Stephen King to Release New Novel in Fall 2009, Under the Dome

Stephen King fans rejoice. He has a new novel coming out, due on Nov. 10. His latest - a short story collection entitled Just After Sunset - has remained on the New York Times bestseller list for the last seven weeks as of the week of January 2. It is typical for King's books to remain on the bestselling list for weeks on end, and as far as his new book Under the Dome is concerned, we should probably expect no less. Scribner has officially added Under the Dome to their 2009 release list, so we can be fairly sure that it will be published this year, even if not in fall.

King is known for his lengthy tomes such as It and The Stand. Readers who are accustomed to this abundance of words will not be disappointed - so far the first draft manuscript (which Stephen King finished in August) for Under the Dome weighs in at 19 pounds, according to King's self-interview on his official website StephenKing.com. More than 1,500 pages make up this 19 pounds - that's twice the number of pages in King's last novel Duma Key.

Under the Dome is a book Stephen King has been trying to complete for over twenty years. He first tried writing it under the title The Cannibals and its current title Under the Dome. He could not finish the project at either point and gave up for quite a while. King now says that he was probably too young and the project was too big for him to take on at the time. He remembers The Cannibals and the earlier version of Under the Dome as two extremely different attempts at writing the same idea. What idea is this? King says it involves what happens when people are removed from the society they have always been a part of.

What can we expect from this book? It's been referred to many times by fans as "epic" and King himself compared it to The Stand in the issues it deals with ("Stephen King's God Trip," Salon.com). However, he mentions that Under the Dome deals with them in a less obvious way. He also refers to it as "dead straight," unlike his earlier attempt The Cannibals, which he calls a "social comedy" in the vein of Needful Things. All clues indicate that the plot directly deals with a small town in which its residents discover they are living under a large and unexplained dome.

Since some Stephen King fans have been looking forward to this novel for more than twenty years, there are bound to be plenty of disappointed readers who feel the wait was not worth it. For those curious enough to want to hear a bit of Under the Dome as it is now, there is a video of King reading from the first few pages of the novel.

Readers seeking more information about Stephen King's upcoming novel Under the Dome should refer to his website or Lilja's Library.

Sources:

Stephen King, "Messages From Stephen", StephenKing.com

C-Span, "Discussion on Writing with Stephen King", C-Span Archives

Lilja, "News", Lilja's Library