review by Ed Wetterman
If you’re a big fan of zombies, then you should check this book out. Do you remember those really geeky fellows in high school? You know the ones; they were into science, history, fantasy, and roleplaying. Nah! I’m certain no one you ever knew was like that. Laymon takes the quintessential nerd a step farther in Resurrection Dreams. Here’s the hype from the back of the book:

Back in Ellsworth High there was definitely no one weirder than Melvin. All the kids made fun of the way he dressed, the way he acted, everything about him. Vicki was the only one who stood up for him, but even she was horrified when he dug up a dead body and tried to bring it back to life with power from a car battery.

That was years ago, but Vicki still has nightmares about Melvin. Now she’s back in Ellsworth and she knows she’ll have to see Melvin again. He’s just been released from the institution and he’s acting even weirder than ever. His experiments with the dead have progressed, and as soon as he can get Vicki where he wants her, he can make his most twisted dream a reality.

Writing: 4 Stars

Laymon is a professional writer with quite a horror resume. He knows his stuff and moves the story along very well. I found I really enjoyed the main characters he introduced, especially the heroine, Vicki Chandler, and her very enjoyable best friend, Alice (Ace) Mason. Ace really steals many of the scenes, as her cool manner and quick tongue makes the character very real and someone I’d like to be friends with! Melvin, the geeky villain, is pretty two-dimensional, and never shows any further depth than the deranged ex-mental patient geek who wants to unlock the secrets of bringing the dead back to life. Actually, I’d have given the writing five stars, except the book is full of sexual situations, even when they aren’t necessary. I found his treatment of human sexuality to be very juvenile, and a distraction from what was a good horror tale.

Plot: 4 Stars

Laymon moves the plot along well, with few wasted scenes. However the sexually explicit scenes are very gratuitous, appealing to me as a thirteen year old boy but not as an adult man. I was surprised by a few of the happenings in the book, especially the “How do you kill the dead?” scene. He also invoked a sense of Tarantino-esque humor, where I laughed at scenes that were so bizarre and horrific as to be funny. Imagine your zombie girlfriend is totally devoted to you, but you love a living girl, and the zombie is jealous. It made for an enjoyable read.

Gaming Uses: 4 Stars

Resurrection Dreams had some good gaming ideas that could easily be snatched by the inventive Game Master and placed into a modern horror type game. Melvin, inspired by Frankenstein, tried many methods of resurrecting the dead and failed time and again, until he finally attempted a ritual from page 621 of Curses, Spells, and Incantations by Amed Magdal, translated from the Coptic by Guy de Villier. The ritual involved cutting the corpse’s midsection and carving the “Face of Ram-Chotep.” This ritual was further enabled by the chewing of a root into a paste and pushing it into the cut with his tongue. The zombie is thus animated, and other than an extreme thirst for sex and blood, is controlled by the person who inserted the paste. This bizarre zombie is almost a cross between the classic living dead and the more modern vampire, and could be an enjoyable addition to any horror campaign.

Final Score: 4.00

This novel was a fun read, but the overwhelming sexuality was too much for me and distracted from the overall story arc. The book is otherwise well written, with good characters and a fun read. It is definitely meant for a mature audience.