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review 2017-03-26 17:26
Zero Lives Remaining by Adam Cesare
Zero Lives Remaining - Nick Gucker,Adam Cesare,Frank Walls,K. Allen Wood

The arcade is more than a kids’ favorite place to hang out. Legends are made in the arcade as the gamers compete for the highest score, the special items, and the secret levels. But this day will be different. Legends will die. Robby Asaro’s physical body passed away some years ago, but his consciousness continued on in his favorite arcade. Now an ill-timed act of bullying will trigger a deadly rage in Robby. This time, the body count is real.

This was a wickedly fun story! I know I shouldn’t have enjoyed it so much but I did. What gamer hasn’t fantasized about living in an arcade? Centipede and Ms. Pac-Man! There was definitely some nostalgia for me in this story.

There are few girls in the arcade and Tiffany Park has caught Robby’s eyes… attention. Unfortunately, she’s also caught the attention of the bully Chris Murphy. I really do like how the author portrayed the bully. He’s a messed up kid who’s looking for attention but he’s going about it the wrong way. We get little snippets of what’s going on in his head. I actually found myself hoping he would verbally express his loneliness and that Tiffany would sigh, tell him he had a jerk way of expressing it, and the two would have a friendly Galaga competition.

But this isn’t one of those books. This is a horror flick and it’s a good one. I was surprised how quickly the body count climbed as Robby’s spirit spiraled out of control. Tiffany has to use her wits to make it out of the building but there was no guarantee that would be enough. Her ally in these attempts was the maintenance man, Dan, who had lovingly tended to the arcade games all these years. They have to outwit and out-maneuver this now-malevolent spirit that has taken on the knowledge and attributed of each character it knocks out.

It was a great ride. I really enjoyed this tale. It had some surprising twists and the insight into Chris’s character put it over the top for me. While this is a short tale, I did get attached to some of the characters, Tiffany and Dan especially. I enjoyed the little surprises and the initial nostalgia of the arcade.

I received a free copy of this book.

The Narration: Joe Hempel did a magnificent job with this one. I’ve enjoyed several other books he has narrated and he didn’t disappoint with his performance here. One of the characters has a partially paralyzed face and Hempel brought that to life with his performance. He can bounce between angry jerk-face teen to Robby’s spirit to this partially paralyzed character with ease. 

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review 2016-03-06 21:32
Review of Zero Lives Remaining by Adam Cesare
Zero Lives Remaining - Nick Gucker,Adam Cesare,Frank Walls,K. Allen Wood

I originally figured on 4.5 stars, but thinking about it, this book makes me so happy, it needs to be 5.


I ordered Shock Totem's limited edition hardcover because it was awesome. I hadn't heard of Adam Cesare but the VHS tape cover and box were too much for this horror geek to pass up. It is, without question, the coolest looking book on my shelf. The second best thing was when the e-book came out and I didn't have to mess with my good copy in order to read it.

 

"Robby Asaro is dead."

 

"And alive."

 

When Robby is baked alive in his favorite pizza oven at FunCave, his life, his real life, begins. Haunting the arcade (not a bad deal if I say so myself), Robby has his favorite games, his favorite customers and the not-so-afterlife isn't so bad. At least until he inadvertently sets off a chain-reaction that results in more than the loss of virtual lives at FunCave. When FunCave becomes a horror cave, is there anything that can stop this supernatural killing spree?

 

This novella reminds me of a song by Tori Amos called The Glory of the 80's. Adam Cesare has pegged an era and given it all of the nostalgia of a classic 80's movie. It makes me wish (minus the bloodbath) that I had a FunCave in my childhood. I loved reading this and I did finally open my hardcover so that I could read the bonus story at the end, which was also fantastic.

 

 

© 2016 by Andi Rawson of Andreya's Asylum

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review 2016-03-03 13:33
Review: Zero Lives Remaining by Adam Cesare (Audiobook)
Zero Lives Remaining - Nick Gucker,Adam Cesare,Frank Walls,K. Allen Wood

At little more than 2 1/2 hours, Zero Lives Remaining is a fun, punchy listen chock full of B-movie horror thrills.

Adam Cesare’s latest plays with the haunted house trope, placing a group of teenagers in an arcade where a ghost haunts the video game cabinets and everyone’s lives are in danger. The ghost in the machine runs rampant along the arcade’s electrical wiring, snaring its victims in ectoplasmic tendrils and dispatching the trapped teens one by one. Given its short run-time, the focus here is on the action with the characters only subtly shaded in but not deeply enough to get too attached to. There’s the teenage gaming queen, the schoolyard bully who isn’t quite sure how to express his affection for her, the arcade’s maintenance man who suffered a stroke that ended his gaming hobby but whose work allows him to still feel connected, and a handful of others that serve largely as bloody fodder.

