails don't seem to be doing any harm.

The tutor in question has talked at length about all her publishing success, and last week - when she found out that I'm a bookseller - she told me the story of the day she arrived in Manchester to begin teaching, and saw three of her books in the window of a bookshop. Wonderful, right?

Wrong. I happen to work in the shop she named, so I did some checking. Firstly, it turns out that all of her publishing "success" comes down to self-published books and books published by the small press that she owns - which amounts to the same thing. As I've said, I commend people who choose to put the work into self-publishing, but I don't believe it should be touted as having "been published" - because that phrase carries connotations of an editor having liked your work enough to pay you for it and invest in it. I think it's particularly important not to misrepresent something like this in a situation where you are speaking to a room full of people who want a career in writing and think that you know something they don't.

But I digress. I know that we stock some self-published titles, so I checked the system - it's not beyond the realms of possibility that a) we stocked her books and b) they were in the window.

Unfortunately, we have never stocked any of her books. Only 4 of them show up on the system at all - as far as the company I work for is concerned, the rest of her rather considerable output may as well have never been written.

I'm not sure what I do about this. Do I call her out on it? Do I speak to the course leader and ask him if he was aware of this when he put her in a room full of people and allowed her to claim to be an expert on writing? Or do I just send this post out into the world, and know that I've said my bit?

Tomorrows and Flash 365

The chapbook of flash fiction that I've been editing - entitled Tomorrows - is back from the printers.

Editing it has been hard work, but it was worth it. I learned a lot about how books are made, about dealing with authors (and, through that, how I should be dealing with editors if I want to make a good impression), and about what kinds of things I do and don't like in a story. I dealt with a re-write request - something I've never been asked to do as an author - which paid off (that particular story is one of my favourites in the book), and I learned that authors can be a demanding lot.

So far the feedback about the book has been fantastic, and I'm really looking forward to it being released into the wild. Copies are £4.50 and available here, with all the proceeds going back into the Uni of Salford Literary Society so that we can put out some more publications next year. You'll also be getting a brand new story from me - and really, why wouldn't you want that?

As far as flash fiction goes, I'm also happy to be able to announce that as of today I'm taking over the reins of Calum Kerr's Flash 365 project. He's been publishing a story a day to his blog for the past year. He finished yesterday, and he's passing the torch to me (as well as Kath Lloyd, who will be taking on the challenge as Mrs Flash 365). My page is here - please do follow it. I'll be posting a new story there every day for the next year, and they won't be posted to this blog. This one will be staying as it is - reviews, musings, music and occasional ramblings about writing.

Wizard and Glass

This is part four of my read-through of 'The Dark Tower'.  Part 1 is here, Part 2 is here, Part 3 is here, Part 5 is here, Part 6 is here, Part 7 is here and Part 8 is here. . Once again, here be spoilers.


This is the book I've been waiting for in this series - the book where we find out why Roland is questing for the Dark Tower, and what that quest has already done to his life. We finally get the back story to Roland that I've been waiting for for so long, and it comes at a great time. So far the ka-tet have been travelling without any concrete goal - we know they're looking for the Dark Tower, but even they don't know why, and they simply travel and react to the conflicts that ka sets in their path. Any more of it and it would start to get repetitive and boring, so King choosing to focus this book on Roland's history was a good call.

A lot of this book came back to me as I was reading it. I remembered feeling mounting horror towards the end of the book, when we keep hearing the words Charyou tree and know exactly what that will mean for Susan. Rhea of the Coos is a great character, and I can't remember for the life of me if she plays a role later in the series - but I hope she does.

I said in the last post that I'd keep an eye out for something from The Waste Lands cropping up in this book - and that thing turned out to be the Tick-Tock man. I'd remembered the mirroring between the story of 'The Wizard of Oz' and the events in the Oz of this book - which, again, I remembered taking up more time in the book than they did - but I'd forgotten that Tick-Tock turned out to be the man behind the curtain.

This is also the first time in the series that King starts to bring in material from his other books - namely The Stand, and Randall Flagg. I really love that Flagg turns out to be the villain in this series, but I also remember that we're not far now from the point where King appears in the novels as a character himself - and I remember how much that annoyed me on my first read through the series.

I'm really looking forward to Wolves Of The Calla - I seem to remember that there's another showdown with Flagg, though I could be wrong. Before that, though, is Wind Through The Keyhole - and I have no idea what to expect with this one. I'm going to guess that it focusses on the rest of the story Roland tells in Wizard & Glass, the events that transpire between his return to Gilead and killing his mother, but I could be wrong. Either way, I'm looking forward to it.