Cell, Stephen King's latest novel, introduces a new twist for him–-a gay hero. While he has had side characters in his novels who were gay or lesbian–Dayna Jurgens in The Stand and Uncle Tommy in The Talisman come to mind–they are usually neither central to the plot nor drawn much beyond the more pleasant aspects of gay stereotypes.

Enter Tom McCourt, a gay man who happens to be walking along Boston Common on a sunny October afternoon just as Everything Goes Horribly Wrong.

As Cell opens, Tom 's fellow protagonist Clay Riddell is in line to buy some ice cream from a Mister Softee truck. He waits behind a woman in a power suit and two pretty teenage girls as what is later described as The Pulse is transmitted through every cell phone.

The Pulse erases the cell phone user's higher consciousness, leaving behind nothing but base, animal aggression. And what happens next is classic King horror: the woman in the power suit tries to attack the man in the ice cream truck. She is thwarted by one of the teenagers who rips her throat open–with her teeth.

Tom and Clay are understandably horrified by what they witness. Tom is in such a state of shock he can barely move out of the way of a lunatic charging him with a butcher knife. Thanks to Clay's intervention, and a cop who shoots the crazy man in the head, Tom barely escapes injury while around them Boston descends into madness.

As King's fans know, he loves his gore. Those who like their horror more cerebral will get their share of that, but the tightly edited story is also liberally laced with the sort of violence one would expect from this sort of storyline. In typical King fashion, the sensation of an ordinary day becoming a horror of disorder is brilliantly conveyed.

Tom and Clay quickly realize what is unfolding and take cover in a nearby hotel as Boston collapses into a chaos of car accidents, Duck Boats gone amok, crashing planes and vicious assaults. There they are joined by Alice, a 15 year old girl severely traumatized after watching her mother rip out a cab driver's throat before murderously turning on her.

Only Alice 's knowledge of martial arts saves her, and for the first few pages of her introduction into the story, she can barely speak. Fleeing Boston, the three journey north toward Maine, guided both by communications in dreams and Clay's desire to reunite with his wife and son.

Much of Clay's distress is caused not by what he knows, but what he fears. He has no idea if his family is alive or dead, what they might have suffered, or even where they are. The trio journeys first to Tom's house in Malden, where they outfit themselves for the rest of their trip.

Next, they go to Gaiten Academy, a prep school with just one sane student and an elderly Dean left unaffected by The Pulse.

It is at Gaiten they learn disturbing news–the ‘phone people' are flocking together, crudely using tools, and are essentially ‘rebooting' as their minds adjust to using the basest form of group thought. It is obvious that they are up to something that involves a bad outcome for the remaining survivors. Destroying this flock of phone people has a bad outcome for Tom, Clay and Alice –the war is on, and no holds are barred.

Page 1 / 2 / 3 - Next