27 of 30- Under the Dome by Stephen King

Under the Dome by Stephen King

I'm a huge fan of Stephen King's work. That being said, I was slightly hesitant to read Under the Dome partly because it's 1,088 pages long and partly because I wasn't sure it would be able to hold my interest. I couldn't have been more wrong and was surprised by how emotionally involved I was in the book. The basic story is that a town is cut off from the rest of the world by an invisible barrier that completely surrounds them and cuts off all but the smallest amount of air or water filtering through the dome. A power hungry politician Big Jim tries to take total control and there is a band of good guys trying to resist. I loathed Big Jim and was genuinely angry every time he succeeded in any of his goals to gain more power. On the flip side of the coin I have rarely routed for the underdogs more than in this book. The band of resistance were a great group of characters led by Barbie a retired Army officer trying to live a peaceful life after serving time in Iraq. Emphasis on trying. The ending and cause of the barrier will most likely polarize readers to either love or hate it. I personally thought it was just ok but the build up was fantastic and at that point it wouldn't have mattered much to me if it was terrible as the rest of the book was so good. The characters were so well thought out and the dynamics so good that to me it eclipsed the need to know what the dome was and how/if they would escape it. I figured that part would work itself out while the main show was going on. As long as Big Jim got his come-uppance I would be a happy camper.

On a side note Big Jim was a terrible human being but extremely religious. The play between religion and bad deeds was well done here but the thing I thought was funny is that Mr. King decided to have him swear constantly but because he's religious change the swears to non offensive language. It's always something that's made me laugh in real life as it just seems so stupid. I'm not saying it's a good thing to drop f bombs like you're going out of style but if you're going to do it then do it



I pulled a few quotes out of the book as I read. These two stood out as being classic Stephen King;

"It begins right now, Barbie thought. He knew that wasn't true-it had begun yesterday, when the Dome came down-but at the same time he felt sure it was true."

"In the middle of the night it was hard to be an optimist. When dawn was still long hours away, bad thoughts took on flesh and began to walk."


This one I liked because he's showing off his catchy Maine way of speaking;

"There was no generator and it was darker than a raccoon's asshole, but there was a box of wooden matches on the kitchen stove, and the first one she lit showed her a flashlight on the kitchen table."


A character Rommie Burpie is responding to a question about where a particularly nasty character who just got killed is and I like the response. He was typical of a lot of Mainers with French Canadian roots, he tends to overemphasize the accent cause he likes how it sounds;

"Shoveling coal down in hell would be my guess, Rommie said. Dat's where they put the new help."


These I just liked;

"Clever and stupid is a terrible combination."

"America's two great specialities are demagogues and rock and roll, and we've all heard plenty of both in our time."