Dreadfully Ever After
Sequel to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
Steve Hockensmith

When last we saw Elizabeth Bennet and Fitzwilliam Darcy - at the end of the New York Times best seller Pride and Prejudice and Zombies - they were preparing for a lifetime of wedded bliss. Yet the honeymoon has barely begun when poor Mr. Darcy is nipped by a rampaging dreadful. Elizabeth knows the only acceptable course of action is to promptly behead her husband (and then burn the corpse, just to be safe). But when she learns of a miracle antidote being developed in London, she realizes there may be one last chance to save her true love - and for everyone to live happily ever after.
Complete with romance, heartbreak, martial arts, cannibalism, and an army of shambling corpses, Dreadfully Ever After brings the story of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies to a thrilling conclusion.

While a great novel in it's own right, Dreadfully Ever After is just slightly not as good as Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and it's prequel Dawn of the Dreadfuls. Don't get me wrong, this is still an excellent read and I highly recommend the entire series, but there's just something rather small in this that doesn't stand up to the other two.

I think that thing is Elizabeth, Kitty, and Mr. Bennet having to pretend to be someone else and make nice with a doctor in order to try and produce the cure - through either Elizabeth (now Elizabeth Darcy) seducing the doctor or through Kitty seducing the son. Desperate times call for desperate measures, but the play acting and seduction just didn't seem in line for these character. Though I will admit, it does work for the story and at the end, when they decide to just be the warriors they are, is very satisfying.

While Elizabeth is trying to find the cure, Mr. Darcy has been taken to his Aunt's house and she uses this time to try and poison him against low-born Elizabeth and steer him towards her morbid daughter once more.

Once of the fascinating things about this novel, is you get a bit of a point of view from someone who has the disease, but still has their wits about them. It gives an understanding that what the zombies are after is not merely flesh and brains, but a light that they see that shows the person's life. What they desire to consume is life itself.

As with the other novels, the characters work within the world that Jane Austin originally had them in and the books all flow together well. The series is actually quite impressive.

I would highly recommend this novel, with the caveat of reading it after reading the other two. Oh, and read them in this order: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, then Dawn of the Dreadfuls, and then Dreadfully Ever After. Do not read the prequel first, you'll understand it much better if you read them in the order they came out in.

My rating: Four out of five snails.