The in-betweener

The in-betweener

The world’s most morbid imagination turned to the heroic tale to write the epic series of seven books, The Dark Tower. Stephen King’s new novel is what he has described as “Dark Tower 4.5”, and belongs somewhere between books four and five. The volume has two stories. The first takes off when Roland Deschain, the last, damaged and deranged gunslinger, tells the story of “The Skin Man” to his team of Jake, Susannah and Eddie. Some distance away from Gilead is Debaria, a mining town laid siege upon by a monster. This monster is neither man nor animal, or maybe it’s both man and animal. It is sometimes described as a bear and sometimes as a giant man by the few who live to tell the tale after seeing it. The numbers the creature kills mounts, and Steven Deschain, Roland’s father, sends him and his friend Jamie to Debaria to see what they can do about this scourge. Jamie and Roland journey to Debaria and investigate a fresh kill. They also find their first survivor: a young boy, Bill. Bill offers them a clue — a tattoo around the ankle of the creature that had walked through the stable in which Bill had hidden. The creature roared, then made a sound like a cat, and then cried out like a woman and finally a man. Following the clues, the gunslinger boys decide that the creature came from the salt mines and may be a miner who has acquired the ability to shape-shift. Part one of the story ends here. In the second tale, which is told within the first story while Jamie is rounding up the miners, the hero is a boy called Tim who loses his father in an encounter with a dragon. His mother, Nell, is terrified of losing her house and land to the taxman and so marries her neighbour, Big Kells. Kells is initially loving and then his drinking problem surfaces and he becomes abusive. The taxman lets Tim know that he is aware of their family’s situation and reveals to Tim that his father had been killed by Kells. He also gives Tim a couple of secret items to be used if necessary. Tim sees his father’s body in the forest. While afraid of the magic of the taxman, he also now wishes revenge and seeks the support of the magician-taxman. After a series of adventures in which Tim is helped by fairies and creatures of the forest, Tim returns with an antidote that cures Nell, who lost her sight after an abusive encounter with Kells. Nell finally buries her husband’s axe in Kells’s head. Then comes part two of the “The Skin Man”, which returns to Debaria. After an identification parade during which Roland has to use considerable diplomatic skills and persuasion, Bill identifies the shape-shifter in a group of miners. At that moment the man changes shape and goes on a rampage but Roland is able to kill him. Jamie and Roland are feted by the relieved people of Debaria. Both are coming-of-age stories that King casts as an old-fashioned adventure tale, where the boy must encounter and overcome various obstacles, deploy his skills, cement his moral principles and fulfil a destiny. He must plummet (literally and figuratively) and then rise again. Monsters, seductresses, magicians and evil men are all grist to the heroic mill, and King does not experiment much with the formula here. The theme of motherhood is an important one, given Roland’s matricide and orphaned Bill finding a group of women willing to adopt him. Where King fails is in his characterisation. Although he is still brilliant in parts, the effort is clearly laboured. One does not quite come to grips with Jamie in “The Skin Man” nor Tim in the title tale. The Wind Through The Keyhole is a quick read and does not really contribute to the Dark Tower cycle. I read it because I am a King loyalist — would that make me a royalist, I wonder? — and so might you. inbox@dnaindia.net