History Literature / DoloresClaiborne

* DomesticAbuse: Joe, to Dolores but she soon puts a stop to that. Dolores also recalls that her father hit her mother from time to time: in those days, this was an accepted practice. At first, she accepts Joe hitting her because she was raised to believe that this is normal in a marriage, but when Joe's abuse becomes more brutal than anything she saw her father do, she decides that she won't take it any longer.

* IntrepidReporter : Selena
* IvyLeagueForEveryone : Selena attended Vassar on a full scholarship.

* DomesticAbuse: Joe, to Dolores but she soon puts a stop to that.

* WomanScorned: It's implied that Vera murdered her husband because he had been cheating on her.

* TheAlcoholic: Joe St. George, Dolores's husband.
* AlcoholicParent: Joe.

* ScottishEnglish: Dr John [=McAuliffe=] speaks it, despite having lived in Maine since WorldWarTwo.

* ClearMyName: The entire reason for the novel. While Dolores [[spoiler:''is'' partly responsible for her husband's death, Vera's death is a genuine accident.]]

* AbusiveParents: Dolores Claiborne has a husband who, in addition to physically abusing her, has a decidedly unwholesome interest in their teenage daughter Selena, who suffered sexual abuse at his hands in addition to [[ManipulativeBastard manipulation]] into being afraid of her mother in order to keep her from talking about it. It is this, along with the stealing of their children's college money in order to spite her, that would ultimately lead to Dolores's decision to murder him.

* SympatheticMurderer: Dolores. What pushed her over the brink wasn't her Joe's treatment of her, it was his treatment of their children -- emotional abuse of Joe Jr, sexual abuse of Selena, and cleaning out the college savings accounts Dolores had worked long and hard to build up.

The 1995 [[FilmOfTheBook film adaptation]] starred Creator/KathyBates as Dolores, Judy Parfitt as Vera, JenniferJasonLeigh as Selena and Christopher Plummer as (unique to the film character) Detective John Mackey.

** Little Tall Island is the setting for another StephenKing story, ''[[Literature/NightmaresAndDreamscapes Home Delivery]]''.

* MeaningfulName: "Dolores" means "pains, sorrows" and is traditionally associated with the pains of the Mother Mary. Throughout the novel, Dolores experiences a number of pains and sorrows, especially as a mother.

* TheLoinsSleepTonight: After Dolores stood up to Joe's abuse and humiliated him, be became impotent with her. [[spoiler:So, he started to molest his daughter.]]

* CutHimselfShaving: Although Joe does have a history of beating Dolores, she stopped him from doing so months before. She really, honestly did simply injure herself on accident. But the checkout lady refuses to believe her. However, both her and Joe do use the large bruise to let him save face by ''pretending'' that he gave it to her.

-->'''Vera:''' You know, you startled the ''shit'' out of me, woman,' she says. 'All these years I wasn't sure you ''could'' cry - I thought maybe you were made of stone.

The 1995 [[FilmOfTheBook film adaptation]] starred KathyBates as Dolores, Judy Parfitt as Vera, JenniferJasonLeigh as Selena and Christopher Plummer as (unique to the film character) Detective John Mackey.

* {{Jerkass}}: Vera Donovan, who in her old age intentionally [[NobodyPoops soils herself]] in order to make life for Dolores harder.

* WomanScorned: It's implied that Vera murdered her husband because he has been cheating on her.
-->'''Vera:''' But sometimes men, especially drinking men, do have accidents. They fall downstairs, they slip in bath-tubs, and sometimes their brakes fail and they run their BMWs into oak trees when they are hurrying home from their mistresses' apartments in Arlington Heights.

** The novel is explicitly connected by the solar eclipse and weird empathy to ''Gerald's Game''.

* StatuteOfLimitations: Presumably the reason why [[spoiler:Dolores is let free at the end of the novel, despite admitting a part in her husband's death -- it happens nearly thirty years before.]]

Dolores Claiborne is a 1992 psychological thriller novel by Creator/StephenKing. It went on to be the best selling novel of 1992.It was made into a [[Film/DoloresClaiborne 1995 film]].