Voodoo Child – by William Burke – ISBN 1-3432773081 ISBN 978-2-9914480-6-7 Published by William Burke (June 17, 2016). ($2.99 USD SRP) The reviewer received the book from the author as an eBook.
Around the world and then landing on a small island in the Caribbean, this story spans the globe and more.
The action begins on the small island of Isle De Fantomas. It moves to the deserts of the Middle East and then back. The plot is an interesting mix of horror, mystery and voodoo. The most intriguing part of this for this reviewer is the author’s respect for a small religion, voodoo, in this case.
Yes, there are demons, devils, voodoo priestesses, and hordes of the undead. They fill the pages and bring out a very mixed mix of horror and yet a detailed practice of a little-known religion. There are soldiers, military troops and mercenaries and wickedly charming scientists and others not so charming.
The action on this small island centers on an ancient and forbidden voodoo ritual from an obscure book recently translated by General Manual Ortiz’s bokor or voodoo priest. The General has proclaimed himself by various titles Prime Minister for Life of the island, supreme dictator, etc. He possesses this book for killing the previous voodoo priestess. With the bokor’s uncanny ability to understand the languages in which the book is written. Possessor of an ancient voodoo ritual and with his bokor, he performs ceremonies most would leave unexperienced.
The general, his bokor, and his fiancée, Lavonia Dawes, find themselves in a dark dungeon performing a ritual that is darker than any performed for many centuries. While this is happening, his nephew, Lieutenant Miguel Ortiz, goes hunting and tries to kill Sarafina, the island’s current voodoo priestess. One thing leads to another and through an astonishing amount of mistakes, errors, and simple and poor assumptions, the subject matter of the book breaks into the reader’s mind, sparking the uprising of the zombies.
Baron Kriminel, the cigar-smoking spirit of voodoo death, is summoned, and then has to face his lifelong lover, Gira, the spirit of love and fertility. It is a match made in the environment of voodoo spirits and therefore everything becomes even darker.
The Talos Corporation, a mega multinational corporation, investigates many devious and insidious ideas, but mainly works on something very similar to voodoo zombies. Maggie Child, co-pilot of a Blackhawk in the Iraqi desert, is really the main character of this story and, although she was not introduced until chapter 8, she is the main character of the book. She becomes one of the experiments Talos is working on to create super soldiers. James Gallo appears to replace his friend and predecessor. Steven Caine. Maggie escapes with Glen Logan, her accidental partner of hers from the Talos facility where the dark experiments are conducted. Her uncle, Rip Flowers, enters the scene and the fun begins.
All these characters end up on the island and get caught up in the zombie apocalypse that takes over the island. This is where the true horror of the story appears.
Any reader will be captivated by this rather long book. It holds the reader’s interest until the last words of this book, the first part of Burke’s Zombie Uprising series. This reviewer and probably all readers will be waiting with bated breath for the next and other books in the series.
5 stars.