Author: Chris Roberson
Publisher: Warner Bros
Rating: WORTHY!
Illustrated by Michael Allred
Colors by Laura Allred.
This novel is gorgeously illustrated by Michael Allred with awesome coloring by Laura Allred. At the Comic Vine website, Laura is listed as the wife of Michael in the lead-in blurb. Michael isn't listed as the husband of Laura. Shame of comic vine for their genderism in indicating that Laura is really a chattel. I think I am going to have to quit using those guys as a link for writers and artists in graphic novels.
This is the first of four in a series that was pretty awesome. I am not typically a fan of series, but I got into reading this because I first watched the TV show, which is completely awesome. I was initially disappointed in the comic because they changed a heck of a lot for the TV show and I really liked that, but the comic grew on me as I read it and now I am a fan of this, too. Volume two dropped a bit and was not quite up to par for me, but three and four came roaring back so I recommend the whole thing.
There were some issues with it, nevertheless. For example, in this series, Gwen (who is Olivia in the TV show) is not a doctor who conveniently now works the medical examiner's office, but is working on a crew of grave diggers. She doesn't live with a room mate, but in a crypt in the graveyard, and she isn't in touch with her family or her old boyfriend. Nor does she work with a cop pretending to be a psychic to solve murders.
Everyone she knew in her old life thinks she's dead. Her grave is right there in the graveyard. For me the TV scenario was smarter. It's highly unlikely they would have four people working in a cemetery digging graves full time. Don't they have one guy with a little backhoe working part time these days? The expense of having four people would be way too high. OTOH, this is comic book fiction, so I guess we shouldn't expect too much realism.
There are two detectives (after a fashion) in this novel, though. They work for a private corporation, and are pursuing an investigation into certain mysterious events in this city (Eugene, Oregon), and at one crime scene, one of them takes Polaroid pictures. The image shows him waving the picture back and forth to "dry" it, but unless it's a really antique black and white original Polaroid, there's nothing to dry. The newer Polaroid pictures were sealed, so shaking one of those doesn't do anything except maybe risk damaging the developing picture. It certainly won't dry it, but maybe this guy spends so much time sitting on his ass that he got a bad case of Polaroids?
I noted the phrase, "To meet whom?" which is grammatically correct, but once again I have to say I think this form is antique and should be abolished. No one uses it in speech any more unless they're trying to be pretentious, or unless they're an English teacher, and even then I suspect it's rarely used. If it's not part of modern, everyday speech, which this isn't, it's time to let it go in our writing, too. Authors tend to make the mistake of not only writing it in their narrative to show how educated and accomplished they are, but they also put it into the mouths of their characters and make them unrealistic by doing so. BTW, did you know it's The Whom's 50th touring anniversary this year...?
On the good side (and purely in the context of the novel), they had this really interesting explanation for ghosts and other supernatural creatures which was rooted in Egyptian mythology. I don't know if this is true of the ancient Egyptians or not, but the narrator in the story was talking about how they believed in several different kinds of soul. They believed in what he termed an over-soul, which resided in the mind and was more rational and analytical, and an under-soul which resided in the heart, and was much more emotional.
The character said that when the over-soul is freed from the corporeal body, it becomes a ghost, but when the under-soul is so freed, it becomes a poltergeist. When the body dies, but the over-soul remains, it becomes a vampire, and when the same thing happens but the under-soul remains, it becomes a zombie. I thought that was pretty cool.
The character, Amon, goes on to explain that when the over-soul gets into someone else's body, they're deemed to be possessed. If an animal under-soul gets into your body, then you become a werewolf or were-whatever-the-animal-was. If you die but both souls remain in your body, you become a revenant, and he was telling Gwen, that this is what she is, so she's not actually a true zombie. This begs the question as to why Gwen is behaving like a zombie, craving brains, and worrying about losing her memories if she doesn't eat brains routinely.
Like I said, I recommend this novel and the following three.