The Dark Tower IV: Wizard and Glass

Stephen King

Jan 2016 · The Dark Tower Book 4 · Sold by Simon and Schuster

About this ebook

The fourth volume in the brilliant Dark Tower Series is “splendidly tense…rip-roaring” (Publishers Weekly)—a #1 national bestseller about an epic quest to save the universe.

In Wizard and Glass, Stephen King is “at his most ebullient…sweeping readers up in…swells of passion” (Publishers Weekly) as Roland the Gunslinger, Eddie, Susannah, and Jake survive Blaine the Mono’s final crash, only to find themselves stranded in an alternate version of Topeka, Kansas, that has been ravaged by the superflu virus. While following the deserted I-70 toward a distant glass palace, Roland recounts his tragic story about a seaside town called Hambry, where he fell in love with a girl named Susan Delgado, and where he and his old tet-mates Alain and Cuthbert battled the forces of John Farson, the harrier who—with a little help from a seeing sphere called Maerlyn’s Grapefruit—ignited Mid-World’s final war.

Filled with “blazing action” (Booklist), the fourth installment in the Dark Tower Series “whets the appetite for more” (Bangor Daily News). Wizard and Glass is a thrilling read from “the reigning King of American popular literature” (Los Angeles Daily News).

Ratings and reviews

I waited a long time to truly revisit these books. I read the trilogy a very long time ago and became annoyed that it was not completed as promised in the third book. The connection I had to the story and the excitement at reading this series has waned. Not that this is not well written, or that the story is not as exciting, but I found myself having trouble focusing on completing this book.

Finally, we get to live in Roland's world before The Gunslinger. Never had a book just devastate me emotionally. If I weren't reading this in public I would have started crying at one point.

Mostly a story about Roland's past including Alain and Cuthbert. It was interesting to learn more about Roland but somewhat dull compared to the overall story.

About the author

Stephen King is the author of more than sixty books, all of them worldwide bestsellers. His recent work includes the short story collection You Like It Darker, Holly, Fairy Tale, Billy Summers, If It Bleeds, The Institute, Elevation, The Outsider, Sleeping Beauties (cowritten with his son Owen King), and the Bill Hodges trilogy: End of Watch, Finders Keepers, and Mr. Mercedes (an Edgar Award winner for Best Novel and a television series streaming on Peacock). His novel 11/22/63 was named a top ten book of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review and won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Mystery/Thriller. His epic works The Dark Tower, It, Pet Sematary, Doctor Sleep, and Firestarter are the basis for major motion pictures, with It now the highest-grossing horror film of all time. He is the recipient of the 2020 Audio Publishers Association Lifetime Achievement Award, the 2018 PEN America Literary Service Award, the 2014 National Medal of Arts, and the 2003 National Book Foundation Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. He lives in Bangor, Maine, with his wife, novelist Tabitha King.