Johnny and Kate had started an affair once Tully moved to Manhattan, and when Kate gets pregnant with daughter Marah, they marry. When Tully lands a reporting job with a Today-like show, her career shifts into hyperdrive. Expecting rejection, Kate keeps her infatuation with Johnny secret. Meanwhile a love triangle blooms at KCPO: Hard-bitten, irresistibly handsome, former war correspondent Johnny is clearly smitten with Tully. Kate no longer wishes to follow Tully into broadcasting and is more drawn to fiction writing, but she hesitates to tell her overbearing friend. Tully lands an internship at KCPO-TV in Seattle and finagles a producing job for Kate.

Tully has a life goal for them both: They will become network TV anchorwomen. In college, “TullyandKate” pledge the same sorority and major in communications. Tully takes refuge with the family of her “best friend forever,” Kate Mularkey, who compares herself unfavorably with Tully, in regards to looks and charisma. Tallulah “Tully” Hart, father unknown, is the daughter of a hippie, Cloud, who makes only intermittent appearances in her life. Lifelong, conflicted friendship of two women is the premise of Hannah’s maudlin latest ( Magic Hour, 2006, etc.), again set in Washington State. As King acknowledges in his dedication, he owes a debt to zombie-flick director George Romero and horror/fantasy author Richard Matheson. Clay doesn’t have a cell phone, but his son does, and he has no idea in what form he might find Johnny if he manages to find the boy at all. Yet the hero’s odyssey remains compelling as he attempts to return home to estranged wife Sharon and beloved son Johnny, and the surrogate family of refugees he attracts along the way adds a human dimension. The plot can’t sustain the sizzle of its sensational opening: More concerned with the effects of this cell-phone terrorism than its cause, the author never indicates what’s happening beyond Clay’s immediate vicinity.

The author taps into the collective dread of a society battered by 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina as he depicts a battle for survival that pits “normies” such as Clay, the few who didn’t have cellular access, against hordes of “phoners,” who quickly develop a flocking instinct and telepathic communication. Some sort of simultaneous transmission has transformed the city’s citizenry into mindless zombies. As King ( From a Buick 8, 2002, etc.) describes this urban meltdown in gory, graphic detail, it becomes increasingly obvious to Riddell that all who have suddenly become crazy were talking on their cell phones. Bystanders devour the flesh of strangers. King’s apocalyptic cautionary tale suggests that cellular communication could be as pernicious as it is pervasive.Īrtist Clay Riddell has just traveled from his native Maine to Boston to sell his first graphic novel when all hell breaks loose.

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