by Bev Vincent
RAWLINGS, ROWENA MAGRUDER (5)
Rowan Magruder’s twin sister. Father Callahan meets her after she came in from Chicago to be with her brother during his final hours after the Hitler Brothers assaulted him.
ROCHE, IL (2)
Nickname of Enrico Balazar.
ROSTOSOVICH, JOSEPH “JOEY” (7)
A Breaker in Algul Siento. He is married to Tanya Leeds. An engine from Fire-Response Team Bravo kills him.
ROSTOV, DANEEKA “DANI” (7)
An eleven-year-old Russian Breaker at Algul Siento. She attempts to save Baj and Sej when fire breaks out in Damli House. She tackles Finli o’Tego, saving Ted Brautigan’s and Dinky Earnshaw’s lives. She kisses Jake for luck before he and Roland depart for New York to save Stephen King. She goes to Fedic with Susannah, Ted, Dinky, Fred Worthington and Sheemie after the battle of Algul Siento and continues on toward the Callas with them.
RUDEBACHER, DICKY (5)
Owner of the Leabrook Homestyle Diner in New Jersey where Father Callahan works as a short-order cook after fleeing New York. He has a wife and two kids in college.
RUMBELOW, GRACE (7)
A Breaker living in Algul Siento. Formerly from Aldershot, Hampshire, England. A pudgy red-haired woman who reminds Jake of the lifetime president of his mother’s garden club. She demands that Roland tell her who would take care of the Breakers now that their guards were all dead or captured. She survives this encounter.
RUSSERT, DON “DONNIE” (6, 7)
A retired history professor from Vanderbilt who lives in Waterford, Maine. He taped one of the walkins, but no one recognized the language it spoke. He wrote several articles on the walk-in phenomenon but could never get a reputable magazine to publish them. He isolated the center of their activity to Turtleback Lane.
SARGUS, JANE (6)
Owner of Country Collectibles on Dimity Road in East Stoneham. She specializes in quilts, glassware and old books, which attracts Calvin Tower’s attention.
SAYRE, RICHARD PATRICK “DICKY” (5, 6, 7)
The Crimson King’s head of operations. He answers to Walter o’Dim and also serves as executive vice president of the Detroit division of Sombra Corporation. He signed the Memorandum of Agreement with Calvin Tower regarding the vacant lot. He lures Father Callahan out of hiding to stop him from killing vampires and spearheads Mia’s arrival at the Dixie Pig but humiliates her by forcing her to lick his boots. He is caught by surprise when Mordred consumes Mia and tries to hide behind Nigel when the shooting starts. Once the outcome of the battle is clear, he tries to surrender but sees the answer in Susannah’s face. He turns to run, but she shoots him twice in the back of the head. Roland and Susannah find his office in the Fedic Dogan, where he has files on the ka-tet. He also has oil paintings by Patrick Danville on his wall, one of which is of the Dark Tower.
Physical appearance: His face has a lean and foxy look, full of intelligence and dark humor. He looks about sixty, is slim and good-looking, has white hair combed back, wears the gaudy clothes typical of his type, and has a red circle of blood on his brow that seems neither to ooze nor to clot. His teeth are pointed.
SEJ (7)
A hydrocephalic Breaker at Algul Siento. Daneeka Rostov saves him from the fire in the Study.
SHANTZ (7)
Joe Collins’s agent.
SHARPTON, MR. (7)
Dinky Earnshaw’s boss at Trans Corporation, a subsidiary of North Central Positronics, before he came to Algul Siento.
Crossover to Other Works: In “Everything’s Eventual,” Dinky kills Mr. Sharpton by sending one of his special lethal e-mails that contains the word “Excalibur,” which is also the name of Arthur Eld’s sword.
SHAVERS, GEORGE (2)
Intern at Sisters of Mercy Hospital, a member of the Emergency Ride program who responds to the call when Odetta Holmes is struck by the A train. He saves her life and witnesses her transition back and forth between her two personalities.
SHAW, GRETA (1, 3, 4, 5, 7, M)
Jake Chambers’s housekeeper/nanny. She resembles Edith Bunker from All in the Family. She is almost a friend and knows what Jake likes and dislikes better than his parents do. She puts his juvenile drawings on the fridge and always remembers to cut the crusts off his sandwiches. Even at a very young age, he knows she isn’t his mother, but she’ll do until the real thing comes along. When he has night terrors, he can tell her about them. When no one is around, she reads National Enquirer and Inside View. She calls Jake “Johnny” or “’Bama.”
