I just finished 
The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower by Stephen King, and I don't quite know what to say about it yet other than that it concludes what is possibly the best modern fantasy epic I've read, say true. Here we -- the last of his friends; silent members of his ka-tet -- finally travel with Roland to the object of his quest: the Dark Tower. The journey took Mr. King more than 34 years to complete, and ages longer for his hero, and the end is as sweet as the alkali desert that set our boots to earth was bitter, though it left me just as thirsty. Not for more of the same -- this story is done, and well-done for it -- but thirsty for a water of my own creation, if I can dig a deep enough well to find it.
The 
A Song of Ice and Fire series by George R. R. Martin is close in power, but since it's not finished yet (and not as fresh in my mind) I can't rightly compare it. Mr. King avoids the extraneous trappings that bog down the later volumes of Robert Jordan's 
Wheel of Time series, say thankee, but still delivers enough meat to gorge a ravenous imagination.
My only disappointment was in the ignominious fate of Walter o' Dim, that black rogue. But alas, what's done is done.
