Monster Island: A Zombie Novel by David Wellington Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Monster Island: A Zombie Novel
Book Review: Terrible
Summary: 2 Stars
Another bad zombie book in a long line of bad zombie books. The idea was fine, but the writing was dreadful. Hollow characters compounded by a complete lack of style. The author needs to take a few writing classes and work on sentence structure, grammar, and punctuation. I really wish more decent writers would get into the zombie genre. By the way, I would still have bought the book after reading my review since my zombie addiction is so severe. Just thought I would throw that in. Book Review: What a hoot!
Summary: 5 Stars
As I may have mentioned before, I'm a sucker for zombie stories. I look for 'em, and they used to be hard to locate back in the day. Lately, there's been an explosion of zombie horror novels, most of them being pretty lame.
However, MONSTER ISLAND is a truly entertaining read. The characters are all handled well and the plot moves along at a good clip and in a pretty logical way, considering the strange facts of the case. I enjoyed the handful of cognizant zombies and the explanations for them. I also liked the plain, simple reason Wellington gives for the zombie rising.
Wellington's writing style is crisp, and he shows quite a lot of skill and enthusiasm. You can tell he's having as good a time spinning this yarn as we are reading it.
I highly recommend MONSTER ISLAND and I am looking forward to the next books in the series.
Book Review: Surprisingly Good
Summary: 4 Stars
I looked at a couple of the other reviews prior to writing this. I'll start by saying I'm not particularly a fan of the zombie genre. It's hard for me to imagine being terrified by a shambling army of the undead. All the advantages would seem to be with the living and the zombies come off as clownish. The fact that the author overcomes this limitation of the genre is what makes this an enjoyable book. The use of female Somalia militia to fight the zombies was highly imaginative and provide the reader with unlikely, but likable heroines. The entire Druid/magic/mummy angle gets tedious, however this is what allowed this book to overcome the previously mentioned shambling undead factor and become genuinely suspenseful.
I am looking forward to reading the next two novels of the trilogy. This is a well written book that anyone who reads action/suspense novels will enjoy. The action is intense but the writing is never overly gory. Most of the characters are well developed, though a few of the Somali girls serve only as cannon fodder. For the 292 million of us who don't live in NYC a map might be helpful.
Book Review: Almost Perfect
Summary: 4 Stars
Zombie Island is the first of a trilogy of horror novels about the world in the days after the Zombie madness (if you've seen Night of the Living Dead you know where I'm coming from), and the story is intriguing, but there is just something lacking in the actual telling. Dekalb just waits a little too long for anything to actually happen.
I have high hopes for Zombie Nation, though, so we'll see if he can live up to his promise.
Book Review: Great Zombie Novel!
Summary: 4 Stars
Having picked this book up, I found that I really couldn't put it down easily. The author does a great job of slipping in the back story of the end of civilization as we know it. You keep finding out little bits and pieces of what has happened to the world and where are all of the people bit by bit. I am particularly pleased that the author chose to make his zombies, zombies and not the Carl Lewis, sprint faster than the wind zombies that were in the last Dawn of the Dead movie. These zombies shamble which is what they do quite well. Really enjoyed the building tension. A little bit bummed though that this is only part one of three. It ends on a bit of a cliff hanger but that's not going to stop me from ordering the next book in the series.