Sunday 20 April 2014

Original and Witty Zombie Novel



BRAINEATER JONES
by Stephen Kozeniewski



Book Description

Braineater Jones wakes up face down in a swimming pool with no memory of his former life, how he died, or why he’s now a zombie. With a smart-aleck severed head as a partner, Jones descends into the undead ghetto to solve his own murder.

But Jones’s investigation is complicated by his crippling addiction to human flesh. Like all walking corpses, he discovers that only a stiff drink can soothe his cravings. Unfortunately, finding liquor during Prohibition is costly and dangerous. From his Mason jar, the cantankerous Old Man rules the only speakeasy in the city that caters to the postmortem crowd.

As the booze, blood, and clues coagulate, Jones gets closer to discovering the identity of his killer and the secrets behind the city’s stranglehold on liquid spirits. Death couldn’t stop him, but if the liquor dries up, the entire city will be plunged into an orgy of cannibalism.

Cracking this case is a tall order. Braineater Jones won’t get out alive, but if he plays his cards right, he might manage to salvage the last scraps of his humanity.

My review

A guy wakes up floating facedown in a swimming pool with no memory of who he is, where he is, how he died and a number of other questions. Now a zombie, he has to quench his hunger for human flesh with booze that can only be obtained in the only speakeasy in Ganesh City. He gets acquainted with a few people there and starts his own investigation.

The book starts off as a cross between a zombie novel and a detective story spiced with humor. The combination of these makes Braineater Jones a funny, well-structured read where the mystery is not revealed until the very end, and the readers are kept in the unknown craving for more. 

I loved the way Jones tried to figure out who he was, especially when he and Alcibé—nothing but a severed talking head—worked together when solving mysteries.  

Braineater Jones was a really fun read. I didn’t know what to expect when I started the book, but it turned out to be well-written, original and witty. 

*Thanks a lot to Stephen Kozeniewski and Red Adept Publishing for providing me with a review copy of this book.



About the Author



Stephen Kozeniewski lives with his wife of 9 years and cat of 22 pounds in Pennsylvania, the birthplace of the modern zombie. He was born to the soothing strains of “Boogie With Stu” even though The Who are far superior to Zep, for reasons that he doesn’t even really want to get into right now. During his time as a Field Artillery officer, he served for three years in Oklahoma and one in Iraq, where due to what he assumes was a clerical error, he was awarded the Bronze Star. The depiction of addiction in his fiction is strongly informed by the three years he spent working at a substance abuse clinic, an experience which also ensures that he employs strict moderation when enjoying the occasional highball of Old Crow. He is also a classically trained linguist, which sounds much more impressive than saying his bachelor’s degree is in German.

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