Stephen King has written another installment in the Dark Tower books, a long-running, seven-volume series that concluded (somewhat unsatisfactorily, I think) in 2004. The new book, The Wind Through the Keyhole, will fill in some of the action between the fourth and fifth books, and I'm pretty excited to learn that it's coming. Despite my misgivings about the series' conclusion, I really, really enjoyed these books and have returned to them more than once over the years.
At some point, while worrying over the copyedited manuscript of the next book (11/22/63, out November 8th), I started thinking–and dreaming–about Mid-World again. The major story of Roland and his ka-tet was told, but I realized there was at least one hole in the narrative progression: what happened to Roland, Jake, Eddie, Susannah, and Oy between the time they leave the Emerald City (the end of Wizard and Glass) and the time we pick them up again, on the outskirts of Calla Bryn Sturgis (the beginning of Wolves of the Calla)?
There was a storm, I decided. One of sudden and vicious intensity. The kind to which billy-bumblers like Oy are particularly susceptible. Little by little, a story began to take shape. I saw a line of riders, one of them Roland's old mate, Jamie DeCurry, emerging from clouds of alkali dust thrown by a high wind. I saw a severed head on a fencepost. I saw a swamp full of dangers and terrors. I saw just enough to want to see the rest. Long story short, I went back to visit an-tet with my friends for awhile. The result is a novel called The Wind Through the Keyhole. It's finished, and I expect it will be published next year.
The Dark Tower: The Wind Through the Keyhole
(Image: Michael Whelan/Wikipedia)
