Publisher: Sinister Horror Company
Publication Date: 24th Nov 2015
Pages: 207
MY REVIEW:
A copy of Class
Three was sent to Confessions of a Reviewer by the author Duncan P Bradshaw
in exchange for an honest review. This is said review. This book is published
by the Sinister Horror Company.
Duncan P Bradshaw. A name I have seen a lot of but never
picked up anything he has written before. He very kindly asked if I would like
to review a copy of his new book, Class
Four (review coming soon). I decided to give it a go and then discovered Class Three was loosely connected so
decided to give it a go first. I have mentioned before that zombie books never
really did anything for me. They really need to have something different before
they truly hold my attention and make me want to read more. Class Three had that something different
in abundance.
Jim has just been dumped by his longstanding girlfriend.
What does he do to recover the situation? He goes and gets very very drunk. He
has to call on his brother Phil to pick him up and pour him home safely. As they
return to Jim’s house they notice something weird in the sky but they don’t
think it’s the end of the world.
Jim struggles to wake up the next morning and is greeted
by a text from Phil stating: “It’s the end of the world!!!!” and it truly is.
Something has broken up on re-entry into the earth’s
atmosphere and people are dying left, right and centre. The problem is they
don’t stay dead.
Jim and Phil now have to put “the plan” into operation. A
plan that they allegedly came up with when they were kids in the event of a
zombie apocalypse. Problem is Jim can’t remember it.
What follows is twenty four hours in the company of Jim
and Phil as they battle the undead, general nutcases and a weird cult intent on
serving their “god”. All this while trying to find the girlfriend that has just
dumped Jim in the hope she is still alive and he can get her back.
Right where do I start with this one? As I said
previously I have discovered a new found love of zombie books, if they have something different. After
agreeing to review this one I discovered it had a comedy element to it.
Straight away my alarm bells go off. I like a certain amount of wit and humour
in my books (the darker the better) but a comedy zombie book? Hmmm. Now I have
finished it? This, ladies and gentlemen, is a classic. This is a book that all
people who read horror stories need to have on their shelves. Horror. Yes.
Comedy. Yes. Does it mix well? Absolutely yes.
Our main characters in this are obviously Jim and Phil.
As you know Jim has just been dumped. He’s still hungover when it all kicks
off. Phil is single. Phil is nuts. He has an obsession with all things “end of
the world” and “zombies”. A perfect companion to have in a situation such as
this? As it turns out, yes he is indeed. He is also, quite possibly, one of the
funniest characters I have ever read in a book. Phil and Jim work so
fantastically well together. They bounce off each other and compliment each
other so very well. Jim is a bit more serious. He is certainly more serene.
Phil on the other hand is permanently one hundred miles an hour. Constantly
thinking and plotting and constantly coming off with some of the funniest one
liners I’ve read in years. You would honestly think that Mr Bradshaw had
drafted in a comedian to write some of his stuff. He couldn’t be that funny
himself. Right? For two main characters in a story you just could not get any
better.
We have a mixture of other characters throughout the
story that, again, find their position and work it masterfully. I don’t want to
give away too many of them but a few would be: the “reverend”, the leader of
the cult. This man is just off his rocker. Where he came from and where he got
his ideals is anyone’s guess but he finds some other nutters to follow him.
Some of the zombies we follow are also fantastic. You follow their thoughts and
their travels as they try to assuage their constant hunger. You really get
inside their psyche and get to follow the supposedly “evil” side of things. Jim
and Phil meet up with, and sometimes gang up with, a few others on their
travels and they all totally gel together to make up one unlikely band of
heroes.
Plot wise? Well what can you really do with a zombie
story? I mean it’s the end of the world. Zombies eat people and people who
aren’t zombies run away, very fast, to try and survive. The difference with
this zombie story is the mix of comedy and horror and what I would term “real
life” scenarios. Think Shaun of the Dead but more serious and more realistic.
I have always looked at zombie stories and films as
deadly serious. Constant horror and constant running and constant blood. What
people tend to forget when they watch or read these things is that people are
people. People will laugh and joke about things even in the midst of the
absolute horror shown in Class Three. That
is the beauty of this book. It seems so very realistic. When the characters
laugh you think, yeah I might have said something like that or yeah I would
have laughed at that. When the characters come up with something serious you
think, yeah I would have done it that way. There is none of this over fantastical
Hollywood mega blockbuster type explosions and car chases. It feels like real
life with real people dealing with a situation in the best way they can. We all
know that humour would be a big part of it if we were involved in it ourselves.
Don’t get me wrong though. This is a horror book. The
opening chapter gives you a vision in your mind that is so atmospheric and
horrific that it will give you goose bumps. It genuinely chilled me to the
bone. There are other scenes throughout this book that are absolutely horrific
and very harrowing. One scene in particular (that I will try not to spoil for
you) involves a rampage of zombies coming across a group of people stuck in a
traffic jam that have no idea what is going on. One particular group get
targeted in this scene. As you read it you will be screaming. You will be
punching cushions and you will quite possibly have a tear in your eye, as I
did.
This book is wonderful. The writing is superb. Free
flowing and perfectly paced throughout, it will keep you routed to your seat,
wherever you may be because you will not want to stop reading. I genuinely
missed my stop on the bus trying to squeeze another little bit out of it.
Duncan Bradshaw has a fantastic writing style. He gets
you engrossed in the characters from the very outset. His mix of comedy and
horror and real life are superb. Dare I say a bit like Jeff Strand? When you
read Class Three, you will end up
believing the zombie apocalypse is possible.
You best be like Phil and Jim and
have a plan.
To summarise: an apocalyptic horror story with as close
as you will ever get to real life characters in a story. A perfect blend of
humour and horror. You will be scared, you will laugh a lot and you will be
close to tears. If you want to continue your love of all things zombies or
indeed try it out for the first time, then pick this up. You will not regret
it.
General rating:
★★★★★ Just superb.
Horror / Comedy
rating:
★★★★★ See above.
If you would like to help support Confessions of a
Reviewer then please consider using the links below to buy Class Three or any other books from Duncan P Bradshaw or indeed
anything at all from Amazon. This not only supports me but also lets me
know how many people actually like to buy books after reading my reviews.
Thanks.
Book Synopsis:
Hungover, dumped and late for work.
On an ordinary day, one of these would be a bad morning,
but today Jim Taylor also has to contend with the zombie apocalypse.
Follow Jim through twenty four hours of Day One, as he
and his zombie obsessed brother deal with the undead, a doomsday cult and
maniacs in their quest to get to their parents, win his girlfriend back and for
them to instigate 'The Plan'.
Worlds will collide and fall apart in a Class Three
outbreak.
Part-Time Author/Full-Time Loon.
One day upon waking, as if from some frightful nightmare,
I sat at my laptop and typed out letters, which formed words, slowly they
created sentences. People read it and said, that's okay that is, have a
biscuit. And I said yes.
I live in Wiltshire, in Southern England with my wife
Debbie and our two cats, Rafa and Pepe, they just miaowed a hello at you.
Between bouts of prolonged washing up and bungie cord knitting, I type out the
weird and wonderful things that run around my head.
My debut novel, zom-com Class Three, was released in
November 2014, the first book in the follow up trilogy, Class Four: Those Who
Survive is out in July 2015. I'm then going to try and get some novellas
released which are on something other than the undead.
You can see more of Duncan at his website.
Duncan’s author page is here.
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