There's No Place Like Mejico

Ben: Well it's not like there's much of a rush now anyway, I finished the book weeks and weeks ago.

Ben: The morning of January 2nd, to be precise.

Ben: Anyway

Ben: I want to give my review of this book but it's not exactly at the fore of my mind.

Me: Dammit, Ben.

Ben: Damn yourself.

Ben: What have you been doing all month?

Me: We are always online at the same time.

Ben: You are never online.

Ben: I have been waiting with bated breath for your name to appear in my buddy list for a month now.

Ben: My breath is so bated you have no idea.

Me: Get all those rotting worms out of there.

Me: Now

Me: tell me

Me: the tale.

Ben: I don't even know where to begin.

Me: Good book or bad?

Ben: Overall I thought it was pretty good.

Ben: I am a sucker for obviously-doomed romances.

Me: Are you excited for TITANIC 3D?

Ben: It's like the iceberg is literally leaping out of the screen.

Me: Your reinforced hull only makes my iceberg harder!

Ben: Let's try and reel this in.

Ben: I'll start with the framing narrative

Ben: which was completely phoned in.

Ben: Literally composed over the phone.

Me: The Wizard of Oz

Me: Wizard Oz

Me: ZARDOZ

Ben: I love how it is evident that, in the course of writing this book, Stephen King looked at the plot threads that he had been handed and thought "what the FUCK was I thinking when I wrote this, seventeen years ago?"

Me: How do you mean?

Ben: Which, rather than my usual hyperbole, is in fact the span of time between these two novels.

Ben: Like the Ticktock Man.

Ben: Yeah, Darkman saves him.

Ben: For what?

Ben: To reenact The Wizard of Oz and then get shot unceremoniously.

Me: My life for you!

Ben: It was basically just Stephen King saying "yeah sorry, guys, I literally have no idea what I was thinking there."

Ben: Which is fair.

Ben: Seventeen years is a long time.

Me: August 1991

November 4, 1997

Me: Publication dates according to Wikipedia.

Ben: Dude, I read the intro.

Ben: It said seventeen years.

Ben: But I finished the book about fourteen months ago so perhaps my memory has faded.

Me: Were you excited to see how The Stand tied into the events of the story?

Ben: Not particularly.

Ben: I was angered that I was forced to remember it.

Me: But if you hadn't read The Stand you would be clueless about what was going on.

Ben: Right.

Me: With the plague and the note they found about the Walkin Dude.

Ben: I would have no context to interpret ZOT brand soda or BERONI brand automobiles.

Me: Were those even mentioned in The Stand?

Ben: No.

Me: Hahahahaha.

Me: What about the final confrontation with Flagg?

Me: Aka the wizard of the title.

Ben: You mean like when he shot him, but then didn't?

Ben: Let's back up.

Ben: The palace is pretty stupid.

Ben: The mental image he conjures of this place is just silly.

Ben: I really hope he does something more with the wizard rainbow thing.

Ben: Because it seems like that might have potential.

Ben: But other than that he was clearly just grasping in the dark for some sort of bullshit framing narrative to pad around the actual story.

Ben: Anyway

Ben: I am glad our plucky heroes are back on track

Ben: having found the beam and traveled an unknown distance towards their objective.

Me: You were a big fan of the talking train in the last book.

Me: How was the conclusion of that subplot?

Ben: Oh and it was a little bullshit of how they took down the train.

Ben: You see our minds converge.

Me: That's how Kirk outsmarted that android in "Mudd's Women."

Ben: The solution to stopping the train was just to shoot it in the face until it stopped.

Me: Trains don't have faces.

Ben: I am not quite that disappointed though because I really didn't know how he was going to write his way out of that one.

Me: Okay so what about the bulk of the story?

Me: The flashback.

Me: Oh wait.

Me: What about the eye?

Me: On the flags or whatever.

Me: Did they reveal whose pennant that is?

Ben: Something like

Ben: the Bulldozer King.

Me: Hahahaha.

Ben: I guess he was just foreshadowing.

Ben: Some character from a universe that is contemporary to THE STAND who we will meet out in here in the real world.

Me: So anyway

Me: the flashbacks.

Ben: I thought it was pretty good

Ben: perhaps even very good

Ben: for the most part.

Ben: There were a lot of good characters in the far-off and exotic land of Mejico.

Ben: There was actually one scene with one character that made me feel like Stephen King had actually experienced some sort of human emotion with some point.

Ben: It was the scene where the fat old wife of the mayor creeps into his bed as he sleeps and reminisces about their long-lost love.

Ben: I hereby declare that character whose name I do not remember to be the best character in any Stephen King book that I can remember at the moment

Ben: and likewise for that scene.

Me: So you didn't mind spending 600 pages on a book that advanced the main plot negligibly?

Ben: Not really.

Ben: In fact, when I could tell it was all coming to an end I was actively dreading having to cede control to the framing narrative.

