Day 29 : The Drawing Of The Three - Book Review

This is book two of the seven part epic fantasy series - DARK TOWER, written by the always-amazing Stephen King.

This book  follows the gunslinger in this pursuit of the all-important Tower. In the previous book we find our hero, Roland Deschain, has finally caught up with the Man in Black and has learnt the secretes of time and space and how The Tower itself is in the center of it all. We learn how 'he who holds the Tower, controls the future/past of the world'. The gunslinger's world has moved on. The things he has loved and cherished is nothing but a distant memory, he is the last of his kind. All he has now is his ka, his destiny, to reach the Tower and defeat the Crimson King. At the very end of his palaver with the Man in Black, the priest tells Roland of the three draws he's been granted. He will have to choose three companions, or ka-tet, that would ride with him during this voyage.

The beginning of the book is quite gritty and dry as any western imaginable. And to add to it quite dark and violent. In the end of which our hero looses three fingers and is poisoned by the venom of huge lobster-like creatures. Now he is weak, thirsty and all he can see for miles is just the dry sand, salty sea and hot sun. Still he drags on, towards the north, for some reason always north. He remembers the palaver with the Man in  Black in the dusty priest's robe. He remembers all of the knowledge he's gained from him. Roland also remembers how even the he wouldn't talk of the Crimson King. How even he seemed nervous to talk about him. All the more reasons for Roland to draw from the three doors that would come his way.

The doors are like a magical windows that opens into another time and somehow always into the same place. New York City. Our hero is tasked with going to their world and draw one person from there to join him on his quest.

~~~

Door #1 - The Prisoner 

When the Man in Black, draws the tarot card for the prisoner, Roland sees a man with a baboon riding on his back. The baboon whips like a slave and the man himself is strong and lanky but nonetheless helpless and chained. When Roland walks through the door, he finds the true prison this man has chained himself to. HEROIN. This man's name is Eddie Dean and he is an addict. The gunslinger walks into his mind, takes control of him. And somehow during the turn of events help each other, him by helping him rescue his equally addict elder brother. And for Roland by getting him the much needed medicine from Eddie's world. In the end, Eddie , the lean and lanky and intelligent addict begins to trust the gunslinger and agrees to join him in his adventure. Just because, he has lost call cause to return to his city, his world. There is nothing waiting for him back there, but another fix, and his own destruction.

Door #2 - The Lady Of Shadows

The second tarot card the Man in Black shows Roland is of a woman. A strong-willed, no nonsense woman who is brave and just and kind in equal measure. When the gunslinger walks into this door and into her mind, he finds himself in a deeper confusion than ever before. When he entered the prisoner's mind, there was shock and confusion and the hunger for another fix. Here too there was confusion and fear, but also a lot of hate. And in measures that did not seem to come from one complete mind. There seemed to two sets of personalities living in this one body. Detta Walker and Odetta Holmes. Alongwith a handicapped body, for the Lady was did not have any legs. She was strong and brave and cruel and smart. But was short two limbs. Roland liked her nonetheless, and decides he cannot proceed in his quest without earning the loyalty of her. And he does earn it in the end, before nearly killing himself.

Door #3 - The Pusher

The final tarot card the Man in Black shows him is of the Reaper. 'Death, but not for you, gunslinger' That is what the priest told him tauntingly. The Crimson King was surely not done with him just yet. When he walks into the third and final door, he returns to the same city New York, only into a more recent time to that of the Lady and of the kid he'd met during the first book - Jake. He loved Jake. He was like a son to him. And this guy behind the third door Jack Mort, a serial killer, the same one that 'pushes' the kid in front of a Cadillac. And also the same one that caused the destruction Lady's mind and loss of her two legs. Jack Mort has by far impacted more to Roland's fledgling ka-tet than anything else thus far. Roland doesn't appreciate that too much.

