Chris Wheeler's Worldly Inferno

Under the Dome by Stephen King


My rating: 3 of 5 stars
I was more impressed with myself for finishing the book than actually the book itself. Thankfully, it was available on my Kindle so I didn’t have to lug my 15 lbs. book everywhere. It’s probably the longest book I’ve ever read. It was okay, but the length at times seemed unnecessary but after you’re 400 or 500 pages into, you don’t want to throw in the towel and lose all the time you’ve spent. The story hinges on the aftermath of a town literally being sealed up in a dome that is nonexistent to any of the senses but exists nonetheless (like a giant Tupperware container). The characters are pretty well developed, especially the protagonist and antagonist duo. But, (and I would assume this would be the case with any book this long) it drags at times. You find yourself being led down paths of superfluous details on a tangential storyline that you don’t care about and wonder later how it will fit into the overall story. This also isn’t a “scary” read, which I was hoping for. Yep, it’s suspenseful but not eerie, gory (except at the beginning when talking about how the dome comes to be), or what will come to be known as kitschy. More of a big psychological “What if?” storyline. And it borders on an acid trip at times where the story is suddenly punted into an esoteric realm that’s hard to follow and tie back to the reality in the book.

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Why did Bill Cosby ever take his show off the air?  He’s still running around performing (and what is he?  100?)!  Saw him a few years ago and he was hilarious.  No one in the cast passed away, that I’m aware of.  And the ratings were through the roof up until the end.  Of all the shows I grew up with, I would have to say this is my favorite.  I always wanted to be a part of their family, although it would be weird with me being the only white kid.  Not only was it hilarious, they always seemed to traverse through the perils in life but come out on the other end with some down home smiling, hugging and being stronger for it…and they never had to worry about the pesky little things in life like work or grocery shopping or cleaning your room (unless it was a setup for Cliff’s teasing and assuaging monologue) .  And Rudy’s pigtails were always perfect!

I think I’m going to write Nick at Night an email to not drop it from late night syndication.  Ever.  Now…back to the show…