Under the Dome by Stephen King

Under the Dome by Stephen King

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


I didn't like this book as much as I wanted to. I loved the premise: a small Maine town is suddenly covered by an impenetrable force field and is cut off from the world. Though they can communicate via cell phone and Internet, nothing can get through the 'dome'. The town is forced to survive on it's own, as the government tries to figure out what happened and how to break through. This is a classic "microcosm of society" story - how will the town's citizens cope, isolated fro the rest of the world? And, much like "The Lord of the Flies", it ain't a pretty picture.

And I guess that's why I didn't enjoy reading it - the bad guys were SO bad (and there were so many of them). It was painful to watch their machinations as they plotted to rule this new 'kingdom'. I think I'm just sensitive to this kind of behavior - as a little girl I didn't like "The Cat in the Hat" because of the bad behavior of the cat and Things 1 and 2. So, you can imagine my discomfort in reading about politically motivated murder, and rape. Just not enjoyable.

AND, the head 'bad guy' is, once again, a self-proclaimed "man of God". The stereotypical Christian hypocrite. Isn't that a WAY overused cliche? It is SO NOT original.

Of course, King is a good enough story teller that I wanted to finish the book - I wanted to find out what caused the dome and if the people got out. But even here, King resorts to an overused Sci-Fi cliche (harkening back to the original Star Trek series, even!).

So, overall, a disappointment for me, and doesn't make me want to rush out and read more King right away, either.