~~~

At the end of the book. Roland has finally assembled his posse and is now prepared to continue his quest for the Dark Tower. Sure he is short a few fingers, short of resources, short of bullets, is dying of poison spreading up his arm towards his heart. But now, he has the companions he's drawn from the other worlds. He is not alone now after a really long while.

Day 28 : The Awkward Dodge

I am the master of all beginnings.

Getting things started comes easy to me and I excel at facilitating getting more people kicked off at things. But when it comes to having closure on any of them I am a slave to bad timing and sheer procrastination. Nobody likes confrontations or awkward situations. I am no different. I avoid them like the plague. Actually there are times in my life when I have simply swerved away from people for years just to avoid an face-off. Most of the times I have been so successful for so long that I don't even remember why I am avoiding these people. It has become so much of a habit now I still avoid being a hundred meter radius around them like a coward's restraining order.

The reason this has turned out to be a big deal today is cause I am going this thing next weekend. And there is a chance that this person might be dropping by. I remember something weird happening between us. But no matter from what angle I look at it, I still cannot figure out what that thing was. We have no actual history together nor do we have a lot of mutual friends. Well there is one. She used date friend of mine. Who dumped her to get married to another (hotter) girl. Good times.

Um. Is that it? Am I avoiding this girl because one of my friends dumped her to do the dirty (legally) with somebody else? Nah I don't really think that's it. I have been around extended exes a bunch of times. That has never bothered me so far. Most of the time I do enjoy their company. We usually join forces and blast on our mutual acquaintance. More to his/her discomfort. Guys love doing that too, girls.

Anyway. This has been bothering me enough to make a whole post in here about. So clearly there is some merit to it. Until I figure this thing out, I think I am just going to leave this note here to everyone reading -
"If something ill happens to me during the next few weeks. Please let the world know, another innocent humble God-awesome sick-as-Shaft soul bites the dust to the fabled awkward-ian standoff. And do NOT tell me what happens in the latest episode of Game of Thrones. I swear I will freaking HAUNT you from my grave."

Day 27 : Temporal Paradox

A temporal paradox, time paradox, or time travel paradox is a paradox, an apparent contradiction, or a logical contradiction that is associated with the idea of time and time travel.

And this is something that has been around for as long as we've had science fiction. Some of the best grossing movies of all time are based on time travel. Most of them end up the same way. How all our attempts to change the present only causes the past to repeat itself. Take 11.22.63 for example, both the book and the new TV show. It is like a cautionary tale for any nerd who dreams of travelling to the past and change it. It does have an brilliant ending though, will make you weep.

Time travel does that all the time apparently. Every single story they've written around it has ended with mourning and bitter disappointment. Including this week's Game of Thrones episode, which has got everyone weeping rivers of tears.

There is thing called causal loop. Doctor Who goes on and on about it a bunch of times. It is inevitable. You see your present is built by your past. So if you go to the past and change something to benefit your future, the present as you knew it doesn't exist any more. It becomes something else, something unforeseen. There are a lot different variations of this, the grandfather paradox, Novikov self-consistency principle. I confess I've only spent a little over a weekend on them. But I think I have learnt enough to say this much, this is way too complicated. There is no real way to just go in change what we want to and not mess shit up. 

Damn. That episode though. right in the guts. I remember right from the beginning in both books and show, everyone asking why Hodor used that one word for everything. Now we know. Because this wise-ass Bran went back in time used his mind of the past to get to his mind in the present to execute his will. Well the needle got stuck at 'Hold the door' which became Hodor, the only word the kid would ever know. And this is how people would know him in future, including Bran.

Paradox.

Your past crafts your present which is a stepping stone into your future. Things has to go through a series of specific sequence of events and actions. That is how things got to way things are now, and how things will turn in the future. Even a little deviation in those events are going to change a lot of things as we know it. People are trying to figure out a way out of this loop for ages. No progress yet. End of story.


There. We have just solved Time Travel. Pfft.

Day 26 : Success

Entitlement - it can be most easily defined as the feeling that somebody has that he should get everything that he desires, just by virtue of his desiring it.

