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Book Review: Death Warmed Over

Erin Penn

Amazon Cover - Death Warmed Over

Book Cover from Amazon

Death Warmed Over (Dan Shamble, Zombie PI Book 1) by Kevin J. Anderson

BOOK BLURB ON AMAZON

Ever since the Big Uneasy unleashed vampires, werewolves, and other undead denizens on the world, it’s been hell being a detective—especially for zombie PI Dan Chambeaux. Taking on the creepiest of cases in the Unnatural Quarter with a human lawyer for a partner and a ghost for a girlfriend, Chambeaux redefines “dead on arrival.” But just because he was murdered doesn’t mean he’d leave his clients in the lurch. Besides, zombies are so good at lurching.

Now he’s back from the dead and back in business—with a caseload that’s downright unnatural. A resurrected mummy is suing the museum that put him on display. Two witches, victims of a curse gone terribly wrong, seek restitution from a publisher for not using “spell check” on its magical tomes. And he’s got to figure out a very personal question: who killed him?

For Dan Chambeaux, it’s all in a day’s work. (Still, does everybody have to call him “Shamble”?) Funny, fresh, and irresistible, this cadaverous caper puts the PI in RIP … with a vengeance.

 

MY REVIEW

A typical urban fantasy detective – the twist on this one is the PI is a Zombie and one of his cases is investigating his own death.

What I loved about the story: This PI doesn’t work just one case, but a dozen cases at a time. He isn’t a down-and-out Noir PI trying to climb into or out of a bottle. He just happens to have been killed recently. Other than that, he has a good set of friends, a solid job, and a smart girlfriend. Unlife promises to be as good as living had been.

With the dozen or so cases, Mr. Anderson doesn’t need to create false trails and red herrings. There is so much going on, of course Dan Chambeaux has a time uncovering the big bad’s case since he also has to work on all the other cases which pay the bills. I think this particular aspect of the story is more real than most detective stories I have read.

What I didn’t like about the story: Several times the author repeats information from the chapter before. About 1/6th of the book is repeats. Now in order to do the investigation, the PI does have to review the evidence to see if he is missing anything. Sometimes going over the information with friends lets him see the problem from a different perspective. If I was editing the book, I would recommend cutting about half of the repeats.

The chapter endings usually complete a mini-story within one of the PI’s cases, which makes picking up and putting down the book easy. If you read about 2 to 3 chapters at a time during a commute or between errands, the repeats may not bother you at all. I tend to swallow books whole – in this case I bought and finished the book the same day.

Overall a good story and solid start to a new series. Also works fine as a stand-alone.

Flash: Mistborn

Erin Penn


Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

The mistborn condensed out of the morning fog, a slightly more solid shape in the earth-thralled cloud. Eliza kept quiet in her makeshift tent as she watched. Beside her, the hound snorted and rolled over for more sleep, pulling the underblanket so Eliza’s elbows were stuck with old leaves and bark from the maple tree under which they had set up camp. A second form swirled into being, looking like a curl rising from cooking pot just about to boil. The two danced in the open grass field as more and more mistborn joined them.

The twilight morning meadow brightened as one ray of late spring sun made it above the old growth trees surrounding the field. It sizzled through the dancers, separating them and struck the dew saturated ground, throwing up steam. A new being formed, harsher, stronger, more solid, and even shorter-lived than the present meadow denizens. It curled a vector around the nearest mistborn, dragging the gentle morning creature into the light where both dissolved. More beams broke through the tree tops, speckling the grass with light and conflict. Mistborn after mistborn was destroyed by cruel, angry steamers.

Several mistborns broke toward the shadows under the trees. One ran straight at Eliza, seeking shelter, a moment more of existence, under the trees she had chosen last night. Trees that kept the dew off her and her tent all night. The creature could not leave the moist grass and a steamer snatched it when the mistborn hesitated at the border between dew and dry. The insubstantial creature screamed silently as it left this existence.

Shuddering and smiling, Eliza broke camp quickly once the sun had completely cleared the horizon and burned off the last of the fog. The lean-to blanket above and ground cloth below, with a few twists of rope, return to being a backpack. Her companion hound clawed and threw dirt, burying the small cooking pit. They moved as one to leave the magical place.

Eliza was undecided if the meadow was blessed or cursed. A question to ask should she qualify for the academy, if she made it there by Solstice, if they would take someone in her thirties, if … so many ifs. She picked up the pace. The ballet and battle had lost her a big chunk of the morning.

(Words 387 – first published 4/15/2014; published in new blog format on 11/5/2017)

Other Cool Blogs: Magical Words April 1, 2017

Erin Penn

Acquired from the internet hive mind

NaNo – Well, This Isn’t Going As Planned

So much for my science fiction thriller I planned in my head all of October and attacked the first day of National Novel Writing Month. The second day I did the “Butt In Chair – Hands on Keyboard” … and I got a blog posting. In fact I got several blog postings. Sunset and sunrise saw me return for the BIC-HOK, and, well, I have a blog for today.

If this keeps up, my blog for 2017 may get completed before the end of the month and 2018 could have a great jump start.

Novel, not so much.

It breaks the rules, and I hate breaking rules. NaNoWritMo is about writing Novels – fictional pieces, long-form. Most of my blogs, and that is what my brain is providing right now, are neither. 

On the other hand after nearly two years of brain-to-keyboard disconnect, I am happy with ANY production. I just would have been happier to have salable production.

The plus side is I will have the basics for the Writing Exercise non-fiction book I have been thinking about.

Writing is a weird thing. The biggest discipline is “Butt in Chair – Hands on Keyboard”. Forcing your mind to stop thinking about writing and actually doing writing requires will-power; depending on the day and how long the habit has been in place, a great deal of will-power. After directing the will-power to the initial task of BIC-HOK, discipline in directing your mind in specific writing tasks can be lacking.

Sometimes it makes magic. Rarely does it meet deadlines.

Melissa Gilbert-McArthur wrote a Magical Words on the combination of BIC and deadlines, and it can be found here: http://www.magicalwords.net/melissa-gilbert/friday-fundamentals-deadlines/. Power to her for having the will power to pull off both at once.

Me, I am going to take the writing bug and get a little more blogging done.

WRITING EXERCISE: Butt-in-chair. Sit in your writer seat for half an hour today and write something. Do it again tomorrow. Do it five days in a row. Half an hour in your writer seat. No internet, no facebook, no twitter. If you live with someone, hand them your phone and walk to your seat and start. BIC-HOK and write. There you go -the first five days of the twenty-one days to create a new habit. The rest is up to you.

Art Projects: C&I Time

Erin Penn

In September I broke out my pens and brushes for the first time in years and really went to town in making a few beautiful pieces to give out as awards in the Society for Creative Anachronism. Below are some closeup shots.

 Completed on the September 23, 2017, the “J” scroll was inspired a 1410 Italian manuscript, The Prayer Book of Michelino da Besozzo.