Cemetery Dance

Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

When an award winning journalist is murdered in his own apartment by a man who was supposedly dead - a zombie, the suspicion quickly falls on a secluded group of worshipers in New York City that may include animal sacrifice in their worship services. He had recently been working on a series of cruelty to animals articles. It appears they are practicing voodoo. This group was included in the journalist's reports.

Lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta is one of the officers investigating the case of this close friend. FBI Special Agent Pendergast also joins the hunt for the murderer. His investigations only help fuel D'Agosta's anger. Another newspaper reporter takes up the animal cruelty articles. Soon a zombie tries to attack the widow and the new reporter.

Public opinion is whipped up against the religious group. A movie director becomes a spokesman for them. A devout believer in animal rights is the brains behind the movement. Soon there are demonstrations in New York City to save the animals that are being sacrificed. When the new reporter is also killed by an apparent zombie. public opinion against the religious group gets worse. They want to break down the cult and reclaim the land and the animals.

As Pendergast and D'Agosta keep searching for the murderer - a zombie? - they keep getting tied up in the demonstrations. The New York Police are involved with protecting the demonstrators and the people in the religious group. But Pendergast has some other ideas as well, taking D'Agosta along on some investigations that are on the shady side of the law.

Cemetery Dance had me sucked right in from the first chapter. Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child break one of the unwritten novelists' laws of protecting the liked recurring characters. I kept wanting to have it all be a mistake, a case of mistaken identity. But no, they added to the poignancy of the novel with the first victim.

The mystery is also well done. The twists and turns getting to the final solution are mind boggling. The clues are there but I was so caught up in the story I missed them. The action doesn't stop. Captain Laura Hayward is worried about what D'Agosta is doing to himself and his career. They have been broken up for a while but they are still friends. Bill Smithback and Nora Kelly celebrate their first anniversary. And Pendergast is...Pendergast.

If you haven't read anything by Preston and Child before, you won't go wrong with Cemetery Dance. It is well done and stands on its own. Yes, there are characters that have been in earlier books, but their stories are not necessary to this book other than normal background the reader would get even if they were brand new characters.

Cemetery Dance starts off strong and doesn't quit. It gets quite weird as the voodoo elements and Panderers's Louisiana background come together. And voodoo zombies? As usual, Preston and Child are able to put the supernatural pieces together and develop a great suspense.

Notice:  Graphic violence

Relic
Reliquary
Cabinet of Curiousities
Still Life with Crows
Brimstone
Dance of Death
The Book of the Dead
The Wheel of Darkness
Cemetary Dance
Fever Dream
Cold Vengeance