Under the Dome

A Novel

By: Stephen King

Narrated by: Raul Esparza

Length: 34 hrs and 24 mins

Publisher's summary

On an entirely normal, beautiful fall day in Chester's Mill, Maine, the town is inexplicably and suddenly sealed off from the rest of the world by an invisible force field. Planes crash into it and fall from the sky in flaming wreckage, a gardener's hand is severed as "the dome" comes down on it, people running errands in the neighboring town are divided from their families, and cars explode on impact. No one can fathom what this barrier is, where it came from, and when - or if - it will go away.

Dale Barbara, Iraq vet and now a short-order cook, finds himself teamed with a few intrepid citizens - town newspaper owner Julia Shumway, a physician's assistant at the hospital, a select-woman, and three brave kids. Against them stands Big Jim Rennie, a politician who will stop at nothing - even murder - to hold the reins of power, and his son, who is keeping a horrible secret in a dark pantry. But their main adversary is the Dome itself. Because time isn't just short. It's running out.

©2009 Stephen King (P)2009 Simon & Schuster

Enjoyable, But Should Have Trigger Warnings

I enjoyed it. I feel like it had a good ending, and I don't really see how it could have ended any differently. I guess the people who didn't like the ending were expecting a mad scientist or the military to be responsible and were disappointed, but I thought the ending was just right.

However, there were some brutal sexual assault scenes in:
Part 12 Chapter 10
Part 14 Chapters 4 & 5

If you are sensitive to that, just skip those chapters. I feel like Audible should put trigger warnings on books with this kind of content because I was blindsided by it.

The narrator is alright, but he needs to stop with the accents. Some of his voices are just ridiculous. Some characters randomly have British accents and the French character sounded Jamaican for some reason. I just don't understand what he was going for some times. These people are from New England!

Overall I enjoyed it though. I would recommend if you enjoy dramas and science fiction.

Great story, ends quickly

Any additional comments?

This was a great story and the narration is top notch! However, after making it through 35+ hours of the story, I felt like it all ended in a few short minutes. That could just be me.

It was great writing, amazing character development and dialogue.

Awful narrator, dumb ending

I am a Stephen King fan but he is definitely past his glory days with this novel. King has no idea how modern teenagers really speak.The death scenes, and there are so many of them, are described in precise, gross, gory detail. The characters are so obviously political and stereotypical they are cartoon-like and the abrupt ending is stupid, leaving no closure at all. What happens to this town? What happens to the survivors?who are these creatures who masterminded the dome?

It is implausible that one small town has so many racist wingnuts of such low intelligence and that they can all be driven to blind obedience and murder of their neighbors within a few days of living under the dome. Furthermore, none of them seem to suffer the anxiety of the reader in realizing they are running out of time and bad is going to become worse. They are apparently oblivious.

The narration is just awful. This guy cannot do voices and should not even try. The story is set in Maine and the lead villain, Big Jim, comes off with some kid of accent that sounds southern. The children's voices are the worst. They are difficult to even listen to. The women sound ridiculous.

It did hold my interest and I finished it, but the ending just annoyed and aggravated me. However, King is the master of "deus ex machina" endings and this is no exception. Sometimes I wonder if he just keeps writing until his editor says the manuscript is due and then he just makes up some stupid way to get out of the predicament.

Interesting book, characters and concept

Loved this one! It was difficult to put down. Loved the way characters were presented and found the concept of the dome a very interesting mystery.

Love the flow

I used to be a voracious reader until I suffered a brain aneurysm. Stephen King being one of my favorites as a youngster (always waited for the Stand to be made into a movie). So happy to have audible and to be able to catch up with Stephen King. The flow and style of his writing and character development is so comforting, like finding and putting on that lost favorite soft t-shirt. I love it.

Bad Narration

This is one of the worst narrations I’ve experienced. Every phrase has the wrong emotional delivery or strange rhythm to it.

Great book, phenomenal performance

Under the Dome is maybe Stephen King's angriest book - tightly written, powerfully resonant - and Raul Esparza did an amazing job creating distinct voices for the many characters, and even nailed the Mainer touch. A++

Terrible Narration

I am struggling to keep going with this book. the narrator seems unable to do a New England accent, and instead gives everyone an English accent. if you can't get the accent right, just don't do one.

Great book as usual

I loved the creative story line. I don't however enjoy the obvious political jabs and opinion of the author. But even with obvious political point of view in this story, it was a great book. And I will continue to read Mr. Kings books and just work through the political points in his stories. Its well worth it.

Good story, horrible narrator

The story’s pretty good. Although the narrator is the worst I’ve ever listened to. Nails on a caulk board bad.