Under the Dome

A Novel

De: Stephen King

Narrado por: Raul Esparza

The “propulsively intriguing, staggeringly addictive” (USA TODAY) novel from master storyteller Stephen King—a #1 New York Times bestseller.

It is a typical October morning in Chester’s Mill, Maine: glorious weather, a perfectly blue sky, and quiet. Then, all hell breaks loose. Inexplicably, and simultaneously, a plane falls from the sky in flames; a woman’s hand is severed; and a farmer’s John Deere explores (with him on it). A few moments later, a pulp-truck crashes spectacularly. Somehow, an invisible and impermeable barrier—exactly following the town’s perimeter—has descended upon the town.

Life under the dome quickly becomes a hothouse—with the best in some people and the worst in others flourishing. There are unambiguous heroes and villains, from a supremely corrupt local politician to a very enterprising newspaper reporter. The situation under the dome deteriorates by the minute: supplies of everything are diminishing quickly, the citizens are panicking, and the police force, under the control of the diabolically devious alderman Jim Rennie, implement their own version of martial law. Meanwhile, Barbie, brave Iraq war vet and short order cook, and a band of intrepid pals engage in a race against time to find the source of the dome and raise it before there’s nobody left alive in Chester’s Mill.

Under the Dome is filled with a marvelous and enormous cast of over 100 characters. King’s trademark idiomatic language is pure pleasure to experience. “Nowhere in Mr. King’s immense body of work have his real and fantasy world collided with such head-on force” (The New York Times Book Review).

©2009 Stephen King (P)2009 Simon & Schuster

Raul Esparza is a very versatile Narrator

This novel is well done and entertaining as well as a study of humanity under a set of conditions and I would like to call out that Raul Esparza did an amazing job of covering a large cast.

Good book, lousy narrator

The story was good, not Stephen King's best but good nonetheless. However, the narrator was pretty awful. I'm not sure where the deep south and California skater dude accents came from as the book takes place in Maine. His few attempts at genuine Maine accents are pretty lame. He also does a poor job job of maintaining characters' voices in various scenes.

Also, despite several reviews from very confused readers who though the story line was right-wing and were surprised to see sex and profanity in a Stephen King book, the book has a clearly leftist bent and no more sex or profanity than other King books.

hampered by its delivery

I have heard some fantastic audiobook narrators -- Patrick Tull (Aubrey-Maturin series), Mirron E. Willis (Last King of Scotland), and Dion Graham (What is the What) come first to mind as examples. Unfortunately, Raul Esparza's delivery manages to keep pulling me out of the story. He's perfectly fine when speaking as the narrator; his standard enunciation is clear, his pacing is appropriate, and his emphases make sense almost always. But woe to the hearer when he ventures at regional dialect! At the risk of unkindness, he doesn't know Down East from Down South. He can't sound like Maine for more than a few words in a row, and the same character keeps sliding like pedal steel, if not all the way to Hattie McDaniel, then at least to somewhere near Foghorn Leghorn, and then back, sometimes with a quick flyover past Long Gisland. He also sounds, unfortunately, like everybody's kid nephew.

This is not a reflection on King's book, at all; I'm only two hours into it so far.

It's a small town, and we all support the team

I finished listening to "Under the Dome" by Stephen King, and I think it was his best book yet. Highly recommended.

The one downside is that King's growing hostility toward religion in general, Christianity in particular, is pretty evident. Also, and I don't know if the text contains these errors, or whether they exist in the written book (I would be VERY curious to know) but there are multiple places where the dreaded "S" is placed at the end of Revelation which is as bad as a huge "Kick Me, I Know Enough About the Bible to be Stupid"sign on one's back, but it is omitted in others. At first, I thought it was intentionally done to show the redneckish error of people who painted the verses on the side of the building, but the dreaded "s"is also present in the "narrator's" point of view at times, and absent at others, and absent in the spoken words of the very redneckish guy who put the verses on the wall. So... perhaps the guy who did the reading for the audible book slipped up and added a "s" where none was present in the book in those places. I would be VERY curious to know. This is near the end of the book.

If these errors are in the book, it is unforgiveable for someone of King's stature and long history of working with Biblical themes. Further, in the author's end notes, he stated that he had a fact-checker working with him to insure accuracy in the fact-based areas of the story. If this is just an Audible voice actor's error, King WIN and Audible FAIL, but if it is in the book, inexcusable King FAIL.

King at his best

I have listened to this book many times and always find more interesting things about the characters. Great reader too!

Under the Dome --all parts

I found this book gooooooooooooood! I couldn't stop listening. The main villain was so humanly real that I swear that I knew him personally --hated him. This is great Stephen King --I love it when his monsters are of a human ilk.

Classic King!

What an awesome book - classic King with a large cast of characters and message about people interact especially in dire situations. I didn't want the book to end and I still want to know what happens the characters now.
The narrator did a fantastic job capturing the tone of King's style and switching from one character to the other with ease.

great

This was a little long but I listened at every opportunity. Scenes and events were discribed so graphically you can visualize them and feel rith there. The characters came across so clearly you feel the emotions and craziness of each. I will listen to this book again.

Good, if uneven.

This was my first King novel and I wasn't disappointed. The writing was solid and the plot and character development was interesting, but I felt the end payout was a little weak. Even still, I enjoyed the journey.

Most unsatisfying ending ever!

This has got to be thee worst, most unsatisfying & cringe worthy ending I’ve ever “read”. Unfortunately I can’t really say why without spoilers.
I’ll just say that while listening to this, I imagine that the most people are probably hoping the ending will have a little bit of “what happens after” & definitely hoping it delivers a hefty dose of justice for the bad guys...
but that does not happen.
I really enjoyed the story & its many characters up until the end though. This is a long book & the great majority of it was enjoyable, so I still feel like I got my credits worth.
I’ve just decided to pretend it had the ending I imagined. Works for me!