This is my attempt to make somewhat generic book related topic.
Anyway I just started reading Stephen King's Dark Tower I - The Gunslinger. However I've heard this series has many ties to other Stephens King books including settings, characters, and events. I have read basically 0 Stephen King. Should I read some of his other work first to get the full enjoyment out of the Dark Tower series?
I have no recommendations at this time. Just saying, "dude, this is a good idea." I'd like to do time to do some more reading. I'll let you know if I come across something!
Funny enough, yesterday I was putting my books back on my bookshelf and was thinking I should do some more reading. I seem to have a lot of good books (in my opinion) but I never read any of them. Dekker's Books of History Chronicles are still among my favorite...yet I still have not read them all. Nor do I own them all but that is another matter.
In regards to The Dark Tower. No. You don't need to read anything else before that, it stands alone just fine. Being familiar with 'The Stand' could help, but is not necessary. The 'Dark Tower' series is kinda unlike most of his other books. I think it's his attempt at a Lord Of The Rings level of epic. Though 'The Stand' was pretty close to that level of grandeur already. If you have never read anything of his and want to get started, 'The Dark Tower' or 'The Stand' are great places to start. Lots of Dark v.s. Light in those books. Following (mostly) likeable characters along a grand and difficult journey though a strange and mysterious setting. And you won't have to wait years for the last of the series to be released! Perhaps I should re-read them all...again.
After you finish that series you might want to read Black House, but that is only slightly related. Low Men in Yellow Coats is a related short story from the collection 'Hearts in Atlantis', but is only related by being set in the same universe. There are more, but that is all I can think of. I am sure there is a list on the internet someplace of everything Dark Tower related; But spoilers.
I also think Desperation is in the same universe type area, but not at all related. Still a good book. It just has a certain feel to it. Very grungy and raw.
As I have probably said before, his earlier work is better (Pre-2000 maybe?). He seems to get overconfident in his later work (forgoing a good editor perhaps? Hard to quantify.) and the Dark Tower book after his accident gets rather... self gratifying? That's as best I can put it.
I have all the books mentioned (and lots more) if you wish to borrow any. Unless you are going the audio route, then I have few and they are hard to loan (but not impossible).
I found a wiki which shows all the ties between Dark Tower and King's other books. Sheez I think practically every book he ever wrote is somehow related to Dark Tower if even only minutely. A couple of the major ones are what you mentioned The Stand, Bleak House, etc... it also mentioned Salem's Lot.
As I haven't read any of King's books before I think I'll try out a couple of these to see if I like them before embarking on the Dark Tower series. I'll mostly looking for audiobooks so I'll be checking the library's system and other... places...
The first one I was able to find available was Salem's Lot so I started listening to that today. So far so good. There are a lot of parallels to Stoker's book.
Oh yeah, if you want a good place to keep track of books you've read, plan to read, own, etc... Goodreads is a good website for it. I've been using it for awhile now and I actually like it. Besides the three default "shelves" of Read, Currently-Reading, and To-Read you can create as many custom "shelves" (which are actually tags) as you want. I've got one to track books that I actually own. I used their Android app to scan them all into Goodreads by the ISBN barcode on the back.
It does ratings and recommendations crap too.
Jeez, I should have gotten paid for that advertisement.
So I finished Salem's Lot and liked it. I'd like to read a couple more single Stephen Kings books before embarking on any really long chronicles (Dark Tower series)...
Nick, you said you like his earlier work better. Any specific suggestions? I know you mentioned the Stand. I'm also considering trying a couple books that I've seen the movies for (The Shining, Dead Zone, The Mist) are these any good?