Bev Vincent - The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly: 8 Secondary Characters from The Dark Tower Series

THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY

Eight secondary characters from the Dark Tower series

By Bev Vincent

Copyright 2005 by Bev Vincent

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Cemetery Dance Publications

132-B Industry Lane, Unit #7

Forest Hill, MD 21050

http://www.cemeterydance.com

First Edition eBook

Artwork Copyright 2005 by Glenn Chadbourne

Introduction

My contract with NAL (New American Library) for The Road to the Dark Tower stipulated that I would deliver to them a 70,000-word manuscript. Ron Martirano, my editor, said I could probably go as high as 80,000, but my publisher wanted to keep the book from appearing too thick and daunting on the shelf.

Early on, I had an idea I was going to have a hard time keeping it under 100,000 words. What I ultimately submitted ran slightly over 130,000 words, including footnotes and appendices. I fully expected to be told Id have to cut some -- or a lot -- of material, a process I did not relish.

Fortunately, my editor is as big a fan of the Dark Tower series as I am and he made no mention of the fact that Id delivered nearly double what my contract specified, concentrating instead on the content.

However, I had already removed some material before I submitted the manuscript. The Dramatis Personae chapter was by far the longest in the book and my first draft featured not only the principle characters but subsidiary characters who either made repeat appearances throughout the series or who I considered pivotal for other reasons.

Rather than reduce the space devoted to the major characters, I decided, after much soul-searching and regret, to delete some of the lesser players. Now, thanks to this Cemetery Dance chapbook, I have the opportunity to reintroduce readers to eight characters worthy of scrutiny.

Here, then, are the good, the bad, and the ugly.

The Good

Calvin Tower (Toren)

Like Roland Deschain, Calvin Tower is the last in his line. For generations, the Torens (Tower changed his name legally from the original Dutch version) have been custodians, overseeing the safety of the rose, Keystone Earths representation of the Dark Tower. His family once owned most of the Turtle Bay region of Manhattan, but Tower has sold off everything except the vacant lot at Second and 46th to pay taxes, mortgages, and medical bills. Even his bookstore, the Manhattan Restaurant of the Mind, occupies leased property.

He dreams about the empty lot but he hasnt been there since he paid to have Tom and Gerrys Artistic Deli knocked down after it went bankrupt and he had a fence erected around it, which was almost as expensive as the demolition. Sometimes he dreams of a field of flowers that goes on forever from the lot beyond First Avenue. Roland believes that the voice of the Beam told Tower to keep the lot, which is worth millions. Even so, Towers resolve is weakening and, under considerable pressure, he accepts $100,000 in earnest money from Enrico Balazar on behalf of Sombra Corporation, thereby agreeing not to sell the property to anyone until July 15, 1977.

At the age of twenty-six he inherited a considerable sum of money. He should have been one of the most successful antiquarian book dealers in New York given his location and talents. However, his bookstore isnt a moneymaking venture. Balazar calls it a hole that Tower pours money into and estimates that Tower does $50 worth of business a day at best.

Though he has divested himself of most of his real estate, when it comes to his beloved books Tower has issues with letting things go. He hounds the owners of books he wants until they relent but he in turn hates to let the books go again, even if he could make a tidy profit. On one occasion he didnt sleep for a week after he sold a valuable edition. He allowed his insurance policy to lapse so he could use the money to buy a book collection. His first wife called him a packrat. Hes reluctant to let Eddie even hold one of his valuable tomes. Afterwards, he looks sorry, the way an alcoholic might look after a particularly destructive bout of drunkenness. He calls himself a coward and says that his analyst describes him as the archetypal child of an A-male father and a B-female mother.

He has been married more than once but now he lives alone. Hes in his fifties, stands five foot nine and, at 230 pounds, qualifies as heavy set. His hair is gone on the sides of his forehead. He has no children and Aaron Deepnau is his only friend. Eddie Dean is surprised that theres even one person willing to befriend him. Tower thinks he and Aaron are friends because we fit around each others wrong places, make something thats almost whole.

Though he is a force for good, hes often not a terribly likable person. Even Jake, who buys Charlie the Choo-Choo and a book of riddles from him, isnt sure he likes the man. Moses Carver calls him a greedy highfalutin whitebread sumbitch. Eddie respects any man who could hold out against Balazars goons but he dislikes Tower passionately.

In addition to stubbornness, theres a kind of willful stupidity about him. Eddie believes Tower uses this homemade static to luxuriate in what hes become without having to examine it very often. His analyst has probably propped up Towers belief that he needs to be the author of his own destiny and that it might even be noble to be a selfish fuck. Such a man could never be ka-tet and Eddie is uneasy to think that their destinies are so tightly bound together.

Tower has in his possession an envelope with Stefan Toren and Dead Letter written on it. Below are the hieroglyphics that mean U NFOUND . The envelope once held his great-great-great grandfather Stefans will. Now it contains the name of Roland of Gilead. Tower knows the High Speech and can converse in it with Roland once he accepts that the gunslinger is, indeed, the last of the line of Eld.

After Eddie intervenes on his behalf with Balazars thugs, Tower agrees to go into hiding until the ka-tet figures out how to deal with the situation. By demanding that Eddie help him save his most valuable books, he unwittingly delivers a copy of Salems Lot into Rolands hands, their first indication of Stephen Kings importance to their quest.

Tower cant fight his nature, though, and is unable to keep a low profile in Maine. He goes on book-buying expeditions, leaving his tracks everywhere. Deepnau says, Hes a decent enough man in most ways but he does not enjoy being taken to task. He proves to be a difficult man for Roland to deal with and it is all Eddie can do not to kill the man. He reneges on his promises to sell the property several times and only Deepnaus badgering wins him over in the end.

He and Deepnau rescue Father Callahan from the Hitler Brothers in an unlikely act of bravery. Eddie thinks Towers courage arises from greed. He also thinks that, to Tower, none of what happens to him is real. Its like hes mistaken his life for a life in one of his storybooks. He thinks things have got to turn out all right because the writers under contract. Tower might have been less complacent if he knew that the Crimson King had a contract out on the writer instead.

Tower comes up with the idea for the Tet Corporation to assemble a group of telepaths and precogs at a ranch in Taos. The idea came from books which Benjamin Slightman -- author of The Hogan -- wrote under the name Daniel Holmes, which was also Odettas fathers name.

In 1990, Calvin Tower died of a heart attack in his new bookstore, rebuilt after Balazars men burned the Manhattan Restaurant of the Mind in 1977.

Aaron Deepnau

Aaron Deepnau is crucial enough to Rolands quest that the Calvins believe Stephen King hid a veiled reference to him in Insomnia . In that book, Ed Deepnau is conscripted by the Crimson King to orchestrate the death of Patrick Danville. Aaron Deepnau had a cousin four or five times removed named Ed who died in 1947, the same year King was born. He was a bookkeeper, as inoffensive as milk and cookies.