Review: Dawn of the Dead (Novelization) (1978)
1978’s Dawn of the Dead is one of the most influential classics in the horror genre, and particularly in the zombie genre. At first blush, the idea that the novelization to such a film would be a quality book given the source material makes sense. A great story should translate at a very basic level.
That’s not entirely the case for the novelization of Dawn of the Dead, sadly. Originally published in 1978, shortly after the release of the film, the novelization has the feel of a slapdash cash-in. Co-authored by George A. Romero and Susanna Sparrow, the book adapts the screenplay of the film with minor additions. While paced fairly well, it is a pale imitation of its source.
What Works About the Novelization?
I can offer this much in the favor of Dawn of the Dead: It was good enough that I finished it over the course of successive nights before bed. It’s not a particularly challenging read, but there is some value in the familiarity of it. The core story is good, classic, even. Being lifted wholesale from the screenplay, all the strengths (and weaknesses) of the film are laid out on the page. Dawn of the Dead remains Dawn of the Dead. It is just the way it is experienced has changed. Regardless, the core story, the experience of Roger, Peter, Stephen, and Francine, is right there and it entertains and thrills on occasion. This can be enough sometimes.
Some of the additions are interesting and ultimately rather disconcerting. The novel’s first two chapters, our introductions to Stephen and Francine, and Roger and Peter are the best chapters of the book. This is where the book feels the most like a serious attempt at translating the screenplay to prose and is where the novelization is likely to hook most readers. The depiction of the chaos of the newsroom and the tenement raid in successive chapters is some of Romero’s social criticism in overdrive. It is also where the voice of Sparrow, as co-author, is strongest.
The novelization is breezy and the pacing is pretty good overall. If you have seen the film, nothing about what I am about to say is a spoiler. But the story moves into overdrive after the death of Roger and before I knew it I was in the finale, the final crush of zombies and all. At 232 pages, the last near 30 pages feel almost like a sketch in comparison to what came before. Regardless, it cannot be claimed that the book is at all slow.
What Doesn’t Work About the Novelization?
Ultimately, the flaws of the novelization come down to a couple of things, all related to the novel’s usage of a third-person omniscient point of view. The film uses this as a shorthand in echoing the cinematic eye of the film, but ultimately this does cause a great many problems and really drags down the experience of the book.
The first major issue is that we are told rather than shown a great many things regarding character thoughts and motivations. Peter, a fascinating character in his own right, played with magnetism by Ken Foree in the film, is almost a parody in this adaptation. Whereas the film could sell the quiet, calculating and ultimately tragic characterization of Peter with the emoting of Foree, the book literally lays out his internal thoughts in such a way it comes off as frankly amateurish. With so much access to the character’s heads, it all comes off as too much. And it is so, so much worse for Roger, the heart of the story’s damnation of greed and consumerism and masculine rage. All the characters have their moments on internal thought spelled out in such a manner. Subtlety and subtext completely abandoned.
Third-person omniscient narration can lead to confusion as well. Perhaps it was because I was reading the novel before bed and my concentration took a hit, but I often had to re-read paragraphs frequently. I found myself suddenly thrown by a jump from a moment with two characters in one location to another location with a different character, much later without so much as a transition. The irony is that in the film, these moments in the film are clear due tot he cuts; I was not so fortunate here. The novel does little to create some form of transition between scenes. It’s particularly a problem in the last third of the novel. A montage of excess and malaise in the film does not translate to prose without some sort of editing trick.
Ultimately, the book feels like a prosed-up version of the screenplay. Substantial additions are few and far between, primarily located in the first couple of chapters. From then on, however, the story is merely that of the movie without any real care of playing to the strength of the written word. There was so much potential. For example, there is the presence of a pet store in the novel and a puppy named Adam that comes off particularly alarming given the implications. Perhaps a more serious adaptation may have explored that further.
Final Thoughts
I think I can find no more damning praise for the Dawn of the Dead adaptation as a book than the fact the Amazon listing for the book lists the following under the synopsis of the novel:
“Dawn of the Dead is one of the best horror movies ever made.”
