By Melissa Willis
GENRE: SUSPENSE
PUBLISHER: SCRIBNER
PUBLICATION DATE: NOVEMBER 10, 2009
Drifter, Dale Barbara (Barbie to his friends), was on his way out of Chester’s Mill. Due to a recent run in with some local kids, and more importantly, one kid’s influential parent, Barbie cannot cross the Chester’s Mill town line soon enough. Before he can reach the town line, though, an invisible field clamps down on the town preventing anyone from leaving or entering. Numerous people and animals are killed at the time the Dome encompasses the town, but they are just the first. In the days that follow, as the town’s leading official (Big Jim) begins to grab power, the once peaceful and friendly town of Chester’s Mill turns into a bubble of despair. Though wanting only to leave, Barbie, a former Army officer, finds himself appointed as leader by the president. However, Big Jim has no intentions of releasing his hold on the city. Jim’s greed for power will make this horrible situation that much worse, and cost the lives of many more people. Amid the greed and the chaos, questions abound: What is the Dome? How did it get there? Why is it there? How can it be removed? Can it be removed in time to save the town of Chester’s Mill?
Under the Dome is certainly an elaborate book. It’s long, 1072 pages to be exact. There are lots of details as well as a large amount of character development. By the time the book ends, there were not a lot of information gaps. The reader pretty much knows everything about the characters and the background of the town and characters. It ranks up high in terms of books that engulfs the reader and brings them into the story so that they intimately know the characters, the town, and the events. This approach worked very well. It’s a large part of what I like about King’s novels. His plots are creative and then thoroughly developed. If looking for a quick, easy, light read, though, might want to by-pass this one. It’s none of the above.
I love how the book opens. King takes the reader to different places around the Dome in order to show exactly what is happening throughout the town. It takes awhile to finish the journey, but it’s successful in setting up the rest of the book. By the time I finished taking the tour, I felt completely prepared to see what happened next. Unfortunately, I felt like that for about 50 pages before actually getting to move on to something else. This same feeling came back several times during the book. There were many events, where the build-up was so great, that the actually event felt anti-climatic. A bit disappointing when one has spent a hundred or more pages getting to the anti-climatic event. There is some good action and some excellent suspense. Part of what makes many of the events end a bit flat is the great suspense building up to them.
For the Christian reader, especially those easily offended, take this book with a grain of salt. I choose not to read much into general market fiction, because in most cases, a green door should usually be interpreted as just a green door. So when presenting the church, King could have been making several statements with the characters and their beliefs. He could have been bashing the church or promoting the idea that there might not be a true God. He could have been encouraging the church to look at the hypocrisy within it. He could have been suggesting that not everyone who claims Christian truly is. There are numerous things we can pull from King’s depictions of the churches, the pastors, and the congregation, but I don’t think offense should be one of them. Many times, the ‘Christian’ aspect of Under the Dome adds some comic relief. It’s not usually flattering, but it does lighten the mood of this otherwise rather depressing story.
Like every other Stephen King novel I’ve read, this one has a significant amount of language, drugs, violence, and sexual innuendos. For those who might be sensitive to sexual content, among other acts of sexual violence, there is a rape scene. It’s not in-depth, but enough to be disturbing. King writes realistic novels for adults and this one is no different. Use discretion before picking this one up.
Under the Dome has almost everything I like in a novel—good suspense, great characters, original plot, realism, and lots to think about. If I had it to do over again, I’m not sure I would have read it though. Don’t get me wrong, this is a fantastically written story, but it’s so depressing. King has some really good insights and a lot of what he has to say is good stuff, but I’m left with such a bitter impression of how the events turned out, that I’m not sure I’m glad I read it. Maybe in a week or two I’ll feel differently, but right now I wish I would have spent my time reading something a little less realistic and a little bit more idealistic. It is a very good book, but I don’t think it was a book for me.
