Mini-review: Alice in Zombieland by Gena Showalter

  Alice in Zombieland
  Author: Gena Showalter
  Publisher: Mira Ink
  Publication date: October 5th 2012
  My rating: 3 stars 

 

She won’t rest until she’s sent every walking corpse back to its grave. Forever.

Had anyone told Alice Bell that her entire life would change course between one heartbeat and the next, she would have laughed. From blissful to tragic, innocent to ruined? Please. But that’s all it took. One heartbeat. A blink, a breath, a second, and everything she knew and loved was gone.

Her father was right. The monsters are real….

To avenge her family, Ali must learn to fight the undead. To survive, she must learn to trust the baddest of the bad boys, Cole Holland. But Cole has secrets of his own, and if Ali isn’t careful, those secrets might just prove to be more dangerous than the zombies….

I wish I could go back and do a thousand things differently.
I'd tell my sister no.
I'd never beg my mother to talk to my dad.
I'd zip my lips and swallow those hateful words.
Or, barring all of that, I'd hug my sister, my mom and my dad one last time.
I'd tell them I love them.
I wish... Yeah, I wish.

I think I may be in the minority of reviewers who didn’t enjoy Alice in Zombieland. With a stunning cover and alluring premise what’s not to love? I think when I read the word zombie; I should have taken that as a sign as I haven’t had much luck with zombie books except for one. But I went in with the hopes that it would provide something different and different it certainly did.

The beginning of the book I had no problems with, I found myself thrown into the mix from the get go, with several questions flying around the place. Do these so called monsters Alice’s dad sees really exist? And if so why are they hanging around here of all places? And the continued pace certainly kept me on my toes. I think what let me down was that I was unable to form a strong connection with any of the characters. Yes there was such a varied bunch; surely one would have stood out? Sadly no, each time I thought I was getting to grips with someone’s character, they would do something which would grate on me for the rest of the book. That’s not to say I didn’t  have fun with this book, there were parts which totally had me hooked and I’m positive that the characters I found to be lacklustre in places will be more rounded and developed by the second book.

Despite not enjoying Alice in Zombieland as much as I’d hoped, I’m sure a lot of others will find this a spell-blinding read.  

And to convince you to give this book a try check out these glowing reviews;

Sam @ Realm of Fiction

Jenny @ Supernatural Snark

Giselle @ Xpresso Reads.