Zombie [Hardcover]

Joyce Carol Oates (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 1995

The renowned author journeys into the mind of a paroled sex offender named Quentin P., drawing a meticulous, unprecedented portrait of cold calculation and dark obsession. By the author of What I Lived For. 50,000 first printing.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

A hero who gets into the mind of a serial killer is a fixture of television crime shows, but such stories are usually disappointing, because the viewer knows it's just a gimmick. Not so with this unusual little novel, which The New York Times called a "note-perfect, horror-comic ventriloquization of a half-bright, infantile serial killer." Joyce Carol Oates has so convincingly written through the voice of a killer, you will feel nervous while reading at how familiar, how human, he is. Part of how she achieves the effect is through sparing use of bizarre capitalization (e.g., "MOON" and "FRAGMENT") and crude drawings done with a felt-tip pen. But the language is what makes it come alive, as in such weird statements as "My whole body is a numb tongue." This book was winner of the 1996 Bram Stoker Award for Best Novel. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

Periodically, Oates seems compelled to write grim novels that explore humanity's darkest corners. Coming on the heels of last year's excellent What I Lived For, this depressing narrative carries macabre imagination to the extreme. It depicts the career of Quentin P., a convicted young sex offender on probation who has turned to serial killing without being caught, despite the worried scrutiny of his family and of his psychiatrist. Convincingly presented as Quentin's diary of his pursuit of the perfect "zombie" (a handsome young man to be rendered compliant and devoted through Quentin's lobotomizing him with an ice pick), the narrative incorporates crude drawings and typographic play to evoke the hermetic imagination of a psychopath; the reader examines the killer's sketches of weapons and staring eyes, and hears him say, "I lost it & screamed at him & shook him BUT I DID NOT HURT HIM I SWEAR." For all its apparent authenticity, however, this novel ventures into territory that has been explored more powerfully by, among others, Dennis Cooper (Frisk), whose chilly minimalism underscores the brutality of such crimes in a way that Oates's more calculatedly histrionic approach does not. This slim, sadistic reverie may be chilling, but it comes off as less a fully realized work than as an exercise from a writer at morbid play.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 192 pages
• Publisher: Dutton Adult; First Edition edition (October 1, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0525940456
• ISBN-13: 978-0525940456
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (75 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #823,068 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Joyce Carol Oates is the author of more than 70 books, including novels, short story collections, poetry volumes, plays, essays, and criticism, including the national bestsellers We Were the Mulvaneys and Blonde. Among her many honors are the PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in Short Fiction and the National Book Award. Oates is the Roger S. Berlind Distinguished Professor of the Humanities at Princeton University, and has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters since 1978.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gruesome but compelling, May 28, 2000

By 

"mfshermantank" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Zombie (Paperback)

Zombie repulsed me. The narrator, Quentin P., is loathsome, sick. But in Oates' hands, the brutal serial killer becomes someone we almost know. Oates plunges us into Quentin's world and forces us to acknowledge that his madness is not without its own twisted logic. You see, all Quentin wants is someone in his life he can love and control completely. Zombie's horror is not so much in what Quentin does, but in how he recounts it: He describes his crimes the way my son might talk about his day at school. Zombie is short and taut, more like the novels Oates pens under her pseudonym, Rosamond Smith, than like her longer works. Gruesome, yes, but a compelling read.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Inside the mind of a serial killer, April 16, 2000

By 

Linda Linguvic (New York City) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Zombie (Paperback)

In this short and startling 1995 novel, Joyce Carol Oates again proves her expertise and versatility as a writer by getting inside the mind of a serial killer. The book is written as a diary, with bizarre capitalizations and crude drawings. She uses simple prose as the serial killer's dark obsession and demented scheming becomes clear and the reader is drawn into the workings of his mind. It is horrifying. The tension never lets up as one victim after another falls victim to his needs. The worst part is that we have all read the papers and know that there are really sickos like this out there in the world.

33 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Damn you, Joyce!, October 20, 2009

By 

Jenn Emerson (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Zombie: A Novel (Paperback)

I knew I was a fan of Joyce Carol Oates after being forced to read her by an English prof in college. She has a perspective and a skill with prose that really impressed my impressionable bachelor's degree mind. I'll grant, however, I am not a big reader and don't keep up with Oates' complete catalog. It was about a month ago when I ran across this title and thought, "Wow, Joyce Carol Oates is doing her take on the latest zombie phenomenon? I need to check this out." Dumb a**. Of course, she's not writing about zombie zombies. But that's kinda what I thought when I started reading it. I didn't know anything about it, much less that this book was originally published more than a decade ago.

I think coming into it virtually blind made the book a more intense experience for me vs. someone who has read the reviews, synopsis and so on. (Kinda like how I enjoyed "The Blair Witch Project" more than most because I went into it blind and believing.)

For that reason, I'm not sure how much I actually want to say about the story. When I got the book, I began reading it right away just because I was in a reading mood. Then I couldn't put it down. I wanted to, though. I felt like throwing up at least four or five times while reading it.

I wasn't finished with the story when I had to put the book down to go make a living. After I'd put it down I was reluctant to pick it up again. I'd pass by it on the bookshelf and give it the stink eye.

Then, finally, the other night all the circumstances collided making it the right time to finish this book.
It's a slim read, practically a novelette. But it's a testament to Oates' abilities. She knows just how to turn a phrase, flip syntax, reroute a time line - like a puppet master pulling at the threads of your emotion. It's so funny how unassuming she seems in person, her lady-next-doorness. She's pretty damn brilliant.

Despite that, I cannot recommend this book to anyone I know because it is just too damn creepy. It would be like recommending rape or something. That's it. My mind has been raped! Okay, well, it's not that bad. Well, sorta. I don't know. I mean, it's basically the journal of a sociopath who describes in calm self-righteous detail his gruesome and terrifying deeds.

It got me to thinking about how a lot of people are like this, maybe everyone. Not the horrifying sadosexual acts, but just that sociopathic drive to get what you want - trudging a path to a self-serving goal without a thought to those hurt along the way.

Yet Quentin is hurt by those he hurt. He finds ways to be offended and victimized by his own victims as he stalks and tortures them - completely insane.

In the end you realize, really, Quentin is the zombie - dead inside, a soulless automaton on a path of destruction. I so desperately wanted to reach through the pages and stop him. But I couldn't. I could only read on, paralyzed. The horror.

That night, after I'd put the book down, I got ready for bed, got under the covers and turned out the light. About 10 minutes later I got up, grabbed Zombie and put it outside on the patio, went back in and locked the door.

Because I'm such a contemplative reader, I usually keep all the books I read. I like to refer back to them, remember lines and phrases. However, "Zombie" is going with me on my next visit to the used book store - it will ride in the trunk of the car, of course. I don't need Quentin anywhere near me again. Though I am afraid he will forever reside in my paranoia.