SKANK, BANGO (3, 5, 6, 7)
A graffiti artist. He tagged the artist’s rendering of the Turtle Bay Luxury Condominiums, the men’s room at the New York Public Library, Father Callahan’s jail cell in Topeka, the restroom next to the bar in the Plaza-Park Hyatt and the tunnel beneath the Dixie Pig. Jake thinks of him as the great lost character. The graffiti normally features only his name, but in the hotel bathroom he also wrote, “Bango Skank awaits the King.”
Crossover to Other Works: Bango Skank first appears in Peter Straub’s short story “The Buffalo Hunter.” He was supposed to be included in The Talisman as well, but that didn’t happen.
SLIGHTMAN JR., BENJAMIN (5, 6, 7)
Author of The Hogan, a Western in Calvin Tower’s collection, valuable because of a misprinted title (The Dogan) and the author’s name on the copyright page. See also Daniel Holmes.
SMITH, BRYAN (7)
Driver of the van that hits Jake and Stephen King. He is returning to his campground from the market in Center Lovell with ground beef and Mars bars. His two rottweilers get into the cooler, distracting his attention. He’s lost his driver’s license before and is one more offense away from losing it again. Roland convinces him to tell the authorities that there was no one else around at the time of the accident before sending him for help. He is Sheemie Ruiz’s twin.
STAUNTON, ANDREW (2)
One of two foot patrol officers who spot Jack Mort after the shoot-out at Clements and the robbery at Katz’s Drug Store. He fires the shot that should have killed Jack Mort but hit his cigarette lighter instead.
STURGES, JOHN (6)
Director (dinh) of The Magnificent Seven.
SULLY-JOHN (7)
One of Bobby Garfield’s childhood friends. Pimli Prentiss threatens to harm him if Ted Brautigan doesn’t cooperate.
Crossover to Other Works: Sully-John (real name: John Sullivan) is a character in Hearts in Atlantis.
TASSENBAUM, DAVID SEYMOUR (7)
Irene Tassenbaum’s husband of eighteen years. He is a famous inventor who doesn’t believe anything is real unless it can be engraved on a microchip. Irene claims he invented the Internet and all the software necessary to support it. Irene’s adventure with Roland makes him pay attention to his wife again, something that hasn’t happened in a long time.
TASSENBAUM, IRENE (7)
One of two useful people Roland meets in the East Stoneham General Store. When Roland arrives in 1999, she keeps her cool and agrees to drive him to Turtleback Lane because she knows the way. She is afraid but not panicky.
A talkative forty-seven-year-old Republican from Manhattan. Maiden name: Cantora. Thanks to her husband David’s work as a computer innovator, she is wealthy, but she’s also bored and neglected. They’ve been married eighteen years and have no children—she suffered a miscarriage early in their marriage. She and her husband spend summers in the house that once belonged to John Cullum.
She is excited by the adventure. When Bryan Smith tries to get out of his van, she picks up Roland’s gun and makes him stay put. She helps Roland think clearly in the aftermath of the accident. She returns for him after the police leave and has already decided she’ll sleep with him if he wants her. She doesn’t feel confident about her looks: her hair is going gray, she is getting wrinkles, she carries a spare tire and has a lumpectomy scar. Against her nature, she remains quiet around Roland. The fewer questions she asks, the less she’ll know about Roland’s mission and the better h
er chance of returning to a normal life after he leaves. She enjoys sleeping with him, but by the time they arrive in New York, she’s eager to get back to her husband. Leaving as unexpectedly as she did might get his attention again. After Roland leaves, she has to be content knowing that she played a part in saving the world.
TOOTHAKER, ELVIRA (7)
A woman from Lovell, Maine, who sees Stephen King shortly before Bryan Smith hits him. She is picking raspberries with her friend Justine Anderson, whom she met at Vassar in the 1940s.
TOREN, EDDIE (7)
A young man from White Plains, New York, who dreams of Susannah and goes to meet her in Central Park in 1987. He says his last name is German. In his version of reality, Gary Hart is the president.
TOREN, JAKE (7)
Eddie Toren’s younger brother. He and Eddie dream of Susannah for months before they meet her in Central Park.
TOREN, STEFAN (5, 6)
Calvin Tower’s great-great-great-grandfather. The envelope that once contained his will, dated March 19, 1846, now contains only a slip of paper with Roland Deschain’s name written on it.
