Barnabas, Quentin and the Body Snatchers: Dark Shadows, Book 26

If you have ever wanted to read a story about a vampire and a werewolf pop-star teaming up to battle aliens from another planet (and who, in all honesty, hasn’t?), then Barnabas, Quentin and the Body Snatchers is for you.This bonkers book is based on the equally bonkers cult 1960s daytime U.S. soap opera, Dark Shadows. Though there was a spot of time travel and the occasional visit to a parallel universe, the television series was mainly about the supernatural - vampires, ghosties and werewolves, but no alien invaders (though I expect if the series hadn't been cancelled they would have got there eventually). This story then is a completely insane tale of monsters vs aliens written by someone who hasn't the first idea about writing science fiction. Like the TV series it's based on, the book is hilariously funny without intending to be. That's not an insult, by the way, I adore Dark Shadows precisely because of it's 'so-awful-it's-brilliant' nature. If you're the sort of person who appreciates Plan 9 From Outer Space and Mystery Science Theatre 3000 then you'll get it.Okay, that's the story part of this review out of the way, now for the audiobook. It's got problems. As much as I adore Kathryn Leigh Scott, the actress who played Maggie Evans on the TV show, her reading leaves a lot to be desired. She makes little mistakes, starting right at the beginning where she gets the name of the book she is reading slightly wrong (body snatcher instead of body snatchers - an error repeated at the end of the reading too). Also, the voices and accents she gives to the characters are a bit dodgy too. Still, being charitable, maybe the mistakes and dodgy accents could be considered to be in the spirit of the Dark Shadows TV show, which was made awesome by actors forgetting their lines and scenery falling down. Still, if I had to recommend which version of this story to buy, I'd say go for the actual rather than the audio version.PS - It's hard to know how to rate something like this. I mean, it's truly terrible, but also wonderful at the same time. I'll give it three stars just for making me laugh.

Rating based on the convenience of having this particular novel in MP3/CD format (original paperback from the late-1960s to early-1970s). Plotline not taken into consideration for rating. Recommended for Dark Shadows fans.

Great audio book