Review: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls

  • April 17, 2010
  • James Skemp
  • review

This is a book review of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls, written by Steve Hockensmith.

First, I haven't read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, and didn't realize that this was a prequel to that tale.

However, as one who has been known to enjoy a zombie movie, now and again, this short tale was rather delightful.

The language only flirts with being period, so there's no worry of slogging through any of that. Instead, it's treated as a rather modern telling of a zombie tale, set long ago, unlike the first, which sounded to be more of a tweaking of Pride and Prejudice.

The pictures - black and white, hand-drawn, with lined shading (whatever that's officially called) - is rather nice, and present scenes (although not completely accurate) taken from the book. Thankfully, these are always after the events take place in the book, so the only way these'll spoil the story is if you go looking ahead.

I found it to be a very quick read, once I picked it up, thanks to relatively quick pace and very little extraneous story.

As for the characters, we get to know about a dozen, although only half of that are of any interest, and even that group adds and loses numbers, as the book progresses. (For example, only one of the sisters is really of any interest at the beginning of the book, but by the end two are.)

As for whether I'll pick up Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, having read this, I probably won't. This was a fun read, but I suppose I enjoy watching them more ...

So, if you enjoy zombies, and have interest in reading a (short, quick) story about them, pick this up. Otherwise, don't bother.