Before You Go Monster Hunting; Look in the Mirror! A Book Review of "Night of the Living Dead Christian" By Paul Emery

            Monsters are all around us.  Everywhere you look you may see them and not even know.  Some of them are your best friend from high school, your teacher or professor, the neighbor down the street, or maybe even that old lady you just helped across the street.  The truth of the matter is monsters have learned how to live among us, and we have become so desensitized that we don’t even realize…, the monster may be ourselves.

            In his newest book, “Night of the Living Dead Christian”, Matt Mikalatos takes us on a fictional journey as he comes into contact with a werewolf named Luther.  In this book we see Matt take on the challenge of helping his newfound friend break free of the curse of the beast.  Through many strange turns and events we see this journey take shape as Matt is joined with a Mad Scientist, an Android, a half zombie, and a vampire names Lara.  The mission is to find out the cure for Luther’s lycanthrope transformation, if it is possible.

            Relevant Magazine offers this praise for the book, “Think Monty Python meets C.S. Lewis.”  While Relevant Magazine may well be right that Matt’s book is like C.S. Lewis in my opinion Matt’s writing style is completely different than C.S. Lewis. C.S. Lewis was more of a philosopher and had a more established reputation writing fiction and Christian literature than does Matt. With that said the praise offered by Relevant Magazine is well deserved in the sense that this book is a great spiritual allegory.

“Night of the Living Dead Christian” was a book I found myself immersed in.  I, too, have always had a fascination with monsters and to see them used as representations of spiritual behavior not only hooked me, but kept me latched to every page.  As I read through the chapters and was introduced to the various monsters I kept asking myself, “Which one am I?”

            Amongst the chapters Matt weaved in interludes, which served as a brief distraction from the story.  Each of the interludes was on a spiritual topic from the perspective of the werewolf.  Some of these issues addressed were Fathers, Transformation, and Love.  Although each raised some questions for me on the purpose of the author, especially transformation, these were all a good break from the story line, and allowed the reader to look at some important topics and how they are viewed by the world. 

            I give this book 5 monsters out of 5.  In this world of post-Twilight I think this book serves as a great way of reaching friends who might not be so keen on Christian fiction, and especially Christian allegory.  I have already recommended this book to some of my close friends, and I certainly recommend it for you.  Matt Mikalatos is a name I now know, and I look forward to any additional books he may write.

To see more of what Matt has to offer check out his website at http://www.mattmikalatos.com

See the author’s video about this book at http://www.tyndale.com/video/296

Check out Tyndale Publishers at http://www.tyndale.com

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from Tyndale House Publishers as part of their Blogger Review Program. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commision’s 16 CFR, Part 255: “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.”