There’s a fun superficiality to the nostalgia-driven proceedings (Centipede and Ms. Pac-Man get plenty of shout-outs), but I never felt terribly connected to the cast even as many of them met their gruesome fates in varied and interesting ways. The creators of Mortal Kombat may want to get Cesare on the line for “fatality” suggestions, as he presents some strong finishing moves against his beleaguered teens. I may never look at a claw arcade game quite the same way again.

Joe Hempel’s narration is solid, and he gives his character voices are distinct enough to help separate dialogue during all the calamity. He has a straight-forward, somewhat airy, presentation style that brings a sense of fun and whimsy to the listening experience, and the production quality is perfect.

Ultimately, Zero Lives Remaining is an enjoyable way to kill a couple hours if you’re in the mood for bloody mayhem set against the intriguing background of a video game arcade palace.

(Note: Audiobook was provided for review by the narrator.)

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review 2016-02-17 01:37
Zero Lives Remaining review
Zero Lives Remaining - Nick Gucker,Adam Cesare,Frank Walls,K. Allen Wood

One of the most promising of the up and coming "new-wave" horror authors, Adam Cesare, again delivers what he does best with Zero Lives Remaining Namely, a gore-soaked throwback to the days of old. He's previously done much the same with cannibal movies (Tribesmen), horror movie VHS nights with friends (Video Night) and creature features (Exponential). This time round, Cesare targets the old school arcades that were effectively rendered extinct by the combined onslaught of Playstations, Xboxes and PC gaming.

One of the best things about Cesare's writing is he does not waste pages establishing irrelevant character traits that never have any bearing on the plot (*cough*King*cough*). Instead, he gives the reader just enough to work with per character and then gleefully sentences each of those characters to a grim (and usually messy) death. Zero Lives Remaining does not deviate far from that formula, though it could be argued that after a typical prologue which fills in who the ghost in the machine is in this instance, things happen too quickly. My major complaint with this one is the way in which events go from Caspar the Friendly Ghost to full on mayhem. It makes a kind of sense within the pages of the novella, but it did not feel earned to me - perhaps because bad, misunderstood boy Chris is painted in strokes which are too broad.

But Kais, I hear you ask, didn't you just say Cesare's ability to quickly sketch in a character is one of the things you like most about his writing? Yes. Yes I did. But the narrative still has to work even with less detailed characters and I never quite bought into the threat this time around. It went from Point A to B to C so damned fast, my head was left figuratively spinning.

Oh well. Once the mayhem starts, it's pure Cesare all the way. So by the time the penultimate death had taken place, I was back on board and again smiling with satisfaction over what had just taken place.

All of which is to say, this is good Cesare. Better than the disappointing Video Night for mine, but not in the same league as the exceptionally fantastic Exponential.

3.5 Stabby Ectoplasmic Tendrils for Zero Lives Remaining.

Source: www.goodreads.com/review/show/1174554916
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text 2016-02-02 02:11
Zero Lives Remaining - Adam Cesare
Zero Lives Remaining - Nick Gucker,Adam Cesare,Frank Walls,K. Allen Wood

It's 1989 and Robby is working at the Funcave arcade making pizzas. Some may not think very much of Robby's job, but he loves working there and takes it very seriously. Then, one day, a freak accident pulls Robby into the pizza oven and just like that, no more Robby. Even though his body isn't there, as the years pass, Robby is still around, passing through the electrical circuits of the video games, the wiring, and the machines. Turn the calendar to 2014. Tiffany is now the video game wizard and her favorite game that she has mastered is Ms Pac-Man. It seems so effortless for her as if she gets help from the machine once in a while. Then, one day, she is harassed by a sleezy guy named Chris. Tiffany doesn't like Chris much...and neither does Robby.

 

Zero Lives Remaining brings back a chunk of my childhood - the Saturday afternoon draining of quarter after quarter in those classic standup arcade games - and melds a tidy little horror story with it. Cesare uses a bit of Wes Craven's Shocker along with grabby doses of ectoplasm, ala Ghostbusters to go along with a world of sights and sounds that those of us who grew up in the 80s know quite well. The storytelling is crisp to go with the memorable characters and unforgettable, over-the-top kills. Good stuff.

 

4 killer Inky, Blinky, Pinky and Sues out of 5

 

 

You can also follow my reviews at the following links:

 

https://kenmckinley.wordpress.com

http://intothemacabre.booklikes.com

https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/5919799-ken-mckinley

http://www.amazon.com/gp/profile/A2J1JOKW56F2YT

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