Stephen King Fans discussion

On to book two! Please remember to mark ALL spoilers, and if discussing the SERIES - please note that so that anyone new to the series will not be spoiled.

Thanks! :)

Whoa! Slow down everybody... Everyone will get their chance to talk about the book. Let's just form a straight line and be orderly about it. There's no need for pushing and shoving! ;)

I've just started listening to the audiobook read by Frank Muller. I've read the book itself probably like... 3 or 4 times I think, and I figured this would be a good way to multitask - I'm knitting while I listen. :)

So, I love the story, not so big on the reader. He just enunciates words in an odd way, and almost seems to want to sound like Clint Eastwood if he was a little bit confused but trying to play it off like he's just annoyed but trying to play THAT off like there's nothing wrong. LOL

Anyway... Roland is on the beach now... and he's met the lobstrocity.

LOL poor Becky is all alone! My bf insisted that I should read this book next since I just read The Gunslinger again, but unlike him (and you), I like breaks between series books. However, I may break down and read it before the end of the month. I can't promise you won't be alone until then though lol. I love the idea of listening to this book (any book) and knitting! I have so many projects I need to do and that would be wonderful. I've never listened to an audiobook before though, I like it the old-fashioned way I guess. Would this audiobook be too annoying for an audiobook newbie?

Speaking of Clint Eastwood, when I originally started this series years ago (I read books 1-3), Clint was the guy I always pictured as Roland. I think he is a perfect representation for him (like a darker version of his Westerns), would you agree?

I plan on starting this... In a couple weeks. I have a few other books to finish up first!

Dawn wrote: "I plan on starting this... In a couple weeks. I have a few other books to finish up first!"

Which means, she'll be finished in a couple of weeks plus one day.

Nikki, I think that there are better audiobooks to listen to for an audio-noob. Duma Key is FANTABULOUS. Lisey's Story is really good as well. UR is good. I think that Under the Dome is really good, but I've only heard a sample of that one.

Non-King audiobooks that are really good are The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman - he reads it too and is great. Anansi Boys by Gaiman read by Lenny Henry is pretty good too. The Help by Kathryn Stockett read by several different women is very good.

That is all. :P

Nikki wrote: "Would this audiobook be too annoying for an audiobook newbie?"

If you're new to audiobooks, I suggest you listen to the sample on Audible before you make a decision either way. It's odd, but people seem to either love or really dislike Frank Muller's style. I'm one of his fans.

Like Becky, I'm doing the book by audio. Right now, Roland is checking out the first door. The Roland-in-Eddie's-Doorway scenes are some of my favorite in the series. Although this book starts out with a bang on the beach. SK is almost the only author who can gross me out and make me laugh at the same time. Dad-a-chuck?

Link to the audio sample: http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?...

He does take some getting used to, but I am actually finding it less distracting now that we've got other characters to even out the tone. The Gunslinger was hard to do for me with Frank Muller reading it, because it was all in that seemingly monotonous voice, with hardly anything to break it up. But now it's not so bad. LOL

I don't know if I really care for the Brooklyn gangster accent Eddie has, but maybe it's more accurate than how I hear Eddie in my head. It just seems a bit too much. And Henry too, actually especially Henry.

I'm curious what Detta will sound like. LOL

*******Spoiler*******

And I must say that I truly love the way that Roland interprets the world through Eddie's eyes. It's great. Army women and tooter-fish and the ritual of Clearing The Customs...

*******Spoiler********

Detta sounds like the caricature that she is. Most obnoxious.

To this day, I mentally (and sometimes out loud) refer to them as tooter-fish sandwiches. I can't seem to un-think it.

i couldnt wait i had to move on, im on page 320 of wizard and glass. ranks as my fav series of all time.(Lord Of The Rings aswell)

my least fav. charactor yet in the series is detta

Michael, I feel your pain... It's hard for me to wait and go at this one per month too! *sigh* Every other time I've read through the series, I've read them straight through. Next time!!

I'm up to the point where Eddie+ and Balazar are about to meet. This is one of my favorite parts of the entire series.

Have I mentioned that I love Eddie Dean. I love him. :D

I liked this sooooo much better than Gunslinger! Actually, I think that I could have started with this one and not been lost... or at least not any more lost than at the beginning of Gunslinger. Kind of wished I'd done that...

I loved this book. I believe it is better than the Gunslinger as well, especially because I was slightly confused for a while in the Gunslinger. My favorite character pops up pretty quick in this book. (Eddie) :)

Eddie is my favorite too. I love love love him.

What about Eddie? Do you like him?

Chris wrote: "What about Eddie? Do you like him?"

Sometimes. When I'm not loving him. ;)

LOL

You guys are making me want to start this now, so I can find out who the heck Eddie is. But alas, other books call. Soon though, I'm excited :)

Well hurry up!

I'm trying, but I have to wait for a certain someone else first to read a certain other book with me, before I can start this one. Blame him!

Eh? Me?? I'm still trying to finish the book I'm reading with you now that you blew past me on, then I have to get the book I'm supposed to start reading with you.

I actually should finish Lions tonight, and with luck, ToM will be in the mailbox tomorrow.

ToM is huge, but I doubt it will take either of us long at all to read.

I might even bring DOTT to work so I can start on it. ToM might be too heavy.