This is something that we see a lot in people these days. People just expect for good things to miraculously happen to them. We are so narcissistic in our belief that our life is so star-studded awesome that all good things just have to come our way. We deserve every single happy thing that exists in this universe. You can be the biggest the laziest douchebag the world has ever known, but you will always expect your life to turn up like one of those feel-good movies. You sit on your ass all day, never even pretending to actually make an effort. But in the end, you always expect for your life to have the happy ending that all those famous people have.

I blame them stories that we are told when we are young. We read a three page article on how this guy became the next Mark Zuckerberg, but never really get to read the three hundred page chapter of what he had to do and sacrifice to get to become that. We see them successful people in Silicon Valley, or The Social Network, or Pirates.. , or Wall Street and we just get to thinking that to be successful the basic criteria that you check out is that you have to be smart and selfish and you definitely have to be a dick. If you each of  those, that's about it. All of the other stuff just falls into place. Nahhh.

One other theme in all of them stories is how those successful people in the end find themselves at the top of the mountain only to find that there is no one really around them to celebrate their success with. They are at the pinnacle of success but nobody who is close enough to them to give them a hug and a pat on their back to say, 'dude, you made it.' Now, you would say, that guy has millions for dollars laying around, do you think he even cares he has people around him. He can probably pay for random people to come to him and pat his back or even write a epic ballad singing his praises. He is frigging millionaire. He can do as he damn well pleases. Well, I guess he can.

But I also think all of us have this deep-set need to validated by the people we care for. We are not as insulated from our own feelings as we like to think. We may pretend to be the sarcastic cold hearted hipster jerks we are. However, we are all mush inside. And our feelings are the true chinks in our armors. But I just don't think that is our weakness really, that is mostly what makes our success more worthwhile. Being able to celebrate and share our success with people dear to us makes it more special.

Don't seclude yourself. Don't shed yourself of people close to you. They are not a burden. They are probably the things that would provide you with the crucial incentive to go through with that final push towards glory.

Day 25 : A World That Has Moved On

As mentioned in my previous post here I had just started on the epic Dark Tower series of fantasy books by Stephen King. It is an amazing tale, and is already becoming by favorite fantasy series of all time (Harry Potter will always be 'the one' for me yet. Can't help there, I grew up with it.)

This post is not really for showering praises on the Tower. That would probably come later. This here is regarding a specific phrase that sees repeated use in the book.

"The World Has Moved On"

This phrase is used by the hero in the book show how everything around him has been bespoiled and corrupted. The world is not what he knew once. None of the purity and innocence survives now. He is the only one that survives from the old world. And all that he has are memories of the times gone by. Sure, all this sounds very poetic and artistic and fantastical. How does this mean anything to anyone not reading this book. Well it does.

The world that we live in and the world that is depicted in the book, is not that different. We all have that something that has now firmly placed in the past. Something that is dear to us and now exists only in the past. All we can do is go back to those memories now and then and mournfully think of how things were. That is morose yes, on a personal level yes. But then when you come to think of it on a grander scale. Everything has moved on. The world we see now what our forefathers witnessed, nor would be what our children would live in. The world moves on. Nothing is constant, everything is fleeting. We get used to something in life, and soon we see it evolve into something else, or something take its place.

Sometimes it maybe a good thing. To welcome something new into our lives, we must say goodbye to something else. Our destinies are shaped by the choices that we make to change/better our lives. Or by not choosing to make those changes. But changes will happen, either you choose to make them happen, or they happen to you. The world has a tendency to not stay fixed to your needs or desires. It is a river that flows on, that moves on to deeper valleys. Most of these valleys are deep in sorrows, but now and then they raise to unfathomable heights and take you along with it.

Our destiny is not what you see. It is much beyond our own comprehension. It is not that next promotion, or that six digit salary, or that unattainable lover. Our destiny, our ka, reaches further than all of that. And most of our lives we never really understand what it is ourselves. Most of us know more about the sum total of our lives after we've passed on. We are remembered by the memories we leave behind of us. That is the only world where we survive eternally.

