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specs's Reviews (135)
I hesitate to recommend this to other people because this book was so obviously written for me -- and for girls like me -- that telling someone to read it feels very intimate. If you read this and you know me, you will then known an awful lot about my adolescence and how important science fiction & fantasy books were to me then and are now.
The short, obvious review: I love this book. If you read it and hate it, please don't tell me.
The short, obvious review: I love this book. If you read it and hate it, please don't tell me.
I loved the writing style, loved Anna, loved the village, but can't decide how I feel about the ending. A smart reminder of what was happening elsewhere in the world while the west was mired in leeches and plague? Or an unearned happy ending? Or an emotionally unsatisfying and poorly planned heel turn for the reverend? Unsure. And unsure if being unsure is a good thing
Beautiful and bloody and dark and complex. I thought the story sagged a bit around the 30-50% mark, but it was still a pleasure to read. Also just a pleasure to spend time with Hild again.
Interesting ideas & clearly a brilliant author, but I just could not find a foothold in this story for whatever reason.
Finally, the anti-capitalist zombie romp I've been waiting for.
[full disclosure -- I know Max and got to read this for free]
I love a novel where I can tell that the author had a fantastic time writing it. You can feel Max's glee as he builds the scaffolding of this society and then scampers around it like a demented, brilliant monkey. The premise is great (what if Victor Frankenstein invented zombies, and began supplying them to the world as cheap labor?) but the real fun is in following that thread through to its effects on our own 2020s world. Military? Zombies. Domestic labor? Zombies. Is there going to be a powerful pro-zombie business interests lobbying machine? Of course! Is there going to be Hackers-style guerilla resistance to this whole operation? Obviously!
Of course this massive upset in the labor market goes about as well as you'd think, and I was glad that Max dealt with how this will exaggerate existing social inequities and really just kick people who are already down (while the people in power keep insisting that's not at all what it's doing). That bit was, as the kids say, too real.
There are also lots of little nods in here to wider zombie and horror media. All of the hits are here (this is not an exhaustive list of said hits): S-Mart, Bub, the Monroeville Mall, Burke & Hare, even poor old Polidori shows up.
I just really can't think of another word than "romp" to describe this. And like all zombie media, the zombie here is just the metaphor for what's really dangerous: growth-mindset capitalism and mad (information) science.
[full disclosure -- I know Max and got to read this for free]
I love a novel where I can tell that the author had a fantastic time writing it. You can feel Max's glee as he builds the scaffolding of this society and then scampers around it like a demented, brilliant monkey. The premise is great (what if Victor Frankenstein invented zombies, and began supplying them to the world as cheap labor?) but the real fun is in following that thread through to its effects on our own 2020s world. Military? Zombies. Domestic labor? Zombies. Is there going to be a powerful pro-zombie business interests lobbying machine? Of course! Is there going to be Hackers-style guerilla resistance to this whole operation? Obviously!
Of course this massive upset in the labor market goes about as well as you'd think, and I was glad that Max dealt with how this will exaggerate existing social inequities and really just kick people who are already down (while the people in power keep insisting that's not at all what it's doing). That bit was, as the kids say, too real.
There are also lots of little nods in here to wider zombie and horror media. All of the hits are here (this is not an exhaustive list of said hits): S-Mart, Bub, the Monroeville Mall, Burke & Hare, even poor old Polidori shows up.
I just really can't think of another word than "romp" to describe this. And like all zombie media, the zombie here is just the metaphor for what's really dangerous: growth-mindset capitalism and mad (information) science.
I don't usually read YA but this combined a lot of my interests and was a fun read! Although it also does the thing that always puts of me off of YA, even when I was YA: presenting the rule-breaking, trouble-causing, dangerous person as the sympathetic character, and the person who is following the rules and trying to keep everyone safe as the stick-in-the-mud, boring, possible antagonist. Just makes me feel very old, and very tired.