The Weird and The Yucky

By John Skow

TITLE: DOLORES CLAIBORNE

AUTHOR: STEPHEN KING

PUBLISHER: VIKING; 305 PAGES; $23.50

THE BOTTOM LINE: The world's oldest teenage author cranks out another one.

Stephen King here tries a novel without his customary latex spider webs and prop-department zombies, and nearly makes it work. What drives Dolores Claiborne is a powerful characterization of the title figure, a cranky old Maine islander who takes no guff from life or death. In a rasping, unrepentant tale to police, she admits to murdering her rotten husband 30 years ago. Narrative logic is murky here, but her confession is supposed to show that, on the other hand, she has not murdered her employer, a rich, loony off-islander.

King's mimicry is startlingly good, but as always, his artistic sensibility is that of a clever 14-year-old. His interest is caught by yucky death scenes and weird delusions, and he doesn't really care that these aren't the real horrors that adults deal with. "Wouldn't it be neat if, see, she gets her husband to fall down an old well," the reader imagines King thinking, "and he yells up at her to help him. She just smiles and kind of falls asleep, and the next thing she knows he's climbed up the inside of the well, and he grabs her by the foot, and she can feel his slimy, bloody hand . . ."

If you're old enough for your very own library card, this isn't frightening; it's just silly. But King's fans, subteens of all ages, won't mind at all.