Memories have longer shelf life than anything else that we can create in a life time. I don't suppose there aren't anyone anymore who knows what the heroes in all of those legends and fables look like. But they survive still. Their memories survived ages even after their descendants withered away. This world is theirs too now, even though their doesn't exist any more. That is what I hope for. A world of mine that hasn't moved on yet.

For, my friend, there are other worlds than these.

Day 24 : The Gunslinger - Book Review

I think I have mentioned this here once before as well. I am a big fan of the writer Stephen King. He is one of the first writers whose work I became addicted to. Over the years I have discovered more writers and genres that I've liked and enjoyed immensely. But King would always be the one writer who I can honestly showed me how you can pick up just about any book and see yourself disappear into a world of your own. A secret world only know to you and the writer himself.

King's books are mostly him picking up one freakish camp fire horror story and giving it a tale of its own. And with the extensive writing chops as his. Any story he touches become a classic in itself, creating legions of fans with every new book. He has written extensively in horror, thrillers, drama, with hordes of fans reading everything that he output. I am glad to call myself one such fan, a Constant Reader as he calls his fans. And as a loyal Constant Reader I suppose, I shouldn't be putting of reading the work that King himself considers his best work - THE DARK TOWER

THE DARK TOWER is fantasy series of books writer by King over a period of nearly three decades. He came up with this idea when he was at the young age of 19. Yes, the age when you and I were taking long showers and getting rejected/ignored by every hot girl you come across. King was coming up with ideas that would mesmerize of thousands of readers in coming years. Has written in detail about the discovery of this book concept in the Introduction of the book. This book is the revised 2003 edition of the book, in which King polishes a few plot points and hints at the upcoming story events and better portrays the character of the protagonist of the series - the awesome gunslinger - Roland of Gilead.

The story revolves around Roland's epic search for the Tower, a mystical place that acts like a linchpin that holds all of creation in order. The one who hold the Tower holds shapes the destiny of the Universe. In the book, the world has "moved on", things are not the way that you and I, or Roland himself, has known. His voyage into the Mid-World and Out-World in search of this elusive Dark Tower is jam packed with lore and magic and mind-twisting realism. There are parts in the prose that you begin to feel the thirst and heat that Roland has to ride through. The desert is barren, dry and cruel. Our gunslinger has to face through with grit, for that is his duty. That is his ka.

At the begin of this book, we find the gunslinger making/dragging his way through the immense desert in pursuit of the Man in Black. A man of magical craft, and guile. Someone who could give him the directions to the Tower he seeks. But the gunslinger knows information like this wouldn't come easy. He has rode for eons, picking up scraps of information and trail of campfires that the Man in Black leaves behind.

Then we meet Allie, a bartender who works in a broken down drinking hole in a nearly deserted crap hole of a town called Tull. She is smitten by the rugged gunslinger. She gets closer to him. He acknowledges her affections, with thoughts of the Tower and the Man in Black always in the back of his mind. In the end, she was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Then we meet Jake, a kid of 12. A kid who does not belong this world in between worlds. He is a smaller blonde version of the gunslinger himself. And infinitely more innocent. Roland likes this kid a lot. He refuses to choose between the kid and the Tower, but in the end he is made to choose. Unfortunately.

Then we meet the Man in Black himself. He is lean and tall and conniving. He knows Roland has been pursuing him for years. He knows more about Roland than the gunslinger himself cares to remember. And with his magic, he even knows of the ka-tet Roland would band together in his pursuit of the Tower. He introduces Roland to the tarot cards and the prophecies they hold for him. He tells Roland about the true significance of the Tower. Of how Tower holds supreme over Time and Size. The universe is shaped by the size and time of contemplation. The Tower is bridge that connects and control it all.

The Tower is where he will meet his destiny. His ka.

This is an amazing book. A solid build up for the origins of what looks to be a mind blowing journey ahead. I blitzed through this book, hungry for more.