Roger Ebert
The great zombie story deserved better than this hasty novelization.
(3 / 5)
You can find the Dawn of the Dead novelization, published by Thomas Dunne Books and St Martin’s Griffin, on Amazon.
Imagine this. You’re home alone, waiting for your partner to return, when you hear a knock on your door. You answer it to see a family of five, bundled up against the cold. The father, a kindly older gentleman, explains that he used to live in this house as a boy. And he would love to show it to his family.
Do not let them in.
The story
Released in June 2024, We Used To Live Here is author Marcus Kliewer’s debut novel. It tells the story of Eve, who just purchased a beautiful house with her partner, Charlie. Their plan is to flip the house and sell it.
One night, while waiting for Charlie to come home, Eve is surprised by a knock at the door. It’s a man named Thomas Faust and his family.
Thomas explains that he grew up in the house and hasn’t been in the area in years. Would Eve let them in so that he can show the home to his children?
Against her better judgment, Eve lets them in. She regrets this almost at once when Thomas’s daughter vanishes somewhere into the house.
What worked
I always appreciate a book that allows you to play along with the mystery. And this book does that better than just about any other I’ve seen.
Pay close attention to the chapters, to the words that aren’t there. To everything about this novel.
This is mostly down to Kliewer. This is ultimately his work of art. But the production value is also fantastic. I don’t want to ruin the multiple mysteries, so I’ll just say this. There are clues in this book that require some specific artistic choices in the page layouts in this book. And I loved that.
If you’d like to experience another horror book review, check out this one.
We Used To Live Here is also the kind of story that makes you question everything right along with the main character, Eve. Eve is a great main character. But she might be an unreliable narrator. She might be experiencing every single horror described, exactly as it’s described. Or, she might be having a psychotic breakdown. Through most of the book, we can’t be sure. And that is so much fun.
Finally, the weather plays a large part in this story. There are several stories in which the weather or the land itself could be considered a character. Even an antagonist. This is certainly one. The winter storm is the thing that traps the family in the house with Eve. It also makes escaping the home difficult. Reading this book during the winter was especially impactful. Most of us know what it feels like to be shut in by a storm. I’ve personally lived through some of those storms that are just referred to by their year, as though they were impactful enough to claim the whole 365 days for themself. And that was with people I liked. Imagine what it would feel like with strangers. It’s a staggering thought and one that we explore in depth in this book.
In the end, We Used To Live Here is a fantastic book. It’s the sort of story that sneaks into your brain and puts down roots. And if this is just the first book we’re getting from Kliewer, I can’t wait to see what else he comes up with.
(5 / 5)
As a disclaimer, this is a review of The House of My Mother from a critical perspective. I will not be discussing my opinions of the legal case against Ruby Franke and Jody Hildebrandt. I will be discussing the merits of the book as a work of true crime alone.
In 2015, Ruby Franke started a YouTube channel called 8 Passengers. In August of 2023, Franke and her business associate Jodi Hildebrandt were arrested for, and later plead guilty to, charges of aggravated child abuse. And in January of this year, Shari Franke told her story in The House of My Mother.
The story
The House of My Mother is the true story of Shari Franke, the oldest child of one of the most famous family vlogger families.
As a child, Shari came to the conclusion that her mother didn’t like her. Soon, she began to fear her mother’s anger.
Things got significantly worse when Ruby started their family vlog. All of the families most intimate moments were splashed across the internet for anyone to watch. This became a living nightmare for Shari.
Of course, that was only the start of the family nightmare. Because Ruby was about to meet someone who would reinforce all of the darkest parts of herself.
Eventually Shari manages to escape her home. But her younger siblings were still in her mother’s clutches. She had to save them, and her father, from the monster her mother had become.
What worked
Through the book, Shari only ever mentions the name of one of her siblings, Chad. This is because Chad is the only of her siblings that is an adult at the time of the publication.
There are children involved in this story. Children who’s lives and privacy have already been damaged. Shari didn’t want to do that to them again, and neither do I.
It probably won’t surprise you that this book is full of upsetting details. But not in the way you might imagine.
