The Laughing Corpse

An Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter Novel

By: Laurell K. Hamilton

Narrated by: Kimberly Alexis

Length: 10 hrs and 1 min

Publisher's summary

The early Anita Blake novels find new life in trade paperback-as perfect collectibles for long-time fans or as great ways for new listeners to sink their teeth into the series.

In The Laughing Corpse, a creature from beyond the grave is tearing a swath of murder through St. Louis. And Anita will learn that there are some secrets better left buried-and some people better off dead...

Love in vein: listen to more tales of Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter.

©2009 Laurell K. Hamilton (P)2009 Penguin

Critic reviews

"Anita Blake is one of the most fascinating fictional heroines since Scarlett O'Hara." (Publishers Weekly)

The Laughing Corpse was laughing matter.

Once again the storyline was great! Did not want to put my headphones down. Can't wait to start the next.

luvd this book

story fabulous. performance only adds to story. amazing story amazing audio experience. luvs every second of it.

gorgeous story

the narrator uses voices that are good for the story. the details are extraordinary and the depth of characters are entrancing.

Great performance

the sound effects are distracting but the performance and storyline are great I would definitely recommend

loving this series

I should have tried this series sooner. I shouldn't have let others influence me. I'm loving the interaction between Anita and the other characters, the noir feeling, but with a female character at the center. It really is a fresh take. I already purchased the next one, before I even finished this one.

Just a great story and the presentation of the reader is great. Excitement and the story goes on. It is just so much fun.

Wow I put the raitining in the title box. Great read. So much fun. The reader brings a lot of life to the read.

Edge of seat

I read this series several years ago and am listening time and its awesome! Love hiw it was all pulled together!

The Laughing Corpse

I always like Anita Blake. She has some great friends both kinds of friends! Fun!

It took a book and a half buuuuut..

Any additional comments?

But I came around to this narrator.

I started reading the Anita Blake series in high school. As the series progressed, as some of you know, I fell out of love and into contempt with our little heroine. But I love the world that Hamilton wrote around Anita. Now if only I hadn't started feeling as if I were reading a fanfiction-style story about the author herself she had somehow conned people into publishing and buying. But, as I've gotten into driving trucks, there was more time than I knew what to do with to keep myself awake and interested while driving through mountains and plains were radio signals are.. lacking. So, after some 200-some-odd hours of the current Game of Thrones series, I decided to give this one another chance.

It took me a while to get used to Alexis. When I read Anita, I read her in a lower tone.. And angrier. Always angry. The amount of sarcasm that comes through, as mentioned in other reviews, is a little daunting. In my head, Anita had held more of a droll tone as opposed to teenager-worthy sarcasm, so at the time it didn't translate as much as it does with someone reading it to me. Though, having been a teenager myself when I began reading her, I'm not sure it would have mattered much in the beginning. The story itself is interesting. Some of the interactions between characters lead me back to the whole 'Mary Sue' problem, but Alexis' tone kept me interested. There is a fair amount of replay--or of the exact same words and phrases to reintroduce characters we met in Guilty Pleasures. Anyway, as of this book, it all seems like a bunch of little things coming together to annoy me and distract me from the story itself. That and trying to forget the direction I remember the series is heading in.

I would recommend this book, and the one before it. 'Preternatural' things have always been interesting to me, and she writes them all out, some in new ways and, to an extent, in depth with powers and histories and ancient vampires acting like spoiled brats. I would tell anyone to give this series a chance. You might fall in love with it like I did. And maybe you won't be so bothered about what's to come. I might not either as I listen to them again. Alexis does give me a complete separate perspective about Anita's challenges with the way she reads. I'm not sure if that's normal.. If you've read the series and aren't sure about spending the credit, do it. Start from the beginning and remember the good times! Maybe what Hamilton has been giving all of us disgruntled fans and former fans in more recent years has been lost to the way we read and perceive things in our own tones and opinions.

Maybe that's just me.

Not a fan of the music

book 2 of the Anita Blake series, as Anita deals with her new marks from jean-claude, she fight unknown dead and a voodoo priestess, at 5'3 shes tough as nails..