The Master of Horror

When Steph and I drove to Minnesota for a week in May (including Mother's Day weekend) we rented some books on CD for entertainment on the long drive. Wandering the one aisle of rental audio books at Hastings we finally decided on the Dark Tower series by Stephen King. I don't think Steph has read any King, but I have read The Stand and The Green Mile (now also a very good movie staring Tom Hanks.

Most people equate Stephen King with horror and that makes people think of gross images and frightening, disturbing stories. The books I've read before and now The Dark Tower are not scary but just really well written and engaging. They all take place in or (in the case of the Dark Tower) connect with our world, but things are slightly different and fantastic things are allowed to happen. The way King integrates these fantasy elements into the world that we all live in and are familiar with makes his stories all the more interesting.

For that first trip we rented the first two books of the saga, "The Gunslinger" and "The Drawing of the Three". I had read The Gunslinger last year and enjoyed it then and enjoyed it again on the trip. We easily got through the first book on our way to MN. We listened to the second book on the way back and didn't quite finish the whole thing but had to finish the last cd or two on an afternoon at home.

For our latest trip we decided to continue the saga and rented "The Waste Lands". We almost made it through the whole thing and have less than two cds left (there are 16 total). We both enjoyed this one as well and I for one can't wait to someday get through the whole saga. The seventh and final book is actually being released this September.