I decided to read this due to the interesting premise. It has been used before - I know of two instances, John Wyndham's Midwich Cuckoos (1957) and a 1971 John Pertwee Doctor Who story, 'The Daemons' - where a village is cut off by an enveloping force field, and I was interested to see what this author would make of it.

The book doesn't develop the characters before the dome arrives. Instead, it arrives very quickly and with a lot of foreshadowing. King's interest obviously focuses on the way the small town community trapped inside is very quickly polarised and descends into a toxic atmosphere controlled by a tyrannical local politician who sets up his own private army by packing the police force with thugs.

Given the initial premise, a lot of suspension of disbelief was required, and unfortunately the author proceed to pile up one thing after another until it was no longer feasible. Not only is the politician the biggest drug baron ever, behind the scenes, but - without giving too much away - the story revolves around a father and son who are both serial killers though for different reasons. And there is far too much 'little did he know' type broadcasting where the reader is told someone only has 40 seconds to live or some such. It certainly meant that I didn't relate to many of the characters as I was aware that most were straw men set up to be killed off in short order, often in some grisly fashion. It certainly killed a lot of the suspense that otherwise could have been developed.

I kept thinking there were ways that this story could have been made more believable as well as more involving: there is a huge cast of characters, most of whom are cardboard cut outs and stereotypes. I would have cut out the psychotic son entirely, including the gross-out element introduced by his subplot. A certain other character, who goes off the rails due to grief, could have taken his role in the jail scene where the hero is menaced, and been overpowered and then escaped to play the role he eventually does perform. (Though the whole section where he teams up with a certain character was another case in point of implausibility.) The inability of a grieving character, who is crying too much to see straight, to shoot the proverbial fish in a barrel would have been far more convincing: in the scene as written, the notion that someone could dodge bullets up close in a jail cell with little room to manouever exceeded my disbelief-suspension entirely.

There were other scenes that were also over the top. A slower burn, more convincing descent into madness by the townsfolk could have been developed. As it stands, the fate of the main villain lacks a satisfying resolution, and the revelation of what lies behind the dome's appearance was a big letdown despite the tour de force descriptions of the cataclysm at the end. That revelation reminded me of a first season classic Star Trek episode which I won't name here as I've discovered that the Goodreads app does not honour spoiler tags, but suffice to say I found this very long book ultimately a disappointment and therefore can award only an OK 2 star rating. ( )

One of his better longer books to date. I still think Stephen King does his finest work when he writes shorter books or stories. I enjoyed it. It started great and finished with a bang but the middle still dragged a bit and I think could have been much tighter. ( )

1100 pages of break neck pacing. I swear, by the last 1/3 of this I was holding my breath most of the time when I was reading it. I feel like I've got an elephant sitting on my chest! ( )

This book of Stephen King, which is after all nothing else than a homage to the Lord of the Flies from Golding, might be 1500 pages long but it doesn`t feels overwritten at all. The storyline, the characters,,,, King still can write, and it`s probably one of his best books. ( )

I don't think I've ever read a work of fiction so full of gratuitous violence, murder, and mayhem. Now if your thinking this is the beginning of a negative review, guess again. With so much non stop action, fast paced narrative, and large cast of evil characters, this book was an awesome read ! ( )