Women in Horror Month Book Review: Z-Town by Eden Darry
Genre: Horror – Zombies
Age: Adult
This one was a little disappointing. Maybe my expectations were slightly too high, as typically I really do enjoy the books put out by this publisher. Z-Town just fell flat for me, though if you want a relatively easy, fast, zombie-filled read, you might like it.
After a brief time spent in London, Meg returns home to Provincetown, focused on achieving her dream and buying her own bar. She definitely doesn’t have time for a relationship, and Lane, back in London, was nothing more than a brief fling. But Lane doesn’t see their time in the same way – she hops on a plane over to Provincetown, determined to win Meg back. But when she lands, she quickly learns things aren’t quite right – something has been disturbed, treasures have been stolen, and there’s a load of zombies popping up left, right and centre.
For me, Z-Town didn’t quite hit the romance hard enough; it seemed to almost lean into it, then backs off too quick to let it have much of an emotional impact. Similarly, the zombie aspect feels very standard zombie fare – there’s nothing particularly unique about them, which would be fine if the characters weren’t so bland.
Meg’s only goal is to one day own her own bar. Lane doesn’t seem to really have any sort of aspirations or goals outside “get Meg back”. She knows Meg doesn’t like grand romantic gestures, but she still gets on a plane and travels to the US to try and win her back, which is kind of creepy to me? Especially nowadays when we have so many ways to contact someone in a different country. Along with these two, we get a standoffish, clearly-hiding-something librarian, a tough-as-nails woman who acts as the tank, and a random kid Meg and Lane protect throughout.
It just all felt a bit flat to me, like it was trying to be something without actually knowing why the best of those things actually work. The best zombie books are those that do something different with the kind of tropes they’re dealing with, but Z-Town largely felt like reading a video game plot. Initially, Meg’s determination offers something interesting, and the start of the book focusing on her as her friends and colleagues in the town fall ill is engaging, but once the actually zombies emerge it becomes less so. The zombies appear when a horde of Viking treasure is unearthed, but like other elements the Viking aspect just doesn’t have anything interesting enough about it to sustain the rest.
If you’ve never read a zombie book before, you might enjoy this, but I found parts to be a little bloated and repetitive, and the interesting aspects are either shied away from too much or done in such a way they lose their shine.
Review by Elle Turpitt
Twitter & Instagram: @elleturpitt
www.elleturpitt.com
I received this ebook from Bold Strokes Books via NetGalley for review consideration.
