![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
quippeThe Blurb On The Back:
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains."
So begins Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, an expanded edition of the beloved Jane Austen novel featuring all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie mayhem. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton - and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she's soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr Darcy. What ensures is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers - and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield. Can Elizabeeth vanquish the spawn of Satan? And overcome the social prejudices of the class-conscious landed- gentry? Complete with romance, heartbreak, swordfights, cannibalism and thousands of rotting corpses, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies transforms a masterpiece of world literature into something you'd actually want to read.
England is menaced by a zombie plague but Mrs Bennett is more worried about marrying off her five daughters protect Hertfordshire who with their Shaolin kung-fu training. When Mr Bingley arrives at Netherfield Park, accompanied by Mr Darcy, marriage seems a distinct prospect for oldest daughter Jane. Unfortunately Darcy finds the Bennett family, with their inferior Chinese training (the gentry preferring to train in Japan), lack of money and lack of social refinement, a poor prospect for his friend. When Lizzie overhears Darcy's concerns, she wants to cut out his heart. Instead the two engage in verbal sparring that could grow into something more, until Mr Wickham arrives to join the local militia and reinforce Lizzie's prejudices against the proud Darcy ...
Take Pride and Prejudice and add references to ninjas and zombies and you've got this book. Despite the initial fun of seeing Lizzie and her sisters engage in sword fighting and kung fu, the joke’s charm fades by the final page and the truly funny lines remain Austen’s.
Much of the problem is Grahame-Smith's lack of sensitivity to the original material. While some characters are true to the original (Jane remains sweet tempered, weeping for the zombies she kills while Lydia is self-absorbed and shallow) and some actually do better (the buffoonish Mr Collins goes through a touching character arc), Smith equates Lizzie's quick wit with being quick tempered. Too often she's shown wanting to rip someone's heart out for a slight to her honour and her willingness to use her fists rather than her words costs her some charm. Darcy makes crass double-entendres (an unfunny joke about balls appears twice) and his willingness to beat Wickham into an incontinent, paraplegic pulp mars his image as a romantic lead.
There are some entertaining scenes. The interruption of the Netherfield ball by zombies who eat the servants is amusing, and Smith’s re-imagining of the show-down between Lady Catherine and Lizzie as a ninja fight in a dojo is a lot of fun. However a quick Google search should have told Smith that skunks and racoons are not indigenous to the English countryside and the addition of the burning fields never quite fits the text.
All in all, this is an okay read but the novelty of mixing zombies with regency romance wears off too soon and it doesn’t bear a second reading.
The Verdict:
For a one-note joke this is an okay read, but I can't help but feel that if a little more effort and been taken in trying to make the zombie/ninja element more believable for the time, then it could have become a classic.
So begins Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, an expanded edition of the beloved Jane Austen novel featuring all-new scenes of bone-crunching zombie mayhem. As our story opens, a mysterious plague has fallen upon the quiet English village of Meryton - and the dead are returning to life! Feisty heroine Elizabeth Bennet is determined to wipe out the zombie menace, but she's soon distracted by the arrival of the haughty and arrogant Mr Darcy. What ensures is a delightful comedy of manners with plenty of civilized sparring between the two young lovers - and even more violent sparring on the blood-soaked battlefield. Can Elizabeeth vanquish the spawn of Satan? And overcome the social prejudices of the class-conscious landed- gentry? Complete with romance, heartbreak, swordfights, cannibalism and thousands of rotting corpses, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies transforms a masterpiece of world literature into something you'd actually want to read.
England is menaced by a zombie plague but Mrs Bennett is more worried about marrying off her five daughters protect Hertfordshire who with their Shaolin kung-fu training. When Mr Bingley arrives at Netherfield Park, accompanied by Mr Darcy, marriage seems a distinct prospect for oldest daughter Jane. Unfortunately Darcy finds the Bennett family, with their inferior Chinese training (the gentry preferring to train in Japan), lack of money and lack of social refinement, a poor prospect for his friend. When Lizzie overhears Darcy's concerns, she wants to cut out his heart. Instead the two engage in verbal sparring that could grow into something more, until Mr Wickham arrives to join the local militia and reinforce Lizzie's prejudices against the proud Darcy ...
Take Pride and Prejudice and add references to ninjas and zombies and you've got this book. Despite the initial fun of seeing Lizzie and her sisters engage in sword fighting and kung fu, the joke’s charm fades by the final page and the truly funny lines remain Austen’s.
Much of the problem is Grahame-Smith's lack of sensitivity to the original material. While some characters are true to the original (Jane remains sweet tempered, weeping for the zombies she kills while Lydia is self-absorbed and shallow) and some actually do better (the buffoonish Mr Collins goes through a touching character arc), Smith equates Lizzie's quick wit with being quick tempered. Too often she's shown wanting to rip someone's heart out for a slight to her honour and her willingness to use her fists rather than her words costs her some charm. Darcy makes crass double-entendres (an unfunny joke about balls appears twice) and his willingness to beat Wickham into an incontinent, paraplegic pulp mars his image as a romantic lead.
There are some entertaining scenes. The interruption of the Netherfield ball by zombies who eat the servants is amusing, and Smith’s re-imagining of the show-down between Lady Catherine and Lizzie as a ninja fight in a dojo is a lot of fun. However a quick Google search should have told Smith that skunks and racoons are not indigenous to the English countryside and the addition of the burning fields never quite fits the text.
All in all, this is an okay read but the novelty of mixing zombies with regency romance wears off too soon and it doesn’t bear a second reading.
The Verdict:
For a one-note joke this is an okay read, but I can't help but feel that if a little more effort and been taken in trying to make the zombie/ninja element more believable for the time, then it could have become a classic.
