Zombie

Working Stiffs (Book Review)

October 5, 2012 By Horror Palace Leave a Comment

Book: Working Stiffs
Year: 2012
Publisher: Necro Publications
Author: Lucy Leitner
Language: English
Chapters: N/A
Pages: 248
Type: Novel

Publisher’s Summary: Working Stiffs is a hilarious, action-packed tale of survival in the fast-paced world of pharmaceuticals. Something has gone horribly wrong in the Pro-Well Pharmaceuticals factory and ex-meth dealer Marshall Owens, the company’s owner and drug genius, must keep the surrounding Pittsburgh area from finding out. Unfortunately, the undead assembly line workers have other plans. The infection spreads and chaos reigns supreme as the surviving Pro-Well employees battle their way through offices with whatever weapons they can scrounge from the supply closet. They must get outside. But they don’t know that The General is out there amassing a shambling, rotting army of Pittsburgh’s finest. Will the employees make it? Will two repulsive workers find love in a janitor’s closet? How many office workers can one man take down with the blade of a paper cutter and some staplers? Will Marshall Owens go back to selling meth? And most important of all, will Pro-Well’s stock value plummet? Find out all the answers in this brilliant new horror/comedy novel reminiscent of style of Christopher Moore.

Review: I am going to start this review with my perception of the plot for Working Stiffs; a previous drug-lord named Marshall Owens is the CEO of a Pittsburgh Pharmaceutical company. He creates chemicals that zombiefies or sickens lowlifes in society like the homeless, whores and addicts so he can put them to work at the drug company on the assembly line so he can get out of paying the employees.

These drugs turn the unsuspecting lower rung of society into grotesque gray-looking creatures with rotting teeth and scabbed skin desiring flesh. These working zombies so to speak get chained up and must perform daily duties in the factory in return for human meat that they desperately want. But there is a twist when “The General” doesn’t get turned into a walking dead, somehow escaping the drugs power…and he bands the affected together for a little payback on the money-hungry Mr. Owens.

Working Stiffs has tons of action and very descriptive brutality which I admired. There is blood, guts, gore and body parts all over this book. The author painted an extremely vivid picture in my mind that worked flawlessly. On the downside, it was tough to comprehend on certain occasions; there were many characters to follow while trying to picture in my mind the time allotments that were given instead of chapter breakdowns. Additionally, there were some comedic elements that frankly didn’t work. I never felt a chuckle coming on, moreover I think it was unneeded and took me a touch out of it.

An extra tidbit is that Working Stiffs is a part of a 5 horror book collection of new authors, and if you desire more scary books to read late at night take a peek at; Revelations, Red Town Lost, Last Stand On Zombie Island, Crogian and of course this zombie-comedy novel, Working Stiffs which will be a moderate recommendation by me. I am not particularly a huge fan of zombies but it did have plenty of moments to keep my mind wandering.

The book is available to buy at Amazon on Paperback for $15.95 or you can get the E-Book or Kindle Edition for a mere $4.99. On a side note; there was a limited supply of autographed, hard-bound books available for Working Stiffs, but it’s sold out already, I can see why because zombie lovers will be titillated with this one. My ratings, suggestions and links are below.

[amzn_product_inline asin=’193906502X’]

Reviewer: Dark Goddess
Date: 10/05/2012
Rating: 5.5/10
Suggestion: Paperback: Avoid
Suggestion: E-Book: Buy

Weeyatches (Book Review)

September 19, 2012 By Horror Palace Leave a Comment

Book: Weeyatches
Year: 2012
Publisher: Damnation Books
Author: Patrick MacAdoo
Language: English
Chapters: 31
Pages: 174
Type: Novel

Author’s Summary: The devolution WILL be televised. Two young women, both insignificant figures in the magical underworld, find themselves drawn away from their personal concerns and into an odyssey through the Minneapolis sewers, the future, and the past, as they battle against a coalition of wandering sorcerers, a warlock who casts spells through drains and pipes, and the weeyatches, a coven of reality stars/witches, in order to prevent a dystopian catastrophe.

Review: Witch lovers clap your hands because this book is all about an apprentice witch who fights an evil witch. Her name is Dylan and Finn is her master. When they attempt to talk to a malevolent witch named Daphne, Dylan gets captured. With the help of an intriguing person, Mae, who is out for revenge because her brother was killed, Dylan escapes and they make a plan to save Finn, all the while her powers growing stronger.

Along with all of the witches in the novel, you have wizards, warlocks and “drain speakers” who can turn ordinary people into zombie-like creatures. There are an abundance of characters to keep track of and I did like how the story unfolded over time.

The writing style was one that I wasn’t accustom to. There are many time-traveling-like scenarios where the story goes back-and-forth from the past to the present. The reason for this was to alter the events that had happened. Almost like a Sci-Fi type of story. It got quite tedious and cumbersome keeping track of all of the activities going on.

A few positives on Weeyatches; put simply, it was a fascinating story, there were tons of events to keep track of, and it was different than any other witch story I have come across in my 20 years of reading novels. The only thing I wasn’t all that enthused with was to me there was too much time traveler escapades that got confusing, it is a book where you must concentrate all the time or you will be baffled with the story. You do want to make sure you have no interruptions while reading.

Weeyatches is available as a Paperback book at many online locations for $18.99. You can also get the E-Book or electronic edition at a price of $5.95. The book cover graphics are misleading and a touch dull. It doesn’t entice you to pick up the book to read what it is about. After initial publications sell, hopefully the artwork can be updated to appeal to the reading audience on a second edition. My ratings and suggestions are below.