TOWER, CALVIN (3, 5, 6, 7)
Proprietor of Manhattan Restaurant of the Mind. His bookstore doesn’t do much business. Although he has a skill for acquiring valuable editions, he has difficulty parting with them, even for a profit. He once owned several properties in the Turtle Bay area, but he sold them off over the years. He leases the building that contains his store. The only property he still owns is the vacant lot where Tom and Gerry’s Artistic Deli used to be.
He is a custodian of the rose, the last of a long line of Torens dating back at least to his great-great-great-grandfather, Stefan Toren. The name is Dutch—he changed it to Tower. The ka-tet believes he’s been waiting for the White, to let them have the property. His reluctance to let things go makes him difficult to deal with. Eddie is sometimes tempted to kill him when he does willfully stupid, selfish and dangerous things. Calvin is the child of an A-male father and a B-female mother, and Eddie thinks he’s a coward. However, he stands up to the Hitler Brothers, rescuing Father Callahan with the assistance of his only friend, Aaron Deepneau.
He can converse in High Speech. His main contribution to Tet Corporation is to suggest that they enlist psychics to spy on Mid-World and on their enemies, an idea he got from a novel written by Benjamin Slightman Jr. under the pen name Daniel Holmes. He died of a heart attack in his bookstore in 1990.
Physical description: He’s about five foot nine and weighs about 230 pounds. He’s in his fifties, suffers from arthritis, and most of his hair is gone on the sides of his forehead. Wears half-glasses.
TOWNE, FRED (7)
One of the “good minds” employed by Tet Corporation at a ranch in Taos. He believes that Roland’s Patek Philippe watch will stop or run backward when Roland reaches the Dark Tower. He expresses concern about Mordred’s hunger.
TUBTHER, MR. (5)
Eddie Dean’s fifth-grade teacher. Eddie hears his voice in the Doorway Cave, telling him he had such potential until he let his brother spoil him.
VAGRANT DEAD (5, 6)
People who have either died so suddenly they don’t understand what happened to them or refuse to accept it. Eventually they do go on. Christopher Johns told Roland that a person going todash might see vags.
VECHHIO, RUDY (2)
One of Enrico Balazar’s henchmen.
VERRILL, CHUCK (7)
Stephen King’s editor in New York.
VINCENT, COLIN “COL” (2)
A gofer for Enrico Balazar. Deemed useful and obedient but not particularly trustworthy. Twenty-four years old at the time he is killed in the shoot-out with Eddie and Roland.
WALKER, DETTA (2, 3, 4, 4.5, 5, 6, 7)
One of Susannah Dean’s personalities. She emerged after five-year-old Odetta Holmes was hit in the head by a brick dropped by Jack Mort and more often after Mort pushed her in front of the A train. She is self-destructive, wanting nothing more than to be killed by a white man. She shoplifts, but destroys what she takes. Aunt Sophie’s blue plate is the focus of much of her rage because the wedding gift represents the trip to New Jersey that led to her head injury.
She lives in a loft in Greenwich Village and talks like a stereotype. She’s mean, crude and vulgar, but also shrewd. She teased white boys by making out with them and then shutting them down, enjoying the game, even though she sometimes got slapped, punched, spat upon or kicked. She doesn’t care anything about anyone else. She has many secrets that even Susannah isn’t privy to.
Detta reemerges from time to time—in Susannah’s voice and face—especially when she’s under stress. Detta solves the puzzle of the prime numbers in the Cradle of Lud. Susannah sometimes calls on Detta to steady her hand when she is about to enter battle. She’s Susannah’s secret weapon, a private cache of strength and a powerful personality who catches adversaries off guard. Detta deals with the demon in the Speaking Ring and asserts herself when Mia takes control. The only person Detta is nice to is Patrick Danville, and being nice wears her out. Without Detta, Roland believes that Susannah would have been only a handsome black woman with no legs below the knees. With that personality, she was dangerous. A gunslinger.
Susannah calls on Detta on the day she prepares to leave Mid-World. Being Detta all but guarantees she won’t cry when she says good-bye. Roland refuses to let her leave as Detta. This aspect of her personality will always be with her, even in her new life in New York, where she will likely be required in Tet’s war against North Central Positronics.
WALKER, SOPHIA (2, 3, 5, 6)
Odetta Holmes’s mother’s younger sister. Known as Sister or Aunt Blue because blue was her favorite color. She was married in Elizabeth, New Jersey, when Odetta was five. The blue “forspecial” plate that Odetta’s mother gave her as a wedding gift was a focus of Detta Walker’s hatred.