Ben: It was just a good action movie/detective story/teenagers fucking story

Ben: /fantasy western.

Me: Did you enjoy getting to know Roland's dead ka-tet?

Ben: Not really Alain.

Ben: Cuthbert is cool.

Ben: I bet he dies in a horrible way.

Ben: Can't wait for all of book six to explain that one.

Me: What makes Wizard and Glass so painful is the focus of the story. Two stories are happening during the flashback: The War and The Town. One is about the huge shadow-war that is being fought between the armies of the Crimson King and the Gunslingers. This is the one about mythical battles and powerful artifacts being brought to bear against nightmarish demons and mechanical abominations as the world is quickly being brought to the cataclysm that framed the past three books. The other is about Roland's first girlfriend. Guess which gets the book and which gets the chapter.

Ben: What is this from?

Ben: Should I just defer to this review?

Me: That's all there is.

Ben: Man he just leaves us hanging.

Ben: Anyway

Ben: the story itself wasn't rock solid.

Ben: The motives of the antagonists were sometimes pretty questionable.

Ben: But it's doable if you can suspend disbelief far enough.

Me: The Big Coffin Hunters.

Ben: And learning the backdrop of the fall of Roland's world was pretty valuable from an expository standpoint.

Ben: As I said, I largely liked the characters.

Ben: Susan was mercifully not as bad as most of Stephen's female characters.

Me: Did you remember her from the first book?

Ben: Barely.

Ben: Although at the time I figured that she would have been a bit older

Ben: and that she would have known Roland for more than two months.

Ben: But that's basically as long as Romeo knew Juliet and Shakespeare's only slightly better at writing than Stephen King.

Ben: Which isn't even sarcasm, fuck Shakespeare.

Ben: Anyway

Ben: the ending was sort of disappointing.

Ben: About two hundred pages beforehand I was like "hmm I bet Susan gets burned alive on a bonfire."

Me: How did you know!

Ben: Because at the time I was actually invested in the story and was dreading the ultimate outcome.

Ben: The bonfire seemed both applicably grisly and thematically appropriate.

Ben: But then at the end I was successfully tricked into believing (somewhat skeptically) that Susan managed to escape and live the rest of her life doing whatever it is that people in Mejico do.

Ben: But then it was like lol no bonfire time.

Me: Why were they all Mexican?

Ben: I don't think Stephen King knows that other continents on the earth exist.

Ben: There are seven, in case you're reading this, Stephen.

Ben: Unless you're English, then there are six.

Ben: But he doesn't know what England is so w/e.

Ben: Anyway

Ben: the bonfire was actually disappointing.

Ben: I felt only slightly bad for Roland.

Ben: I would have felt worse if Susan didn't take being burned alive like such a fucking champ.

Ben: But actually since the point of a story such as this is to inspire emotion in the reader, Stephen King's failure to provoke such a reaction in me is a failure on his part.

Ben: Fuck you for not making me cry, Stephen King.

Me: Was she pregnant?

Me: I dont rember.

Ben: She thought she was.

Ben: She had no way of knowing.

Ben: I guess that's as specific as I can be.

Ben: The rest of the book just kind of fuzzes together.

Ben: Unless you have a specific scene you want me to recall.

Me: I like the scene where the Big Coffin Hunters meet Walter and he looks like different people they know who are dead.

Ben: Anyway

Ben: I found it enjoyable enough that I read for basically all of New Year's Day and the decided that I wasn't going to stop just two hundred pages from the end, not with all this sweet plot going on, so I powered through until the morning, filled with remorse.

Me: Like every day of your life.

Me: Now put all the books in order from best to worst.

Ben: 1) The middle 80% of book 4 and the last third of book 3

Ben: 2) The first half of book 2

Ben: 3) Book 1

Ben: 4) Everything else

Me: Everything louder than everything else.

Me: What are you most looking forward to in DARTOWER V: WOLVES OF THE CALLA?

Ben: I hear there are wolves in it.

Ben: That sounds cool.

Ben: I did not read the DARTOWER V blurb at the end of the book.

Me: Good.

Me: SPOILERS.

Ben: What is our approach to DARTOWER IV.V?

Me: That will be next after Hearts in Atlantis once it comes out in Abril.

Ben: Well you're reading it first, aren't you?

Me: Yes.

Me: Oh wait, it's coming out in February now.

Ben: Dude.

Ben: Better get in line.

Me: I'll send in cards to reserve copies for myself, Brandon, and Bob.

Ben: Oh, are Brandon and Bob also fans?

Me: They've never seen a rhinosaur in battle before.

Ben: That's because DARTOWER IV.V doesn't come out until next month.

Me: But when it does there'll be no limit.

Ben: Not even one.

Me: Are you excited for the next book

Me: in your quest?

Ben: You mean HEARTS IN ATLANTIS?

Me: Yes.

Ben: Yeah I am.

Ben: I couldn't begin until I got this book off my chest.

Me: Are you able to breathe again now?

Ben: Breath no longer bated.