Several months have passed since The Drawing of the Three, and Roland's two new tet-mates have become trained gunslingers. Eddie Dean has given up heroin, and Odetta's two selves have joined, becoming the stronger and more balanced personality of Susannah Dean. But Roland altered ka by saving the life of Jake Chambers, a boy who -- in Roland's world -- has already died. Now Roland and Jake exist in different worlds, but they are joined by the same madness: the paradox of double memories. Roland, Susannah, and Eddie must draw Jake into Mid-World and then follow the Path of the Beam all the way to the Dark Tower. There are new evils and new dangers to threaten Roland's little band in the devastated city of Lud and the surrounding wastelands, as well as horrific confrontations with Blaine the Mono, the piratical Gasher, and the frightening Tick- Tock Man.