Pride and Prejudice and Zombies – Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith

"It is a truth universally acknowledged that a zombie in possession of brains must be in want of more brains." Anyone familiar with Jane Austen will realize that this is a twist on her famous opening line of Pride and Prejudice. Lately I have been reading quite a bit of Jane Austen fan fiction. Mostly these follow the lives of Austen's characters such as Elizabeth Bennett after her marriage to Darcy. They are often romantic but lack the wit of Austen's original novels.
After reading the first line of the Pride and Prejudice and zombies I was hesitant to continue reading but I am glad that I did. This book is a parody of Austen's original book, using her original text and adding scenes of zombie fighting action. It is set in a time that England (and the world) has been beset by a plague that afflicted many of the living, turning them to zombies. The Bennett sisters are known, not only for their beauty but for their strength and skill in battle against the zombies in Hertfordshire. This is largely due to their father who sent them to China to learn the ninja arts. Mrs Bennett is still scheming to marry her daughters off and the story follows Austen's plot line but mashes it with zombie fighting mayhem. Elizabeth Bennett and Darcy follow their classic pride and prejudice relationship with small twists but the fate of Charlotte Lucas is not so rosy. The book keeps Austen's original wittiness and perhaps at times ventures into the ridiculous as the characters deal with zombies hoards. But it somehow works. Perhaps it is because Austen's original work was very 'tongue in cheek' about the society she found herself in that the presence of zombies is not as unexpected as it could be. As an Austen fan who enjoys forays into the paranormal, I found this book an enjoyable read. 8/10