UF Audio Review: My Life as a White Trash Zombie by Diana Rowland

My Life as a White Trash Zombie

by Diana Rowland

White Trash Zombie #1

Narrated by Allison McLemore

Published July 5th 2011 by DAW

Angel Crawford is a loser

Living with her alcoholic deadbeat dad in the swamps of southern Louisiana, she's a high school dropout with a pill habit and a criminal record who's been fired from more crap jobs than she can count. Now on probation for a felony, it seems that Angel will never pull herself out of the downward spiral her life has taken.

That is, until the day she wakes up in the ER after overdosing on painkillers. Angel remembers being in an horrible car crash, but she doesn't have a mark on her. To add to the weirdness, she receives an anonymous letter telling her there's a job waiting for her at the parish morgue—and that it's an offer she doesn't dare refuse.

Before she knows it she's dealing with a huge crush on a certain hunky deputy and a brand new addiction: an overpowering craving for brains. Plus, her morgue is filling up with the victims of a serial killer who decapitates his prey—just when she's hungriest!

Angel's going to have to grow up fast if she wants to keep this job and stay in one piece. Because if she doesn't, she's dead meat.

Literally. 

The cover art and title sucked me in but Angel keep me listening. The moment she said

“But then again, I was about as far from touchy-feely as you could get. Unless you’re fucking me, don’t put your hands on me.”

I knew we were soul mates. Angel is a great character, she is full of snark and dieing really was the best thing that happened to her.

My Life as a White Trash Zombie is my 1st book to read where the main character is a zombie. And like many creatures, each author puts their own spin on them. Rowland's version of zombies is a like a cross between a vampire and the movie Death Becomes Her, where Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn keep falling apart but with some created makeup and paint tricks they still look good. Yeah, Angel has a moment like that.

I say vampires only because they way that zombies are made in Rowland's world sounds like how vampires are made in many books. They are dying and then a zombie bites them, turning them and then they must feed on brains (instead of blood). Also the zombies act like their human selves as long as they eat brains every few days.

But when they miss a meal of brains..... The hunger starts to take over and they become the mindless zombies that we see in movie, looking for their next meal.


YAY another heroine with a drug problem (aka Chess from the Downside series by Stacia Kane). But Angel has help kicking her pill problem. Apparently zombies don't get shit from pills or booze. Well, ain't that great. Angel now gets her high from b-r-a-i-n-s. That is after she decides to follow the advice she receives from an anonymous note about eating it if she craves it.

“It looked like pieces of bread pudding that had been soaked in raspberry syrup.”

Angel spends most of the book trying to solve the mystery of who turned her into a zombie and who is going around town chopping people's heads off. Oh did I mention that a mysterious person set her up with a job at the county morgue? The perfect place for a zombie to work. She has all the brains she can eat. Or does she??

You'll have to read My Life as a White Trash Zombie to find out the answers to the mysteries.

If you are a fan of the Sookie Stackhouse series but wish it was a little more on the smart ass side, then this is a book for you.

☊Narration Note: I thought that Allison McLemore did an excellent job with Angel. She added just enough southern twang to her voice and but a hella lot of smart ass into Angel that worked. I have both books in audio and paper format and after listening to McLemore do Angel I don't think I could read her without hearing her narration of her.



I'll leave you with this zombie joke:


"It reminds me of an old joke: What did the Zombie say to the whore?" I looked at him blankly. "Um....what?" He winked. "Keep the tip."