I'm new to Stephen King, so the meta stuff so far has been mostly over my head. I've noticed a few homages and more than a few outright references, but if King was calling back to some of his other books I didn't notice. By the end of this one the level of meta-ness in the universe is way too hard to ignore. Coincidences or Ka? For the first half of the book I tried to think it was all coincidences, but that doesn't really add up. So I'll bite, I'll believe that this universe is an amalgamation of whatever Mr. King likes most about his work and others.
One thing that these last two books has impressed me with is the language and the slang that is so effectively introduced. It took a quarter of the book for the characters to start using the local figures of speech. It took me until three quarters, but still, internally I'm saying these weird things. I keep on almost saying "say thank you" instead of "thank you". I want to end sentences with "for the sake of your father", or "remember the face of your father". I'm still thinking "so it is", and that book was a month ago. I honestly want to use words like "sy", "palaver", "cousin" (the verb) and ka. They just feel so right. That's good writing.