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3.88 AVERAGE
3.88 AVERAGE
medium-paced
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Not my favorite of the Dark Tower books, but Song of Susannah still holds up on what’s probably my fourth or fifth read-through of the series. After the sprawl and mythic scale of the first five entries, it’s kind of a relief to see the story tightening its focus and steering toward an endgame. The pace picks up, the stakes feel urgent, and Susannah’s arc – while strange and fragmented – keeps things emotionally grounded.
Yeah, I still think it’s wild that Stephen King wrote himself into his own series (and not just as a cameo, but as a major character), but by this point you’re either on board with the metafiction or you’re not. And weirdly, it kind of works. The story has always been about stories – how they twist together, break apart, and bleed into the world. So it makes a strange kind of sense.
Even if it’s not a top-tier entry, Song of Susannah is the necessary gear shift before the final climb. And having walked the path of the Beam this many times, I’m just excited to be nearing the Tower again.
Yeah, I still think it’s wild that Stephen King wrote himself into his own series (and not just as a cameo, but as a major character), but by this point you’re either on board with the metafiction or you’re not. And weirdly, it kind of works. The story has always been about stories – how they twist together, break apart, and bleed into the world. So it makes a strange kind of sense.
Even if it’s not a top-tier entry, Song of Susannah is the necessary gear shift before the final climb. And having walked the path of the Beam this many times, I’m just excited to be nearing the Tower again.
Started off strong, then lost me a bit when King went ultra-meta with everything. Much more preferred the Susannah sub-plot and the Jake sub-plot to Roland and Eddie's main adventure. Roland and Eddie's main adventure felt very deus ex-machina and just kinda "much." Overall, 7/10 for reasons stated.
adventurous
medium-paced
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gun violence, Violence
Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, Cannibalism
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Supremely underrated, this penultimate volume in The Dark Tower series is maybe the best one yet, and almost definitely my favorite. King’s mind-bending progression into fantasy horror is only deepened by his usefully self-conscious plunge into meta fiction, which serves up delirious rewards for long-time students of King’s career—and poignancy for those who appreciate stories about the weird and mysterious craft of writing.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
Critical Score: A-
Personal Score: A
We find our shattered ka-tet racing toward calamity in this faster-paced installment that benefits from being on the shorter end. Song of Susannah is bookended by two very long novels, the second being the series finale, so it makes sense to give us a bridge of sorts for slot #6. There’s efficiency in these 400 pages, and that’s rare to say about a Stephen King book. Many mysteries are unfolded (with still tons left), the characters move around a lot (with still much further to venture), and while the ending doesn’t cover as much ground as I wanted, it lands on a point of pure (if expected) dread.
So many people rank this book last or near-last in their series ranking, and I’m mildly appalled by that. They complain that it’s just a side quest that doesn’t move us closer to the tower, but I would argue Wizard and Glass is even more of a narrative side quest: a backstory. Yet, that book is many readers’ favorite in the series. So, what’s the real reason people trash this book? They say it’s rushed and should have been drawn out a few hundred pages more to match the other long books of the series. To that, I say it’s not too short or rushed at all (no more than The Drawing of the Three, another fan-favorite that I didn’t love); it’s medium-paced as opposed to the most recent installments’ slow pace (which I like as much as the medium pace, by the way). They say this book has info dumps that are poorly executed. To this I say, it’s no more poorly executed than, idk, a Harry Potter info dump, or more relevantly any other type of info dump King puts in his books. Regardless, I’m super happy to finally get a bunch of answers. What are the other typical complaints? They say this book is too cerebral, and that confuses readers or simply puts them off. But I found neither to be true for me, and I don’t think this book is much more confusing or weird than the other books in the series.
What really brought this to a whole new level for me was the meta element. King goes above and beyond. It’s not a strictly original idea he’s playing with, but him delivering it here is so, so much fun, and he goes about it in such a thoughtful way, one that shines a light on his career and how he feels about writing, his life, his muse, and the general act of creating. The partly fictitious journal entries at the end are super fascinating. “The Writer” stanza is one of my favorite chapters he’s ever written. To be fair, I can see these elements of the book not landing if you have not read many of King’s books and/or don’t know much about his career.
This book is suspenseful from the start, with our characters in quite the pickle from the last book’s cliffhanger. But we up the ante right away when another beam breaks; now that we’re down to two, it really feels like the signal we’ve been waiting for that the end is truly nigh.
I love Susannah’s literalized internal struggle. The control panel and prison cell in Susannah’s head is great. The visits to the castle and Fedic are awesome. To touch on the info dumps a bit more, since these are the scenes that have them, I did find them a bit challengingly dense. That’s not a bad thing, just worth noting. Also, the worldbuilding continues to follow an ideology that I don’t like, one that’s all about fate and romantic morality. It’s entertaining nonetheless, and it’s not much worse than the semi-toxic ideology of, say, Tolkien’s mythos, but again: worth noting. I side much more with fantasy that embodies a pragmatic nihilism, like A Song of Ice and Fire.
