Regarding the Dark Tower ending... Awesome fucking series, but I didn't think the last book sucked so much as the last 10 pages of the last book. Book 7 (with Book 5 coming in as a close second) is probably my favorite out of all them. That being said, those last 10 pages*...no. *I really can't go into this more without giving shit away, and I don't want to ruin it for anyone who hasn't read it.
My whole opinion of the DT series is that he had a great story up until Book 3, then didn't know ANYTHING about how it was going to continue, at all. Book 4 (my favorite stand-alone book in the series) was the interlude to get himself interested in working on the whole series again. You can almost feel him deciding on the entire ending of the series as the next three books go along. Still a great series of books, though.
Not long ago Jägerette drove her dad to the polling place to vote, and was sitting there while he was in the booth, and a woman came up to her and said "oh, are you exited to vote in your first election in 2016?" "I am 29, I have been able to vote for 11 years"
That isn't the one he wrote himself into the book after he got hit by that van is it? I heard he did that and has a penchant for writing himself into his material somehow.
He will even write in other characters by other famous authors. Nothing takes you out of a story like reading another popular characters' name.
Wastelands and Wizard & Glass were my faves. I didn't like the conclusion (The Dark Tower) and the prequel after it. The final three chapters were written in haste: three books in less than two years. Still, he creates a true world of wonder and horrors. It's a bonafide original epic and Roland is an incredibly layered character. And of course, High Speech.
I will probably pick up the Dark Tower series at some point, but I just don't have the time and energy to get into a lengthy book series at the moment. Hell, I might not get to it till I retire.. I sorta see myself in my retirement years hitting up stuff that I never had time for before. So in 25-30 years I have a hot date with Dark Tower.
Same reason I never started Game of Thrones. Dark Tower has at least one thing going for it, despite being around 10,000 pages: it's finished. I don't know how you GOT fans haven't pulled Martin to the gallows by his wiener. 5200 pages so far and no end in sight. Have you seen him lately? Before the massive, Forbes level success this guy looked like an anal wart with heart disease. I'm sure an extra $30 million in his fried chicken coffers has not improved his health in the slightest. It's starting to look like a big practical joint at this point. Mr. King is the best storyteller of all time to me. His execution is spotty on occasion (very occasionally). But the one strike I could really give him is that he obviously has no editor. Who at his publishing company actually has the balls to disagree with him? He's one of about 5 people on earth that could take their ball, go home, and open their own publishing house. The dude has fuck you power. Half his novels since the 80s could shave off 100 pages easy without having any deleterious effect on the finished work. I really think he overwrites on purpose to give his fans their money's worth. He's said something to that book-bang-for-buck effect before.
My first comment on the old boards when they announced the TV show was something like 'STOP FUCKING AROUND WITH SIDE PROJECTS AND FINISH WRITING THE STORY YOU FAT OLD FUCKING BASTARD!"
I can't help but wonder if anyone on the planet is as simultaneously loved and reviled as GRRM. You'll find people who will say they love the books and the world he built and love GRRM, then follow it up with "but that fat fucking piece of shit better fucking finish." I mean, holy shit, it's so fucked up if you think about it. You love his shit SO MUCH it makes you hate him for not immediately giving you more. I swear, the man is living methamphetamine.
There are five books that I consider Perfect (for me, anyway) - and 'The Stand' is one of them. '11/22/63' is also fantastic. "The Green Mile' is wondrous. To me, Stephen King is the Stevie Wonder of books, sure he occasionally pumps out 'I Just Called to Say I Love You' but given he's done 'Songs in the Key of Life' and 'Talking Book' you can look right by the bad stuff and appreciate what a talent he is. I loved the Dark Tower series, and have considered rereading the last book to see if there's something that strikes me better the second time around, as I was quite disappointed by the ending. That being said, I love the whole series, warts and all.
See, people who are fans of the TV show are at most 3 and a bit years into this addiction. I started reading the novels in the 90's and I've watched that bastard get older and fatter and then spin off into side projects instead of finishing the goddamn story for fucking 5 times that long. Almost half my life I've cared about the world that he built and the characters he wrote. I've read the early books a couple of dozen times over the years - one of my go to's for long flights and work trips away. I watched Robert Jordan go from creator of one of the greatest stories I'd ever read, to churning out unreadable dogshit to shut up his publishers and fan base and still fucking die before he finished the fucking thing. Katherine Kerr is one of my favorite authors, in part because she wrote an amazing series of books that I love. But also in large part because when she got old and sick? She finished the fucking series. She posted in her blog about the fact that the next few publications would be wrapping up the story - because she had this incredible wide open and complicated world with a story that was going somewhere - and she had a rough health prognosis and knew as a fan what it's like to be on the hook for a story that might never be finished. As gut wrenching as it is to imagine GRRM kicking the bucket before he's told the goddamn story - part of the reason I love his books so much is that he didn't do what Jordan did and push out shitty filler books to shut people up. But I'd still be a lot happier if he was taking his time about finishing the books if he looked just a little bit less likely to stroke out during a book signing. I did fucking love his response to an interviewer who asked him about it though...
He could really be the ultimate fake celebrity death of all time, if he were in on it, he could break the world.
It's actually funny you say this, because after thoroughly enjoying the first Mistborn Trilogy I have decided to trust Brandon Sanderson with finishing The Wheel of Time. It has been so long since I last read them that I started over and was pleased to be reminded how awesome The Eye of the World and The Great Hunt were. I read 600 pages of The Great Hunt in basically a week and just downloaded The Dragon Reborn last night. I do have a strong memory of those middle books sucking something fierce though. Winter's Heart was the last one I read and I think that was when it was published in 2001 and I think I enjoyed it (lots of Perrin and Mat so probably), but when I heard he was sick I just kind of gave up until the whole thing finished out. I have decided to not read A Dance with Dragons until this next Song of Ice and Fire book comes out just so I can give myself a little bit of backstop against it looks like he is going to die before finishing.
Martin has finished the series, according to multiple sources. If he hasn't finished A Sign Of Spring then he has at least completed its plot synopsis for another trusted author to publish. Also in an interview two weeks ago he said he would write an eighth "wrap up novel" if fans demanded enough. Dude, you haven't even CONSIDERED a release date for Winds Of Winter yet, quit yanking your fans' dicks like they appreciate it.
Sanderson is one of my instant-buy authors. The phrase that gets thrown around a lot about him is "worldbuilding". He has created like 7 or 8 (or 15, I can't remember them all) complete worlds, each with their own rules of magic. And his characters are great. Jordan laid out the last three WoT books with Sanderson and his wife before he kicked, and wrote whole chapters of them before he died. After waiting what felt like 183 years for that series to finish, I was satisfied with the ending. I might just reread the last one again.