George R.R. Martin reviews Stephen King’s latest in this week’s BookWorld:

Zombies are the Rodney Dangerfield of monsterdom, the poor relation none of the other monsters wants to admit to knowing. Vampires boast of ancient lineages and dwell in magnificent (if somewhat ruined) estates. They dress elegantly and quote poetry, and while they may not drink wine, you know that if they did, it would be only the best vintages. Werewolves tend to be average joes, ordinary working stiffs who say their prayers by night until stricken by lycanthropy. Aside from a few nights when the moon is full, they’re just folks like you and me. Zombies, though? Rotting corpses, ripe and decaying, dressed in rags and covered with dirt, mindless, clumsy, slow, hideous and foul-smelling. The sheriff in "Night of the Living Dead" summed them up perfectly when he said, "They’re dead . . . they’re all messed up."

Calling zombies Rodney Dangerfield(s); man, that’s just cold.

Sadly, Martin seems to have missed out on the recent fast-moving zombies entirely, which undercuts one section of the otherwise-charming review. At least, it did for this zombie afficionado.