King appears to be trying to redeem some of Detta’s prior racist characterization; she’s no longer an “evil bitch” archetype, but an empowered ally. It’s still flawed, but much improved.
The last stanza is like Rosemary’s Baby on steroids without feeling hackneyed.
The structure of the book as a song, with stanzas, plus a cute stave and response at the end of each one, is a fun extension of the title. And the meaning of the title is revealed beautifully during the climax.
I have a first edition of this volume, and it’s as beautifully designed and produced as V, with even better endpapers (though I’m realizing now there’s no scene that depicts the endpapers illustration) and a much better cover design. The interior illustrations are more impressionistic this time around, which suits the story. They’re also more accurately placed to their respective scenes; each book since IV has gotten better with that (I have trade paperbacks of the first three books).
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
Critical Score: A-
Personal Score: A
We find our shattered ka-tet racing toward calamity in this faster-paced installment that benefits from being on the shorter end. Song of Susannah is bookended by two very long novels, the second being the series finale, so it makes sense to give us a bridge of sorts for slot #6. There’s efficiency in these 400 pages, and that’s rare to say about a Stephen King book. Many mysteries are unfolded (with still tons left), the characters move around a lot (with still much further to venture), and while the ending doesn’t cover as much ground as I wanted, it lands on a point of pure (if expected) dread.
So many people rank this book last or near-last in their series ranking, and I’m mildly appalled by that. They complain that it’s just a side quest that doesn’t move us closer to the tower, but I would argue Wizard and Glass is even more of a narrative side quest: a backstory. Yet, that book is many readers’ favorite in the series. So, what’s the real reason people trash this book? They say it’s rushed and should have been drawn out a few hundred pages more to match the other long books of the series. To that, I say it’s not too short or rushed at all (no more than The Drawing of the Three, another fan-favorite that I didn’t love); it’s medium-paced as opposed to the most recent installments’ slow pace (which I like as much as the medium pace, by the way). They say this book has info dumps that are poorly executed. To this I say, it’s no more poorly executed than, idk, a Harry Potter info dump, or more relevantly any other type of info dump King puts in his books. Regardless, I’m super happy to finally get a bunch of answers. What are the other typical complaints? They say this book is too cerebral, and that confuses readers or simply puts them off. But I found neither to be true for me, and I don’t think this book is much more confusing or weird than the other books in the series.
What really brought this to a whole new level for me was the meta element. King goes above and beyond. It’s not a strictly original idea he’s playing with, but him delivering it here is so, so much fun, and he goes about it in such a thoughtful way, one that shines a light on his career and how he feels about writing, his life, his muse, and the general act of creating. The partly fictitious journal entries at the end are super fascinating. “The Writer” stanza is one of my favorite chapters he’s ever written. To be fair, I can see these elements of the book not landing if you have not read many of King’s books and/or don’t know much about his career.
This book is suspenseful from the start, with our characters in quite the pickle from the last book’s cliffhanger. But we up the ante right away when another beam breaks; now that we’re down to two, it really feels like the signal we’ve been waiting for that the end is truly nigh.
I love Susannah’s literalized internal struggle. The control panel and prison cell in Susannah’s head is great. The visits to the castle and Fedic are awesome. To touch on the info dumps a bit more, since these are the scenes that have them, I did find them a bit challengingly dense. That’s not a bad thing, just worth noting. Also, the worldbuilding continues to follow an ideology that I don’t like, one that’s all about fate and romantic morality. It’s entertaining nonetheless, and it’s not much worse than the semi-toxic ideology of, say, Tolkien’s mythos, but again: worth noting. I side much more with fantasy that embodies a pragmatic nihilism, like A Song of Ice and Fire.
King appears to be trying to redeem some of Detta’s prior racist characterization; she’s no longer an “evil bitch” archetype, but an empowered ally. It’s still flawed, but much improved.
The last stanza is like Rosemary’s Baby on steroids without feeling hackneyed.
The structure of the book as a song, with stanzas, plus a cute stave and response at the end of each one, is a fun extension of the title. And the meaning of the title is revealed beautifully during the climax.
I have a first edition of this volume, and it’s as beautifully designed and produced as V, with even better endpapers (though I’m realizing now there’s no scene that depicts the endpapers illustration) and a much better cover design. The interior illustrations are more impressionistic this time around, which suits the story. They’re also more accurately placed to their respective scenes; each book since IV has gotten better with that (I have trade paperbacks of the first three books).
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No