Dawn of the Dreadfuls - Advance Review

I was one of the lucky bloggers that got to participate in Quirk Classics great blogathon. I got an Advance copy of the Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls.

Also, anyone who wants to win a load of Quirk goods can go to this message board and post about this blog - every entry gets you a chance to win a great pack of Quirk materials!

I will not provide any spoilers (beyond some general information).

The book:

Set 4 years before Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, we meet the Bennet family as a genteel country family beset with problems (no male heir for one) and suddenly the dreadfuls reappear - having been vanquished many years before. With a nod to George Romero's classic Night of the Living Dead they are slow to start but once they reach high numbers they can be almost impossible to deal with.

Now I know - you just want to know - "How was the book?"

It was great. It successfully brings together all of the elements of the "later" book while introducing the family straight from a normal life style suddenly thrust into the start of a zombie apocalypse.

Now, readers of this book who go straight into the original book will find some differences in voice. Dreadfuls has a certain sense of 'camp' and likes to make snide remarks (which are very funny) and reminded me very much of the Blackadder series while the original book (following the voice of Jane Austen) is of course a little more formal.

While we have many new characters (and a lot of ones that show up in the next book) - I do have to wonder if someone named Lumpley every was mean to the author. The descriptions of this character and his lack of one just make the reader smirk in the beginning and I must admit I do love the way that Capt. Cannon is portrayed (no other hints for you! read the book!).

All in all this book does a great job of starting the adventure that Lizze and her family later complete in the original book and it does so while keeping true to the source material and giving us a better understanding of how everything came to be and what made the Bennets such ferocious fighters.

Go buy it on the 24th! Go on... pre-order it... get moving!