Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

I had a weird accident on Friday. A guy on his bike down on the city's south side smacked into me at an intersection. I was terrified; Jase was cool; Sketchy was indifferent; the guy was quite possibly high. In any event, he kept trying to shoo us on our way as we asked if he was ok, and I wouldn't leave the parking lot of where we were dropping Sketchy off until Jase talked to a cop that happened to be parked there. We were informed that if the guy took off and no one was hurt, that talking to him (the officer) was all we should and could do, and that we were now free to go on our way. My nerves were still pretty shaken, so I decided to calm myself by buying a new book. This is how I came to be in possession of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

Ever since I heard about it some months back on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me (a show everyone should listen to! Go ahead, the review will still be here when you're done), I've been looking forward to reading it. I must admit, I was slightly disappointed. On a scale of 1 to 5, I'd give it a solid 2.5.

The concept, I think, is brilliant. Injecting a little modern phenomena into a classic novel, and an important one too. Pride and Prejudice was published at a time not only when the novel as an art form was in its infancy, but when it was nearly impossible for a woman's work to be published once, let alone a second time. I sincerely hope people that don't typically read classical literature will read this, be motivated to read the original, and then jump into Jane Austen's other works.

But enough about my bibliophile nerdiness, back to the review. I have two main complaints about the book; character changes and integration of the new work to the old. Let's tackle the characters first.

Having read Pride and Prejudice a couple of times prior to reading Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, there were sections of the latter where I didn't even recognize Elizabeth Bennet. To render the main character completely unrecognizable is, in my opinion, a grave mistake. Because it's not a case of PaPaZ-Elizabeth clashing with PaP-Elizabeth, it's a case of the Elizabeth you're currently reading at any given point clashing with the Elizabeth of a few chapters or even just a few pages ago. It makes the character totally inconsistent throughout the new story, which is not good. The above also goes for Darcy and Lady Catherine de Bourgh.

All in all, it makes for a difficult and confusing read. I attribute most of this to the heavy reliance of Oriental training. It's kind of strange and totally inaccurate. Given the state of China and Japan when the novel takes place and British opinion towards these countries, it's not just unlikely, but nearly impossible that British aristocracy would have had their sons and daughters trained in Oriental styles of fighting in the case of a prolonged zombie outbreak. The ninjas are even more out-there.

Then there's the issue of integration, and this kind of ties into what I was saying earlier about character inconsistency. The new scenes don't mesh well with the original. If not imitating Austen's voice was an intentional decision, it was a poor one in my opinion. You can blatantly see where the author's voice changes, and it makes the whole thing come off as mediocre fan fiction.

That all said, it's not a terrible book. Not a great one, but not terrible. It's definitely worth a read, but I'd recommend borrowing it from the library instead of buying your own copy.