Dolores and Vera’s relationship is, in part, defined by economic difference and disparate access to power. Both women, however, develop a kinship over time. Discuss their unusual bond—what brings them together? What pulls them apart? Cite specific examples from the text to support your argument.

As the details of Dolores life and crime are revealed, Stephen King’s novel presents several different descriptions for Dolores’s murder of Joe—revenge, self-defense, and pre-meditated murder—as if asking the reader to determine her guilt for themselves. How would you define Joe’s murder? How does changing the description of her crime affect its ramifications for Dolores and her children?

Dolores Claiborne explores one woman’s rage against a Western, patriarchal power structure. Discuss Vera’s implication that violence is the only response available to women who experience domestic or sexual abuse. In what ways does the novel endorse or contradict this idea?