2020 Reading Challenge: A book you picked up because the title caught your attention

[baronessekat]

Paul Is Undead: The British Zombie Invasion by Alan Goldsher

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


well, 2.5 stars but I didn't like it enough to round up and for that I'm rather bummed.

I picked up this book in a used book store because the title caught my eye and then the description sounded fun. What would the world have been like had the famous Rock & Roll band "The Beatles" been made up of 3 zombies and 1 Ninja? Color me intrigued. I like a good zombie story. So I picked it up.

Unfortunately I found it a struggle to get through. What kept me going was actually it was pretty funny. There were seriously a LOT of one-liners and turns of phrases that had me chuckling if not down right laughing out loud. But the story... left me flat.

The story is a narrative of "research and interviews" that the author conducted into the history of the Beatles. John Lennon, George Harrison and Paul McCarthy are all zombies - a specific subset that retains memories and is basically human - but for the whole being undead and brain eating thing. John having been made one when he was an infant and then turned Paul and George and Ringo is a 7th level Ninja. It follows their rise, fall, rise and fall again and eventual disbanding of the group.

I suppose that if you actually liked the Beatles (I know heresy but I actually don't like much of their music from any point in their careers) you might like this book. But personally, except for the funny one-liners I found it lacking.





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Comments

[mesotablar]

well that does it for me, the straw on the camel's back.
I read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies years ago and like you say, it left me flat. After some more attempts at these sort of mash up books, where they take a story and throw supernatural beings in like sprinkling salt, I picked up Shakespeare Undead and it was so bad for me that I got 2 chapters in then threw it against a wall.

Thank you for making me aware that this supernatural veneer is not limited to fiction origins.

[baronessekat]

See I liked Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. I did have trouble getting through P&P&Z (though I actually liked the movie).

But I think, like you, I will just give this subgenre a pass going forward.