The Talisman (King and Straub, 1984)
Sloppy. I don't know if it was a side effect of the collaborative writing process, or if the novelty of co-authorship pulled the wool over everyone's eyes, including the editors, but this is one of the sloppiest novels I've ever read. In some places, it is as if King and Straub had this grand vision of what they were going to write but only captured about a fourth of it on paper - things are hinted at but never explained, teased but never tasted. In others, we see a narrative blatantly contradicting and undermining itself - yes, I checked - it said one specific thing and then the plot of the novel went off the rails based on the understanding that the opposite thing had been said. Finally, we have several things out of place - characters and ideas are mentioned as if we know them already (not as foreshadowing), then a few pages later (if we're lucky) they are introduced properly.
If there were merely narrative flaws here, all might be forgiven, but the story is just as sloppy, if not more so. The failings of the fantasy genre are on full display here. First, there seem to be no laws governing the magic of the Territories. Stuff just happens if the authors find it cool, and magic objects are discarded all too often in order for the protagonist to discover "the magic is in you". The quest has no clear object, no scope of importance, and no clear criteria for failure. I feel the need to discuss this in some detail, so if you're not worried about having the book spoiled, proceed beyond my arbitrary rating. (Though can one spoil something this rancid?) The characters are just props on the stage - their actions and motivations aren't believable or relatable.
There were some engaging vignettes in what is essentially a road novel, but none of the vignettes have enough narrative or emotional depth to tie everything together. The two strongest parts are Jack and Wolf's imprisonment in Sunlight Home (which is marred by fundamentalist Christian stereotyping and brutal violence) and Jack and Richard's travel through the Blasted Lands (which hints at more than it delivers and is marred by the unbelievability of Richard's character - for more on that, on you go past the arbitrary rating). On the whole, just like Jack's magic juice, this book left a bad taste in my mouth.
Arbitrary rating:
1 out of 5 meaningless quests
And now for the promised detailed discussion:
Jack's personal quest is to heal his mother by finding the Talisman. He accomplishes this goal. Then why do I say the quest has no clear object, no scope of importance, and no clear criteria for failure? Well, not very long into it, we realize that the Talisman is more important than Jack's mother. At that point, it becomes unclear to me why his mother (and the queen, her counterpart in the Territories) needs to survive. The only reason to save the queen is to prevent Morgan from taking power, so after Morgan is killed, there is no reason the queen needs to live. And all this time we've been hearing that the Talisman must be protected, that it is the axis of all possible worlds. Jack even sees little galaxies inside it. Several characters we've met throughout the story have their own little epiphany - a psychic "Hurrah!", if you will - when Jack gains the Talisman, thereby screaming out loud that the Talisman affects everyone's well-being. Yet the Talisman is destroyed in order to heal Jack's mom/the queen, so why is the life of one (two) human(s) worth the destruction of all those worlds? Or better yet, why would Morgan's destruction of the Talisman result in the destruction of those worlds, but Jack's doesn't? None of this is ever explained. Add it to the list of unexplained phenomena, like the funnel in the beach, the Oatley Tunnel, the possession of Thayer School, the saviorhood of Jack in the Territories (they never really say why they are worshipping him), the uncharacteristic flipping of the train, and the ruin of Point Venuti. (Seriously, Richard couldn't have been vacationing there more than seven years ago - how could it have become an abandoned ruin peopled by crazies in that short amount of time, especially in the otherwise civilized state of California?)
The other thing that's really on my mind - at the beginning of the book, Speedy Parker says specifically - in Chapter 4 - that Jack should travel in the Territories whenever he can so that his journey is faster. Yet repeatedly Jack "remembers" Speedy telling him to travel in modern-day American whenever possible, because it is safer. Nowhere does Speedy tell him anything remotely like this. Speedy does tell him to stick the roads in the Rand McNally atlas since there are no maps in the Territories. The clear implication to this reader is that Jack should use Rand McNally in the Territories, because the roads are in similar locations (which indeed is the case throughout the book). Unfortunately, Jack spends most of his time in the boring old U.S.A., following Speedy's nonexistant injunction to the letter. Grr.
Okay, one more. "Rational Richard"'s denial of the things happening around him is completely, utterly unbelievable. He insists he has a fever, he's hallucinating, the werewolves are actually Colombian drug lords... The last straw for me was when he purposefully destroyed his glasses so that he didn't have to see the things he couldn't understand. That is just stupid. King wears glasses. How could he let something so completely unbelievable slip? I about quit reading the book right there.
I'm only scratching the surface here. To read more on why you shouldn't read this book, check out
this review (fair warning, there is a smidge of colorful language). I was so stymied by the flaws in the story, I didn't even get to the problems this reviewer found.
After the mess of The Talisman, this book turned out to be pretty good. A bit gruesome for my taste, but the plot was tight, the characters were memorable, and the Dark Tower-related scenes were excellent. The glimpse we get of the Crimson King's nether world is chilling and perfectly imagined.
