Review--Warm Bodies by Isaac Marion

R is having a no-life crisis--he is a zombie. He has no memories, no identity, and no pulse, but he is a little different from his fellow Dead. he may occasionally eat people, but he'd rather be riding abandoned airport escalators, listening to Sinatra in the cozy 747 he calls home, or collecting souvenirs from the ruins of civilization.

And then he meets a girl.

First as his captive, then his reluctant guest, Julie is a blast of living color in R's gray landscape, and something inside him begins to bloom. He doesn't want to eat this girl--although she looks delicious--he wants to protect her. But their unlikely bond will cause ripples they can't imagine, and their hopeless world won't change without a fight.

Wow! A one-day read, who would have thought?! I admit to being intrigued by the previews of Warm Bodies earlier this year, but never got around to seeing or reading it. So I decided just before the DVD release that I want to read it! And then I bought the movie as well while it was on sale. Let's just say that Isaac Marion's Warm Bodies surpassed all my expectations of a zombie read!

R is definitely an odd zombie, as our narrator he has quite the mindset, but I guess he has to so the story isn't a running commentary of BRAIIIINS! He is truly a character of his own. He does eat people, but a zombie guy has got to eat. That being said, there are two kinds of zombies in this one, the ones like R and then there are ones called Boneys which are more like skeletons running around and being zombie like.

The world is in an apocalyptic state, zombies are out and about eating people and humans are sequestered in their safe homes which are guarded 24/7. Then when out and about eating people he eats some of this guy, Perry's brain. And he starts to see some of Perry's memories, which isn't all that uncommon, but when he starts to interact with the spirit of Perry after consuming his brain during these memories, well, that's pretty freaking uncommon!

It's after he first kills Perry that R meets Julie, a young girl who knows how to fire a gun and kill zombies, yet he has no urge to eat her. Possibly since he saw her in some of Perry's memories, but he suddenly has this insane urge to protect her. And that he does.

Julie reacts splendidly to this happenstance. She's confused and a bit weirded out, she can tell that there's something different about this zombie when she normally kills them instead of trying to have a conversation with them. But R manages speech better than most. She even starts to see him as a friend after all he does to protect her from his own kind.

Like I said, this was a pretty fabulous read for a zombie book. Zombies are hard to like since they are flesh-eaters. But R was a highly enjoyable hero. I loved him! He starts to change by being around Julie, he's less zombie-like and it begins to spawn the idea of a possible cure for zombies everywhere. Perhaps they can fight this virus or plague or whatever you want to call it and they can return to a state of normalcy.

There was a bit of romance in this one, but nothing over the top. R begins to like Julie, a lot. But they come from different worlds, how could something ever work between them? Well, you'll have to read it and find out.

According to Goodreads, this is Warm Bodies #1, so it leaves you to wonder if there are going to be more books in this world. I know there's a novella prequel out and about, but as far as novels, I really don't know. But I hope to find out!

Warm Bodies was an exciting zombie read set in a pretty scary future setting, but one theme remains ever clear in all these apocalyptic settings; there is always hope. (And now I must find the time to see the movie because I definitely want to watch it now! And I may even write up a review for that as well!)


Overall Rating 5/5 stars