Current mood:

contemplative

Preston and Child's Cemetary dance (formerly Revenant)
I really like the various novels by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. I definately like their novels together rather than there solo efforts but that's a whole different topic. It's been 2 years since they published their last book together "Wheel of Darkness" which had some really Lostish themes and content in it. The rumor was after that that they were working on a zombie book called "Revenant" where something really bad was going to happen to one of their regulars. Well that book just came out under the title "Cemetary Dance." I'm really not liking this title and would have prefered they kept the original title. It fit more with the actual content of the book. Personaly I liked it. It wasn't as good as their best books (Relic and Cabinet of Curiousities)but it wasn't their worst. I liked this more than Wheel of Darkness or Still Life with Crows. I liked it about as much as I liked Brimstone.

At this point I want to put up a spoiler warning for anyone who has any interest at all in reading this book. I just don't want to spoil anything for anyone.

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OK... the big huge thing about this book is that they kill off Smithback in the first chapter. Now Smithback was introduced in Relic and was a major player in many many other books. He was the male lead in the book Thunderhead where he met his wife Nora, who plays a major role in this book. Smithback is the #2 on thecharacter that has appeared in the most books. He appears in Relic, Reliquary, Thunderhead, Cainet of Curiousities, Dance of Death, Book of the Dead and now in Cemetary dance. The only character than can be found in more books is Pendergast who'e series it is.

There were some really sad scenes here and it was interesting to see how each character coped with his death. D'Agosta seemed particularly affected in that he was really really angry through the entire book and although his ex/girlfriend Laura wouldn't admit it he didn't need Pendergast to get him in trouble this time around, he was finding it for himself and a one point taking Pendergast with him. Which is kinda a role reversal from normal. Nora is understandable a mess here. She was attacked by the killer too and her husband was mudered. Not to mention she's being stalked by a "zombie," at times even in the form of her husband. Pendergast seems to be at least somewhat affected as well. There are a couple of times he seems kinda off his game. He also at a couple of points seems a bit defensive. Although there were other issues there. Although Pendergast does show some of his feeling regarding this death in the "tea ceremony scene" which makes more sense if you've read those book that i've listed that Smithback has been in before. Throughout the book there is a lot of reflection on Smithback and the things he's done throughout the books. It makes the whole thing kinda depressing.

Overall it was a really quick read with a lot of suspense. I liked it a lot more than last time's Wheel of Darkness because Pendergast seemed more like his normal self here. In that book he really seemed to take a back seat to Constance, whom is only mentioned in this book. This book feels a lot more like Preston and Child again which is a good thing. I didn't see who the bad guy was until prettly late in the book which was good.

This was a pretty good, but not great outing. The characters are all prettymuch worse for wear at the end. Smithbak's dead. Nora's got a concussion and probably some brused ribs not to mention some likely psychological issues from loosing her husband, being attacked by his killer, being chased by zombies and kidnaped. Pendergast was shot and was in the hospital for it at the end of the book. D'Agosta has a broken arm care of the real zombie. Plenty of random extras are dead. There are some scenes here that will be really hard for animal lovers as well. And well..the bad guy literally looses his head.

After this and Child's novel Terminal Freeze, I'm thinking these guys got it in for hollywood. Probably has something to do with the mess that was the Relic movie