It's actually surprisingly light weight, for being such a brick. I doubt I can fit it in my purse though...

And I can't help it if my 100 pp. a day goal is superior to your goalless wandering ;)

I'm just giving you a hard time, you know that :)

LOL... Children, please. Don't make me turn this car around!

Sorry mom :) LOL

You're right, back on topic. DOTT. I'm excited to start, to see if it really is as good as everyone says it is. Being one of the people who didn't enjoy Gunslinger as much, I really hope it is!

Sorry, Mom!

I guess we'll just have to wait and see what you think, won't we. I bet you $1 (big spender!!) that you will though.

I'll take that bet! McDonald's dollar menu, here I come!!

Dawn wrote: "I'll take that bet! McDonald's dollar menu, here I come!!"

You can't say that you hate it just so you can get a couple McNuggets either. =\

Our McDonald's doesn't do the dollar menu. How stupid is that? Cheap bastards.

Jerks.

To this day, I mentally (and sometimes out loud) refer to them as tooter-fish sandwiches. I can't seem to un-think it.

I do this too :) It drives my husband NUTS. At first I did it just to annoy him but now it has become habit. Confuses people not in the "know," though.

As for Eddie. Well, it was probably the first time in my adult life that I fell in love with a character. Def. one of my favorite books in the series.

ok, I have to say that Frank Muller's reading is actually growing on me a bit here. It's much less... distracting... in Drawing of the Three. So far anyway. LOL

I think tooter-fish too. ;)

I've just started my second attempt at The Drawing of the Three. I tried to read it just after reading The Gunslinger - which I did not enjoy. After the giant lobsters came out of the sea... I pretty much decided I couldn't take any more confusion.

I obviously didn't give it much of a chance the first time around.

It gets much less confusing pretty quick. Once you get to the door on the beach, which is not very long at all, things start picking up. You'll see... :)

I love the 'lobstrosities' :) Did anyone else wonder, though.....

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... just how Roland and Eddie managed to eat one a day? They are 4 feet long! Even if it was just tail meat that seems like a lot to go through every day. (Yes, it's a silly observation... but it stopped me cold when I read it. I had to go back to the beginning to see if I had missread the description, lol)

Yeah... You know, I didn't think about that at all.


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But Eddie isn't exactly Martha Stewart, and he was already worried about it being poison, so I think that he just got what they could eat and let the rest go. Maybe he was worried that it would go bad? And he certainly wouldn't know how to keep it. Interesting though... I hadn't thought of it.

Becky wrote: "Yeah... You know, I didn't think about that at all.


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But Eddie isn't exactly Martha Stewart, and he was already worried about it being pois..."

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LOL, who knows... maybe he dropped a lot in the fire while cooking! I find it funny that what jumped out at me was not the magical, time travelling doorways... or the being inside someone else's head... or the giant lobster-monsters... it was how much two imaginary men were eating a day! Sometimes my brain is completely ridiculous ;)

LOL!

********Spoiler*********

So I just met Detta, and listening to the audio, I have to say that for the first time, it really jumped out at me that King can get a teensy bit descriptive. ;)

Maybe it was the way it was read, in a non-stop jumble run-on-sentence kind of way, which just made it feel looooooong... This is not my first time through, it's at least my 4th, but I never felt like the forspecial blue plate section of Detta's intro was overly long before... but this time I did.

Still it's interesting, and shows us a lot of information about her in a relatively short amount of time, without just saying "Detta is..." but I wish that Frank Muller had taken it a little bit slower and made it feel less rushed. Or you know, took a breath or two. :P

Spoilers Alert*********************


Eddie Dean is probably my all time favorite character in all of King's books. This is my third reading of the series, and if possible I love him more this go around.

Becky-I just read the section about Detta and the forspecial plates. It is three pages long and only one sentence! Crazy...the audio of that is probably insane!

As usual, I am highly enjoying the read. The airplane scene is so quick paced, and I too love Roland's view of our world. Astin and tooter-fish. Plus, his opinion of the men on the plane was pretty astute! Don't know how I will wait until December to read The Wastelands, but I really enjoy these discussions, so I'm gonna try!

I know... I'm so thrilled to be finally discussing these in the group! :D

I don't usually read anything else in between them - this will be a first for me. Usually it's one after the other... but I am making myself wait this time!

Plus I have more than enough to read keeping me busy for other groups and read-alongs. :)

I'm sure my dislike for the lobsters had everything to do with The Gunslinger and not really the lobsters themselves. I didn't have a problem with them this time around.

Question: The spoiler alerts are only for the whole series right and not this book?

No, spoiler alerts are for both. We don't have a separate spoiler thread, so anything spoilery should be marked.

However, if spoiling the SERIES or another book in the series, then that should be specified. Otherwise I'll have to delete the post. :(

********Spoiler******** is fine for discussion books.

******Series spoiler******** or *******Book 4 Spoiler****** etc would be for anything other series book mentions.

*****Possible Series Spoiler****

I do love Eddie, very much, but to me the character that has grown on me is the woman who changes from Detta to Susannah -- it's her journey that encapsulates the whole heart of the story to me.

Stacie wrote: "I love the 'lobstrosities' :) Did anyone else wonder, though.....

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I'd forgotten that those dang lobstrosities were so large!

Thanks, Becky! I was worried I'd read a spoiler and wind up with a series spoiler.