The Laughing Corpse by Laurell K. Hamilton is a dark mystery involving necromancers. The Laughing Corpse is the second book in the long-running Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter series. This series is an early work that helped define the Paranormal Romance and Urban Fantasy genres. The series features Anita Blake a small but tough vampire hunter. She has a license to kill vampires that get out of line. In her day job she is an animator. She raises the dead to sort out wills. She also has dead witnesses testify in court. Each resurrection comes with a sacrifice a chicken if newly dead, and a goat if long dead. The longer the dead the bigger the sacrifice. In the first scene of The Laughing Corpse, she meets a man who wants a 200-year-old corpse raised. This task needs a human sacrifice, which Anita is not down for. It doesn’t matter how many millions are offered. The world-building and lore are the highlights of this book. I love what Hamilton has built in a monster filled St. Louis. Anita is a good character who is fun to hang out with. The book is filled with interesting side characters. The dialogue for other characters is not always the greatest and sometimes repeats itself. The pace for the first part of the book is slow, but the second half delivers. The first part sets up a lot where the back half delivers. The ending was awesome and very satisfying. The ending added a full star to my review. The Laughing Corpse was a reread for me and I liked it slightly more this time. The Laughing Corpse was published on September 1, 1994.

Plot Summary: Anita goes with her boss to a rich man’s mansion. The man, Harold Gaynor, requests their consultation about raising the dead for him. The deal turns sour. The corpse he wants raised is 200 years old. Raising it will require a human sacrifice. He offers millions but she will not take it. Anita gets a call from the detectives of the Spook Squad. They need her to head to a crime scene. Her consultation is required over a probable zombie attack. She is shown two torn-up bodies of a husband and wife while the little toddler is still missing. The crimes horrify her but she must do her job to possibly save the boy. She does it think it is a zombie but something else. She gives cops a list of all the dead raisers in the city. However, she hesitates on one, a voodoo priestess Dominga Salvador. She tells Detective Dolph to let her interview Dominga Salvador alone. She fears Dominga will not talk to the detectives. She needs to find the boy. Dominga Salvador is a scary lady. She can raise the dead. She can also keep the souls so the zombies do not age. Dominga asks Anita to join her organization and threatens when Anita does not take the offer. During the conversation, Anita learns that she has risen to the dead using human sacrifices before. Anita leaves scared but doesn’t know if she’s involved. Anita attends a funeral for an animator. At the funeral, she meets his brother. He is a powerful animator from out of town who makes the list. She keeps getting threatened by the rich Harold Gaynor who sends goons after her. Anita makes a lot of enemies in the book, will one of them do her in?

What I Liked: The world Laurell K. Hamilton has created is very well thought out. I love the world building. I love the rules and laws of this world. Dominga Salvador is a terrifying villain I liked her character a lot. I was a good character I too loved to hate. I like That both titles The Laughing Corpse and Guilty Pleasures are places in this world. Guilty Pleasures was a vampire strip joint. The Laughing Corpse is a comedy venue for the undead. The action scenes are written very well. I could picture all the action as I read. The scenes were suspenseful and worked well. The end battle was great writing. I went into the final scene with curiosity about how Anita was going to get out of it. I was very satisfied with the ending. I loved the scene with Evans. Evans is the clairvoyant who tries not to touch anything. He does this due to the fear of having visions. The chicken scene they played at the crime scene was good. It was about how long they can look at the horrific crime scene. Anita wins and immediately throws up. The gore was more than I remembered.

What I Disliked: The dialogue could have been better, I grew annoyed with Jean Claude, the vampire, the most. I was thankful that he’s not in this book too much. He repeated himself too much. I remember liking him in Guilty Pleasures too. The mystery you can not solve. It made me very angry. Anita forgot that when you raise certain people, the zombie turns into a super zombie. It would have been so easy for that knowledge to be in this book in hopes of figuring it out. Harold Gaynor is a millionaire. He wants to pay Anita millions to resurrect an ancestor. This ancestor can lead him to millions in buried treasure. The plot point with the dead necromancer came out of nowhere. I felt Anita could have met him briefly before he died. This would have had more impact.

Recommendation: The Laughing Corpse is an okay dark mystery that takes place in a far more interesting world. The world-building in this series is the reason it is still going. The plot of The Laughing Corpse is not great but I had a good time in the world. The ending of this book is truly fantastic and very satisfying. I will slightly recommend The Laughing Corpse it is not great but fun. The book is way more action-packed than I remember. The Laughing Corpse does have some trigger warnings of attempted sexual assault and descriptions of mutilated bodies.

Rating: The Laughing Corpse I rated 3.3 out of 5.