Under the Dome by Stephen King

I thought I'd start the Stephen King challenge with this chunkster, which I hadn't read before. Under the Dome is a big story with lots and lots of characters and the same kind of good vs. evil style that he used in his classic, The Stand.

The story begins when a mysterious invisible barrier comes down right along the border of the small Maine town of Chester's Mill. Like a sheet of impenetrable glass, the "dome" as people come to call it, cuts the townsfolk off from the rest of the world, and scientists and the military outside are unable to discover what the nature of the dome is or how it can be lifted. The opening scenes when the dome drops are very vivid, and King describes car accidents, a plane crash, decapitations and all manner of mayhem, hooking the reader in from the very first page.

In Chester's Mill the people are scared but begin to rally around their elected officials, in particular James Rennie, who has the town in his pocket and soon realises that the existence of the dome can be turned to his advantage. Luckily, there are a few citizens who recognise that Rennie's thirst for power is getting out of hand, and the characters we encounter begin to sort themselves into the good guys and the bad guys. Our main good guys are Dale Barbara, or Barbie as he is known (possibly the worst-named hero of any King novel), an ex-army decorated hero who had been working as a cook in the local cafe, and Rusty Everett, a medical assistant at the town's small hospital. Rusty is our Everyman character, a real good guy with a young family who just wants to help people, while Barbie is a shrewd and capable man's man, who knows how to take charge of a difficult situation.

As always, King's characters are spot on, and he lets you get to know them well and learn how their minds tick. I have read several reviews which complain of the sheer number of characters in Under the Dome, and it's true there are an awful lot, but they all have their individual personalities and I didn't often find myself confused by who people were. The character of Rennie was particularly well done; King never lets him become one-dimensional and always gives him proper motivations for the evil that he does.

The classic King good points however, are accompanied by one of the classic King bad points - namely the ending. The climax of this novel is absolutely fantastic, with a thrilling earth-shattering event that kept me glued to the pages. Marvellous stuff, I thought, just please let him sustain it until the end. But unfortunately he doesn't, and the book finishes on a bit of a whimper. It's only the last few pages and in a lesser author I might not even notice, but the endings of King's books so often follow this damp squib pattern I do wish he'd try and be a bit more imaginative with them.

I loved Under the Dome, but sometimes it felt like a slight rehash of ground already covered in The Stand. The style and atmospheres of the two books are very similar, though the plot is different, but The Stand just did it all that much better. I think if I hadn't read The Stand first this might well get a five star rating, but as it is I'll give it a four. I'll hang on to my copy though, because I'm going to want to read this one again.