A gunslinger tells a story inside a story inside a story while a killer storm howls outside.
Who drives the story
The last gunslinger, caught mid-quest and mid-memory. He shelters his ka-tet from a starkblast with stories, and in telling them confronts his mother's forgiveness—words he never got to hear while she lived.
The teenage gunslinger and his steady friend, sent by Steven Deschain to hunt the Skin-Man in Debaria. Jamie rounds up the salt-mine suspects; Roland's deduction and silver bullet end the killer.
The boy who hid under a pile of hides while the Skin-Man slaughtered his father. Hypnotized by Roland, he supplies the blue ankle tattoo that cracks the case, and finds a new home in Serenity.
The boy inside Roland's story, who walks into the Endless Forest to cure his mother's blindness. He outfaces a dragon, a swamp, a trap, and his stepfather's axe, and comes home a gunslinger in the only way that counts.
Tim's mother, blinded by her husband's murderer's blows, and the cruel drunk she marries to keep her house. She regains her sight in time to split Kells's skull with her first husband's axe.
The tax collector who orchestrates Tim's ordeal out of malice, and the white magician he caged as a tyger. One sets the trap; the other, freed, hands Tim the cure.
Roland's dead mother, speaking from beyond through a letter left in Serenity. She forgives the son fated to kill her and asks forgiveness for her own betrayals.
How they are connected
Young Roland and Jamie De CurryThe Covenant Man and Maerlyn
The teenage gunslinger and his steady friend, sent by Steven Deschain to hunt the Skin-Man in Debaria.
Bill StreeterThe Covenant Man and Maerlyn
The boy who hid under a pile of hides while the Skin-Man slaughtered his father.
Tim's mother, blinded by her husband's murderer's blows, and the cruel drunk she marries to keep her house.
The Covenant Man and MaerlynTim Ross
The tax collector who orchestrates Tim's ordeal out of malice, and the white magician he caged as a tyger.
Go deeper
Stories as shelter · Fathers, mothers, and the wounds they leave · Monsters wearing human faces · Guilt and forgiveness
Themes explainedThe full story act by act, the ending explained and a quick quiz.
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