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Monday, August 6, 2012

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, Seth Grahame-Smith

The book lists Jane Austen as an author as well.  I was lucky enough to have my best friend's copy, fully annotated for her literature students.  Her literature students are lucky enough to read this book along with Austen's original, and I can see how it would help boys enjoy the women-centered novel more.

For the first few chapters, I laughed with delight at the way Grahame-Smith worked the undead monsters into the plot and language of the original novel.  After those chapters, however, the zombie motif began to get a bit repetitive.  The main downfall is the parallel he tries to draw between the concept of being "accomplished" and being a fearsome warrior.  In Austen's novel, the Bennett sisters are not the former; in the new version, they are the latter.  It shifted the dynamic a little too much for my liking.

That being said, I enjoyed Grahame-Smith's sense of fun and plan to go on to Abraham Lincoln, Vampire Slayer, so I can learn a bit of history I never learned in school.