Nowhere in this book will you find gory details about the abuse the Franke kids suffered. And I consider that a good thing. Those sort of details are all fun and games when we’re talking fiction. When it’s real kids who are really living with the damage, it’s not a good time.
What you’ll find instead is a slew of more emotionally devastating moments. One that stuck with me is when Ruby’s mother gives her a pair of silk pajamas as a gift after Ruby gave birth to one of her babies. Shari asks Ruby if she’d bring her silk pajamas when she had a baby. Ruby responds that yes, when Shari becomes a mother they can be friends.
What a lovely way to make a little girl feel like she’s not worth anything unless she reproduces. And, if she does decide to have children, who is going to bring her silk pajamas?
In the end, this isn’t a story about ghosts or demons. It’s not about a serial killer waiting on a playground or in the attic of an unsuspecting family. Instead, this is a story about things that really keep us up at night. It’s the story of a woman so obsessed with perfection that she drove away her eldest daughter. The story of a young woman who’s forced to watch from afar as her beloved brothers and sisters are terrorized and abandoned. These are the sorts of things that really keep us up at night. These are the real nightmares.
More than that, though, The House of My Mother is a story of survival. It’s about a family that was ripped apart and somehow managed to stitch itself back together again. It’s about a brave young woman who managed to keep herself safe and sane in the face of a nightmare. If you haven’t read it yet, I can’t recommend it enough.
For more like this, check out my review of Shiny Happy People.
(5 / 5)
Boreal: an Anthology of Taiga Horror is a collection of twenty-two haunting tales that dwell in the deepest darkest woods and frozen wastelands, edited by Katherine Silva and including Haunted MTL’s very own Daphne Fauber. Each story has even been gifted with its very own poster, hinting at the horrors to be found within it, bestowing a beautiful visual collection as well.
The tales are varied and touch upon the environment in new and different ways, each hearkening to a sort of epiphany or raised awareness. These stories exude both dread and wonder at the smallness of our human existence in contrast to the sacred world we have isolated from, sheltering ourselves in our comfortable houses with centralized heat and everything we could possibly need or want at the ready. The taiga becomes a sanctuary outside of our own dulled awarenesses. It is a holy place imbued with powers beyond mortal human reach, a wilderness that threatens to swallow us – both whole and bit by bit, simultaneously.
The protagonists enter into this realm through ritual, superstition, longing, stubbornness, and their own hubris – yearning to survive its dangers, and to make their own marks upon it. The starkness of their surroundings harbors delicate moments that would be all too easily missed if not deliberately sought or pointed out. The softness of fur, the dappled sunlight shining through trees, the hazy clouds of breath forming in crisp air, the brittleness of bleached bone… those quiet experiences that beg to be forgotten, to lay safely sleeping just below the frozen surface, awaiting spring.
There are those who followed in the footsteps of their predecessors, seeking to escape the constraints of their parent’s and elders’ indoctrination, traditions, madness, and abuse, yearning to find their own way despite also being inextricably bound to their own pasts. There are those who just wanted to go for a walk in the woods, and remained forever changed by what they experienced. There are those who wished to impose their will upon the wilderness, their order falling to disarray, unable to make lasting impact. There are those who sought to leave behind the world of mankind, looking for oneness in the natural order of things through isolation, leaving a bit of themselves behind after being consumed by the terrors they encountered. There are those who truly found communion with the woods, became one with its wildness, and invited its spirit into their hearts to find peace, even at cost of their own lives. And then, there are the spirits themselves…
(3 / 5)
All in all, I give Boreal: an Anthology of Taiga Horror 3.0 Cthulhus. I love existential angst so I found it to be an enjoyable read, and I appreciated the myriad manners in which the biome was explored. But there were points in which I found myself struggling to follow along, as if the words were swept up into their own wilds in ways that alienated myself as reader, as if my mere voyeurism into this otherworldly place was not enough to comprehend the subtle deviations in storytelling mannerisms fully. I suppose in some sense this seems appropriate, but at the same time, it left me feeling a bit unfulfilled, as if I had missed a spiritual connection that should have resonated more deeply.