WALKINS (6, 7)
People and animals from Mid-World that are sucked into west central Maine through a magic doorway. Some are dressed in old-fashioned clothes. Some are naked. Some speak languages no one can understand. Among them are taheen, slow mutants and Children of Roderick. They usually disappear shortly after they arrive. They started appearing shortly after Stephen King moved into the area in the late 1970s, though King has never seen one. Eddie, Jake and Roland admit to being walkins. There’s even a Church of the WalkIns in Lovell-Stoneham by 1999.
WAVERLY (7)
A Breaker at Algul Siento. He was a bookkeeper in his previous life.
WEAVER [WHEATON], NORRIS (2)
One of two foot patrol officers who spot Jack Mort after the shoot-out at Clements and the robbery at Katz’s Drug Store. Roland shot his gun out of his hand and warned him not to follow.
WILSON, TEDDY (6)
County constable and game warden in East Stoneham.
WILSON, WILLIAM (2)
Eddie Dean’s drug contact in Nassau.
WORTHINGTON, FRED (7)
A Breaker from Algul Siento. A stout, bankerly looking man. He took the Spirit of Topeka to Fedic with Susannah, Ted, Dinky, Dani Rostov and Sheemie. He used chalk to indicate the passage Roland and Susannah needed to take beneath Castle Discordia.
VAN WYCK, MATHIESSEN “MATS” (6, 7)
Second assistant to the Swedish ambassador to the United Nations. Susannah mesmerizes him into reserving a room for her at the Plaza-Park Hyatt using the scrimshaw turtle, which van Wyck dubs the skölpadda. His wife is having an affair.
PLACES
AKRON, OHIO (7)
Ted Brautigan accidentally used his special power to murder a man who stole his wallet here.
AMERICANO BAR (5)
Located near the intersection of Second Avenue and 19th Street. Father Callahan got drunk here after seeing the vagrant dead for the first time.
AQUINAS HOTEL (2)
Hotel where Eddie stays in Nassau, Bahamas, while on a drug-buying trip for Balazar.
AVENUE OF THE AMERICAS (2)
; Jack Mort’s office is located here. Another name for Sixth Avenue.
BANGOR, MAINE (7)
The town Stephen King writes about when he writes about Derry. The “real” Ed Deepneau lives here, as does Stephen King.
BARCELONA LUGGAGE (5)
A store on Second Avenue near 54th Street.
BLACKSTRAP MOLASSES CAFé (6)
Located at Lexington and 60th, one block from the Dixie Pig. Susannah paid a busker on this corner to play “Man of Constant Sorrow.”
BLEECKER STREET (3, 5, 7)
A nightclub district in Greenwich Village. Aaron Deepneau used to hang out here and it was also a favorite haunt of Odetta Holmes. An empty warehouse on this street has a North Central Positronics doorway.
BLIMPIE’S (5)
A fast-food restaurant at 844 Second Avenue (at the 45th Street intersection).
BRIDGTON, MAINE (6, 7)
The Maine town where Stephen King lives in 1977. Twenty miles from East Stoneham.
BROOKLYN (2, 3, 5, 6, 7)
One of the five Boroughs of New York City, home to Co-Op City in Eddie Dean’s world, and the analog to the Portal of the Bear.
BROOKLYN VOCATIONAL INSTITUTE (3)
The school Henry Dean attended before enlisting in the army.
CARA LAUGHS (7)
The lakefront house at #19 Turtleback Lane in Lovell, Maine, where Stephen King lives. The McCray family from Washington, D.C., owned it until the husband had a stroke.
Crossover to Other Works: Sara Laughs is the name of a similar house in Bag of Bones.
CASTLE AVENUE (3, 7)
A street in Co-Op City lined with pizza shops, bars and bodegas. The Majestic Theater is located at the intersection with Markey Avenue.
CENTRAL PARK (2, 4, 5, 7)
Jake and Susannah both heard a man playing a saw in this Manhattan park. It’s where Susannah meets Eddie and Jake Toren in the winter of 1987.
CENTRAL PARK SOUTH (2)
Odetta Holmes’s penthouse is in the Greymarl Apartments at the intersection of Central Park South and Fifth Avenue.
THE CHAMBERSES’ APARTMENT (2, 3)
A duplex apartment located on Fifth Avenue between 38th and 39th.