[amzn_product_inline asin=’1615726918′]

Reviewer: Dark Goddess
Date: 09/19/2012
Rating: 7/10
Suggestion: Paperback: Buy
Suggestion: E-Book: Buy

Bloodlust Zombies Review

June 22, 2012 By Horror Palace Leave a Comment

Movie: Bloodlust Zombies
Year: 2011
Studio: Impulse-FX
Director: Dan Lantz
Stars: Alexis Texas, Janice Marie, Adam Danoff
Language: English
Length: 76 Minutes
Sub-Genre: Zombies

Plot: In this horror-comedy hybrid, a chemical spill at a weapons lab leads to a zombie outbreak. This spells big trouble for the employees trapped inside the facility after an emergency lockdown is declared to try to contain the menacing horde of zombies. The most inconceivable person out of all the workers steps up in a big way and tries to escape before the ravaging, blood-craving zombies infect everyone in sight.

Review: I sat down, popped in the DVD, and after 5 minutes, I knew I was going to hate this film. It is a zombie-comedy, or zombedy, as they’re called now, with horrendous jokes, cheesy acting and wooden characters. These style horror films are a dime-a-dozen these days and most of them fail miserably, including Bloodlust Zombies.

For starters, the so-called zombies are nothing of the sort. Yes, I know, the infected and virus-ridden catch the zombie sub-genre, but I have no inkling why. The zombies in this are not the dead coming back to life. Instead, a spill of this newly devised chemical spreads through a laboratory turning people sick basically. How lame! It’s funny because the infected people try so damn hard to act like zombies, but it is so poorly done it wouldn’t convince a kindergartener.

The leading actress is a porn-star, Alexis Texas. She uses her stage name, which I don’t blame her, I wouldn’t want my real name associated with this horror film either. She does appear topless in many scenes, along with some other women, which is the only positive I could muster from Bloodlust Zombies.

Thank the high heavens that this film only runs for slightly over an hour, because I don’t think I could of took much more of this ultra-low junk of a horror movie. If you see or hear about Bloodlust Zombies, please let it go in one ear and out the other, cause it is not worth wasting your time and hard earned money.

Reviewer: BillChete
Date: 06/22/2012
Rating: 1/10
Recommendation: Avoid

Trailer: Watch
DVD: Amazon
BluRay: N/A
Social Media: Facebook

The Dead And The Damned Review

June 12, 2012 By Horror Palace Leave a Comment

Movie: The Dead And The Damned
Year: 2011
Studio: iDiC Entertainment
Director: Rene Perez
Stars: David A. Lockhart, Camille Montgomery, Rick Mora
Language: English
Length: 82 Minutes
Sub-Genre: Zombies

Plot: In this indie Western-horror hybrid, a meteorite strikes California gold country and turns a town full of prospectors, prostitutes and gunslingers into flesh-eating zombies who develop a craving for a bounty hunter and his Apache warrior prisoner.

Review: Set in the Western times, The Dead And The Damned also known as Cowboys & Zombies, begins with an old fashion shoot-out around a saloon. The acting was stale but the fighting scenes were satisfactory. What you come to find out after a good 10 minutes, is this bounty hunter is out to serve justice and make money for his family back home. His next “job” is to capture alive an Indian who apparently is a rapist and killer. Around 40 minutes in there is a little snafu.

The story slightly shifts to these townspeople who find a glowing green rock in the desert. In amazement they take a pick-axe to the object when a mysterious smoky gas protrudes and turns everyone into zombie-like beings, some slow and some fast. They are out for flesh when they come across the bounty hunter, mistaken killer and a young girl that the bounty hunter purchased to help him in the capture of his next prisoner.

The zombies in The Dead And The Damned were done fairly well. Some of them scary and ravaging. For the most part the make-up was good. But here in lye’s the problem, all of the gun shots, wounds and the like were a CGI catastrophe. I presume the director hasn’t heard of squibs, or either didn’t think it through. It is a low budget film coming in at $30 thousand, but a few bloody squib packs would of went a long way in this film, as 99% of the killing was with gun shots.

There was a particular scene I was impressed with; the young blonde gets trapped in a room with a fierce, older woman zombie. The look of this zombie was scary and the scene had a lot of tension. We also got the only non-gun wound kill here with an axe to the head. Props on that part there.

The sound and score was lame, nothing chilling or frightening, kind of bland and dull. A few nice tracks thrown in would of helped big time on The Dead And The Damned. I am not a fan of old westerns, if you are, this might be an easier watch to you than it was for me, but horror fans desiring decent sound will want to skip this one.

In closing, The Dead And The Damned is a predictable and un-engaging horror film. Will you care for these characters? I think not, because the acting was quite poor. It was hard to buy anybody’s motivation, and the Apache Indian character should of stayed mute, because when he talked it hurt the film more. Overall, this is an easy avoid. I don’t feel like I wasted 80 minutes of my life, but there are far better independent horror movies that deserve your hard earned money over The Dead And The Damned.

If you would like to see The Dead And The Damed, you will not have to waste any money because you can see it for FREE on Amazon Instant Video.

[amzn_product_inline asin=’B00B9B05B8′]

Reviewer: BillChete
Date: 06/12/2012
Rating: 3/10
Recommendation: Avoid

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