Zombie

Rating:
Summary: An interesting character study
Review: I had great expectations for this book. This novel was the winner of the 1996 Bram Stoker award for horror. As such, I expected to curl up to a pretty scary book. Unfortunately, the book was not all that scary. Zombie is a character study of a Jeffery Dahmer type. Most of the novel concerns the thoughts and fantasies of a homosexual child molesting killer. The plot is somewhat weak. Not much actually HAPPENS in the novel. I place quotes around the word "novel", because the book hardly deserves to bear that designation. It has more of short story feel. The entire book is only 181 pages long. And many of those pages contain drawings and much white space. I was able to read the book in a couple of hours. However, all in all, I did enjoy the prose. Joyce Oates did keep my interest. It was interesting getting into the mind of a serial killer. Was this novel worthy of an award? Probably not. I suspect that being a professor at Princeton helps Joyce Carol Oates impress the sort of people that give out awards. But I do recommend the book as an interesting short story character study

Rating:
Summary: Very disturbing
Review: I had to read this book in a contemporary lit class for colege this year and it was one of the sickest books i have ever read. Anyone who would read this book for enjoyment is very sick and twisted. Things like this go on every day, that is the sadest part. Definetly could have gone through life without reading this one.

Rating:
Summary: Zombie: Not a Beach Read, but a Good Read
Review: I was warned that there are people out there who find Zombie by Joyce Carol Oates far too disturbing a read to manage. So of course, I had to have it sent in from the library immediately. I wanted to test my true mettle as a committed reader of the Gothic. Zombie is narrated from inside the disjointed and painfully grotesque mind of a homosexual serial killer who truly isn't out to kill, what he really wants is to transform the male of his choosing into a devoted zombie who will fulfill his every desire. His desires are pretty simple: sex, cuddling, intimacy, and the occasional household cleanup. His method of getting these needs met is the horror, as he kidnaps the men and then tries to lobotomize them. I won't give away the ghastly climax (forgive the pun, those who have read it), but it's painful to read.

The real genius of Oates, in this and so many other of her books, is her ability to get inside a character and force us to sympathize with them, whether we want to or not. I found myself repeatedly hopeless over Quentin's prediciment, screaming at the book for him to PLEASE take his medication before matters got worse. But alas, they got worse anyway.

Oates, well traveled in academic circles, also creates in Quentin's father a character that is an ironic representation of academic approaches to the madness of human passion. The father is a respected scientist and professor, embarrassed by his son who has been convicted of a sex offense, but at the same time always willing to help him, to push him toward achievement. He perpetually steps close to seeing the true nature of Quentin's madness, but always backs away, unwilling to see the truth. Quentin sees his father as having a "corderoy face" and "pink a***ole mouth" and the reader cannot help but feel the utter ineffectuality of the father's worldview. This is highlighted when the world famous Nobel Prize winner that he so admires is posthumously discovered to have been conducting Nazi-like experiments on the mentally challenged. The father quietly takes down the photos he had of himself with the Nobel Prize winner but defends his honor saying there is no way such a thing could be true. Again, the father who is supposed to be scientifically minded, is the least oriented toward fact.

Although Zombie hardly makes good beach reading, it is an infintely worthwhile read

Rating:
Summary: A View of the World From the Serial Killer's Eyes
Review: I would recommend this book strictly from the value of the writer's viewpoint--the mind of the killer himself. Oates has done a tremendous job of making you feel like this person really is abnormal--what I would guess a true sociopath would think. However, the reader gets no sense of the humanity of the victims and without that the book doesn't attain the horror level I would expect from a Bram Stoker winner.

Rating:
Summary: Breakthrough babe
Review: I've read all of JCO's fictions and this is her IT.

Rating:
Summary: A true understanding of what scares us
Review: In the disturbing movie thriller SE7EN, detectives Somerset and Mills discover the journals of John Doe, a suspected serial killer. The reams and reams of writings describe, in exacting detail, the day-to-day existence of a man who is clearly insane. After reading ZOMBIE, I would have no trouble in believing I have read a small portion of those diaries.

