Dead of Night: A Zombie Novel

first off, i'm a big mayberry fan. i've read all of his joe ledger books and enjoyed them. however, i wasn't sure about his zombie books. probably b/c of the audible samples and some of the reviews. yes, i read a lot of the reviews you guys write (thanks!). i've listened to a bunch of the zombie books on audible and needed my zombie fix. b/c of that and the strength of the joe ledger series, i decided on dof (dead of night) before dust & decay and rot & ruin.

don starts off slow building the story. dez is a female cop in a small town. she's your stereotypical hot blonde cop with an attitude. she's pissed at the world b/c she believes everybody's always left her so instead of being hurt again, she lives a reckless life, indulging in men with blonde hair and a good butt. the only person she cares about is jt, her partner. jt is an older black guy who is like her surrogate father.

the story starts with dez and jt investigating a crime at a funeral home. the doc and cleaning maid have been viciously killed, and the dead body is missing. while investigating, the cleaning lady attacks dez, and she re-kills her. at first, jt doesn't believe dez and asks her if she's still drunk. that's when they notice the body of the doc is missing. they try to come up with some plausible story as their backup arrives. the chief doesn't know what to make of their story so dez, jt, and their backup start searching the woods for the missing bodies, and this is where the action starts to pick up.

as people start to get infected, they don't know what to do with them b/c they're friends. in a small town, everybody knows each other. so at first, they're reluctant to kill someone they know. so what do they do? they handcuff an infected friend and take him to the hospital.

eventually, those killed by the infected come back to life, and infection starts to spread. the story starts off slow, but the action builds as the story progresses.

trout, dez's ex-boyfriend, is a journalist who happens to be in town when the first killings take place. they fight like hell, but trout smells a story. he realizes the missing body is that of a missing serial killer. he thinks a group of crazed fans stole his body so he follows the leads. he eventually tracks down the prison doctor who injected the serial killer. trout and his buddy, goat, learn the doc's secret and try to get the word out, but the military has encircled the small town.

i don't want to give more away, but i enjoyed the story. i enjoyed listening to what it's like being a zombie. we learn about it from the funeral home doc. what the virus does is break the link b//ween your consciousness and your body. you can see and hear everything you're doig, but you can't stop your body from craving fresh blood. this is a great take- it's sad and horrifying!

i think the biggest downside is the whining about killing all the people you know. i think i'd be too s#!tless to care at the time. how about you?

overall, i'm glad i took a chance on dead of night. it's a solid standalone zombie story. it's got everything for a good zombie story- background, characters, action, zombie carnage, and a good ending.

Do not even think of opening this book if you are even the slightest bit squeamish. There is brain eating, rotting bodies, skin crawling, and worm-eating flesh. It will affect everyone men, women, and children, with equal gruesomeness.

This book tells a story of one man’s journey to revenge leading to biological experimentation gone bad and gives you a glimpse of what would happen if an unknown disease were to strike in some small town USA. Actually I think the experimental drug worked as it was designed to do, but not the way the good doctor had planned.

This story had pulse pounding action to the very last word! I am going to have to add Jonathan Maberry to my favorite authors list because I just love his style. I absolutely loved the ending!

The Narration Review
William Dufris narrated this book. He has great character voices and you can always tell the difference in the characters when they speak. He put a lot of effort into making the emotions come to life. When he starts to describe some of the gruesome scenes you get the feeling he is actually looking at it and can hear the disgust building in his voice.

** Note **
I received this audiobook as a Random Act of Kindness (RAK) from Darlene over at Darlene’s Book Nook. If you haven’t heard about RAKs for books, then feel free to click on the link up on my Alaskan Bookie Blog and visit the Book Soulmates website. It is an awesome way to share the love of reading!

The narration of this book is terrible and distracting. Instead of just reading, the narrator over-acts each sentence like a little kid telling a ghost story with flashlight under his face, doing his best imitation of Vincent Price. It was tiresome. The content of the book seems like it has potential, but I couldn't get past the narration.

Fairly run of the mill as zombie stories go, a bit more solid on the explanation side in terms of where the zombies come from and why -- but they're zombies, so they are what they are and any author that tries to backfill that story has his hands tied behind his back already.

The reading, however, is truly horrible. William Dufris should be prevented from ever doing another audio book interpretation. It's so over the top melodramatic as to be cloying -- as if he's reading the story to a pre-teen audience who have only ever seen Mexican soap operas before. The minute I started the book an realized this was the same terrible reader that totally ruined John Scalzi for me on Audible I cursed and almost shut off the player. I've suffered through the book because the story line isn't bad -- but the reading so terrible that I am frequently "outside" the story and focused on the bad reading instead of what's going on.

Ugh.

I love zombie books, but this has got to be one of the best, if not the best zombie book that I have read thus far. It is not the same old "must have brains" zombie book where they walk around senseless and has not real story line. This book had a great story line, great characters, and I did not want it to end. It is a rare find to come across a zombie book that brings humanity into it and not just zombies zombies zombies. I love this and recommend this listen for anyone who appreciates a good zombie tale. A zombie tale that explains how the zombies population got started (which was very unique and a new one for me). The characters are easy to relate to and the narrator, William Dufris did an excellent job of bringing this book to life. It's not often you find a zombie tale that brings you the gore that all zombie fans love, the horror that we all crave, and even a tear or 2 to your eyes in a couple of places. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and will be listening to it again at least once. Two thumbs and two toes up for this book. lol Enjoy!!!

The time spent listening to this book could have been spent listening to one of Maberry's other, more action packed reads. It was slow to start and the characters weren't very enjoyable.

This one isn't as 'hit the ground running' as his other works, but it does get up and grab you eventually. Once you reach that point, you can't wait to hear what happens next.

The performance was fine, in my opinion, seeing as how he didn't have much to work with at first.

Dead of Night isn't exactly inspirational. Unless of course you make sure you never, ever volunteer to buy a long lost relative on family property....

Come to think of it, that's a good idea.

The female lead was a guy with ovaries, but other than that, it wasn't half bad. Eventually you grow attached to the characters. The last few chapters are heart wrenching, and terrifying all at the same time.

The story was fast moving, the characters seemed real, and the story was "believable", as far as zombie stories go. Can't wait for th next book!

This was another terrific book from Maberry! His books are fast paced and extremely entertaining. If you are a fan of zombies and/or horror I would give it or any of his books a try. Warning, it is graphic and not suitable for the faint of heart. Also, some have complained that the narration was not the best but at least in my case the story caught my attention and I never noticed.

Much closer to the top of the list than the bottom. It made me feel things and think about things, and I guess that's what good book does.

How human it was, and also the science/idea behind the original zombie/infected person.

This is quite an emotional book, and he handled it really well. He made me cry, twice.

Yeah. I did listen at every opportunity, ignoring my husband and children where necessary :)

Jonathan Maberry is a great author, I've enjoyed everything of his that I've read and listened to. I just wish Audible would include his Pine Deep trilogy in their catalogue. His stuff is hard to find where I live.

Love Jonathan Maberry -- would not listen to another book with William Dufris.

Great.

Anyone -- the narrator for Dust and Decay.

I liked the story, love Maberry. Would have passed on this one with this narrator, though.