I agree with King. This has got to be his best work. Thank you, Steve-o.

Day 23 : JON SNOW LIVES - Book & Show Theory

Snow breathes again. Hoohah!
I've been waiting so long to write this. Damn.

I'd read the books and it ended with Snow lying in a pool of his own blood. I'd completed the TV show and even that ended with him laying in a pool of his own blood stabbed my his brothers of the Night's Watch. Ever since then no matter where I go, or who I meet, I have been blabbering on about how he will come back. No matter they asked for it or now.

There were all these hints and clues all over the books that predict how even after all those multiple stabs to gut, Jon Snow will still come out alive. It becomes more obvious in show. I mean there is no other character throughout the series that has ever had anything substantial to do with the White Walkers. Nobody has fought with them. Nobody has killed one (in the books, only Samwell Tarley is actually shown killing one though). Nobody else has been so adamant lecturing everyone how the wights are our real enemies. No one. They can't just built such a huge story arc dependent one character only to kill them of just like that. Makes no sense, they would just have to redo the exposure with somebody else, which at this late juncture would just confuse the audience.

The last few of minutes of the episodes is jam packed with little information and nuance. Which I am sure we would be analyzing very closely throughout the week. Ghost was awake when Melisandre enters the room, how come he just suddenly dozed off when she started the ritual. Throughout the last episode and this one, the Ghost's eyes were blood red, angry (and glowing?). But at the very end of the episode he sits up, he feels a lot more docile and eyes weren't that vivid. Jon Snow woke up only after the direwolf let out a cry.

Me thinks - Jon Snow is a Warg.
Me thinks - he went into Ghost's skin due to shock of getting stabbed and was stuck there not knowing how to come back to his own body.

It took Bran a long while to figure out how to come and go into Hodor's body. And he had help. Jon Snow hasn't even yet realized he is a skinchanger. As per her own admission, Melisandre's magic was weak when it comes to bringing back someone from death. But her magic in someway helped Jon to enter his own body again. Or well, she just gave him a new haircut, one that we can see on him for the rest of the season at the least. We will soon know.

Another theory that I believe in is of Jon being the real Azor A'hai. Stannis Baratheon was strong and just and very kingly. But he never really seemed like the kind of character that sticks till the very end. Plus his sword never really pulsed heat like the legendary Lightbringer was supposed to. All it used to was glow. While we all know Jon Snow's Longclaw is already made of ancient Valyrian steel, and has already shattered a White Walker to smithereens. His sword can easily be the Lightbringer they talk about in the legends.

There are still a lot that is unknown. Mainly regarding what has changed in Snow. Is he still going to be the babe in the woods we know, or is his personality itself going to have a reboot. If you remember during Arya's escape from the Brotherhood Without Banners we saw Beric Dondarrion brought back to life. He was clearly not stronger than The Hound, but he still fought fearlessly only because he had Thoros of Myr to bring him back from the dead using his magic. Beric says every time he is brought back, he looses some of his soul (umm Horcruxes in Westeros?) It would be interesting to see if the Night's King theory holds up at all. Or by some twist of fate he goes and joins them. Nah.

I still believe in R + L = J (it was no coincidence Lyanna showed up in Bran's dream).
I still believe in Three-headed Dragon (remember Daenery's hallucination in the House of  Undying).
And I still believe Jon Snow has a lot more role to play in the Game of Thrones.

There are a whole lot things that can happen between now and winter. Them bring back Jon Snow to life this early in the season can only mean there is another big battle to fought this season. And it is going to awesome!

Plus, for a culture where kinslaying is one of the big sins you can do. It seems almost every big player in Westeros has killed atleast one blood relative. Euron. Ramsay. Bad boy.

Plus, The Mountain is a badass,

Plus, the dragons came this close to eat Tyrion's head off.

Plus, Davos, the Wildlings, the Red Priestess all are at Castle Black.

As for us, we will all be waiting impatiently for the next episode.
This is going to be a tough week ahead for us Northerners.