ZOMBIE is Joyce Carol Oates' ode to the serial killer, a character who has become the subject of a perverse form of fascination in North American culture over the last few years. Whether social critics would ascribe this to a loosening of public morals, or a fear of death, I do not know. But the mere idea of the 'serial killer', the person who methodically kills and kills again, is one that continues to haunt.

Oates is, of course, hardly the first author to plumb the depths of human perversity. Thomas Harris has given us three glimpses into depravity in his last three books: Francis Dollarhyde, Jame Gumb, and Hannibal Lector (from, respectively, RED DRAGON, THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS, and HANNIBAL). Other notables from the past include Rex Miller's Chainsaw (SLOB), Shane Steven's Thomas Bishop (BY REASON OF INSANITY), and of course, Robert Bloch's Norman Bates (PSYCHO). All have attempted, in one form or another, to delve into the inner workings of the mind, to see what triggered the madness within us all.

Oates' first-person narrative takes us into the consciousness of Q_ P_, a young man currently working as a caretaker for a student house. He has had a good upbringing in a stable environment, surrounded by people who love him, and who do their best to understand his actions. He has also just been given probation for the attempted rape of a minor. Through his often childish ramblings and schemes, the reader quickly learns just how dangerous Q_ P_ really is.

Unlike the previous novel's mentioned above, Oates does not provide some clue into why Q_ P_ is the way he is. By his account, there has been no history of abuse, or trauma, that most people would view as the source of his unbalance. What Oates does within the pages of ZOMBIE is to remind the reader that there are no easy answers. People may find relief in an explanation of actions, but Oates refuses to provide this outlet. Q_ P_ is who he is. It's pointless to debate why he is the way he is.

There can be no satisfactory reason as to why Q_ P_ is obsessed with creating a 'zombie' by means of a crude (yet at one time widely accepted) form of lobotomy. There is no reason why he chooses his victims, although there are hints of an instance of unrequited love as a child.

And in the end, the reasons don't matter at all. Oates has done her homework into the patterns that serial killers fall into (the keeping of certain items from the victims, the belief that certain people are somehow connected to them on an alternate level). But the pattern does not explain the individual. Q_ P_ had led no different life than the rest of us. There is no reason why he should become unable to control his impulses and fetishes. And yet, he can't.

This is Oates' masterstroke, the final, absolute refusal to appease societies collective need for closure. Oates understands the primal urge that is, "We fear that which we do not understand". It is precisely because we can't comprehend or sympathize with Q_ P_ that makes him a monster. He's just like everyone else you meet daily. He's the person you sit next to on a bus. He's the person who you talk to on the phone. He's you.

Rating:
Summary: Inside the mind of a serial killer
Review: In this short and startling 1995 novel, Joyce Carol Oates again proves her expertise and versatility as a writer by getting inside the mind of a serial killer. The book is written as a diary, with bizarre capitalizations and crude drawings. She uses simple prose as the serial killer's dark obsession and demented scheming becomes clear and the reader is drawn into the workings of his mind. It is horrifying. The tension never lets up as one victim after another falls victim to his needs. The worst part is that we have all read the papers and know that there are really sickos like this out there in the world.

Rating:
Summary: At times boring but mostly interesting
Review: It is lacking in genuine action but makes up greatly in the psychological aspects. It's one of those stories that makes you think about your own life. In parts of the story, I was unable to get into the "novel." It was quite disturbing with its use of stereotypes, which makes one think how close to reality this story really is. All in all, it was a fast read and a story I will always remember.

Rating:
Summary: At times boring but mostly interesting
Review: It is lacking in genuine action but makes up greatly in the psychological aspects. It's one of those stories that makes you think about your own life. In parts of the story, I was unable to get into the "novel." It was quite disturbing with its use of stereotypes, which makes one think how close to reality this story really is. All in all, it was a fast read and a story I will always remember.

Rating:
Summary: Ruthless, cutting-edge narrative
Review: Joyce Carol Oates dips deep into the kaleidoscope of human behavior in Zombie. It is an unflinching, jaunty ride....The reader learns about a character like never before. James W. Tucke