Greetings from 'The King of Castle Rock'

Welcome to a special world, centered around the small town of Castle Rock. A place hidden in the darkness of evil. This world is filled with colorful characters and touching stories of hope and survival. Their homes spread across the land to places like Derry, Jerusalem's Lot, and worlds beyond our ability to imagine, waiting for us to explore them. All of this vast empire is ruled by one man, its creator, Stephen King. This blog is about the work of the undisputed 'Master of Horror', from the literature to the process. Enjoy your journey through the world that Stephen King built, and rules!















Friday, April 27, 2012



Explore the Worlds of the Dark Tower




In honor of this week’s release of “The Wind Through the Keyhole,” the eighth novel in King’s ‘Dark Tower’ series, I thought it would be appropriate to provide some information about a valuable resource in finding your way around the worlds associated with the series.  Robin Furth, King’s personal research assistant for the ‘Dark Tower’ series, published an encyclopedia of knowledge about the ‘Dark Tower’ series, entitled ‘Stephen King’s The Dark Tower: The Complete Concordance.”  

Furth provides the reader with information that will help understand the characters, worlds, plots, and even the language in the Dark Tower series.  She identifies all of the characters in the stories, and provides a genealogical tree for the main characters.  She also provides maps of the three worlds in the series.  These worlds are identified by King as the “In-World, Mid-World and End-World.” These maps will help the reader to know exactly where the characters are at any point in a story, which is very helpful when reading the books. 

Furth also describes other elements of the series that enhances the reader’s experience.  She identifies the languages used including “High Speech, Low Speech and Mid-World Argot.” Furth includes dialects from the “Mid-World” used by certain characters.  Not only does Furth help readers understand the language, she also includes rhymes, prayers and songs that originated in the “Mid-World.”

In addition to the languages and maps, Furth’s reference book explains some of the mysterious elements of the series.  She provides a history of Roland’s Ka-tet, an important concept that appears in several of King's novels.  She also identifies political and cultural references that are made in the series. Her book contains much more information about the ‘Dark Tower’ series.   

The first edition of this resource book was published in 2006.  Furth revised it in a 2010 edition.  This reference source will be revised once again to include the latest information from the continuing series that has spanned for more than thirty years.  The latest revision of this book will be available in November 2012. 

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