Pride and Predjudice and Zombies, a Book Report

I never had to read Pride and Predjudice when I was in school, and having now read most of this zombified adaptation, I am very glad. It’s like reading a summary of a bunch of socialite’s Twitter accounts. I have some acquaintances whom I would consider to be Atlanta socialites, and believe me, there isn’t any more happening now among the cool kids than was in high school.

Thankfully, every few pages or so in the book, zombies attack and slaughter a few people, but its still not enough to distract from the boredom of the original story, and I had such high hopes based on the opening page’s merits. Honestly I think I am the wrong person for the book. Someone with a great sense of humor and a great love of Jane Austen’s original would likely very much enjoy it.

It starts with a really great sentence:

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains.

Further down the first page, a gentleman, Mr. Bennett, keeps his pimp hand strong. He says to his wife as she’s prodding him with questions:

“Woman, I am attending to my musket. Prattle on if you must, but leave me to the defense of my estate!”

Sadly, for me the book drops off sharply from there, though I did try really hard to stay with it through the whole thing. I made it about half way, but have now given up hopes of the zombie attacks increasing in frequency to the point where the tedious socialite stuff is completely overshadowed.

I don’t blame the author. In fact the zombie parts are excellent. The heroine, Elizabeth Bennett, is modified in this version into a highly trained martial artist and is not at all scared to whip some putrified zombie ass in large quantity. Unfortunately, the quantity is not nearly large enough for my tastes.

I suspect that the author tried to leave the book intact enough that fans of Jane Austen’s original novel would recognize much of the plot, but since I would rather do my taxes while in line at the DMV, I am the wrong person for it.

I would equate the experience to going to dinner with a friend who has a really boring/awful girlfriend, thinking that hanging with your buddy will be good regardless of how terrible she is, and then being annoyed when he lets her do all the talking all night, only interjecting now and again.

As I say, there is probably a huge section of literature fans who love this book, and it is a great idea for an adaptation. I am not a fan of literature, though. I’m just a guy who likes to read.