At more than 1,000 pages, Stephen King’s “Under The Dome” expounds on a premise hatched by “The Simpsons Movie” in 2007. For over Chester’s Mill, Maine, where the novel is set, as in Springfield, an invisible dome has inexplicably alighted.

While Homer Simpson found his way out, no border is porous in Stephen King’s chilling vision of a paperweight world. Nothing besides a few cellphone signals, not even birds, could get in and out here. Impervious to airplanes and missiles, the dome encapsulating Chester’s Mill is also a force field, blowing up appliances near it and throwing the human brain for a loop.

Chester’s Mill’s dome permits King to revisit a tried-and-tested theme in previous works, e.g. The Mist: the breakdown of society in claustrophobic circumstances. In this insular Maine universe a hundred people are trapped, in plain sight of the U.S. President, the press and the rest of the planet. When it descended one fine October day, the dome pretty much mutilated anyone unlucky enough to be at its circumference.

Fascism, it turns out, simmers perfectly well in such conditions. Four days after the dome descended, one Big Jim Rennie appoints himself strongman, taking over the town police department, which he fills with jocks and bouncer-types.

There are sane voices, fortunately. Out of this calamity arises Dale Barbara, retired soldier and town misfit. He is joined by an English teacher, several skateboarders, a librarian, and a journalist. Not unlike the people of Bolder rising against Randall Flagg in The Stand, they make one last pitch for democracy while their little world hangs in the balance.

Under The Dome ultimately rips off from no one. If King were to let on, “The Simpsons Movie” is hardly the first. He wrote 75 pages of “Under the Dome” in 1976, shelving it until 2007. Finally published in November 2009, “Under The Dome” succeeds King’s 2008 effort, Duma Key.