The Walking Dead: Rise of the Governor – Review
I generally enjoyed the Walking Dead television series but I never read the comics. With the main series now done, I was prepared to branch out. Instead of getting into the comics, I went for the novels.
I started at the beginning with Rise of the Governor. If you are looking for the regular cast of the series, you will be disappointed. Rick and company are no where to be seen, although they would not have been far from the events of this novel, which takes place close to Atlanta at the beginning of the zombie apocalypse.
For those who watched the series, you will know that before Negan was the big bad guy, it was the Governor, aka Philip Blake.
But how did Blake become the bad guy who caused so much trouble for Rick and his group? Was he born evil? Or was he shaped by the events of this worldwide disaster?
While there are a number of characters central to the story, the focus is on the Blake brothers and Philip’s daughter Penny. We find these two brothers, who are not particularly close and extremely different in personality, trying to cope with both terrifying circumstances and heartbreaking loss.
If you try and fit this story into the television story, you will have some trouble. Part of this story was adapted for an episode of the Walking Dead. It is where the Governor is taken in by two sisters and their sick father. One of the sisters is Tara, who becomes a major character in the television series. The other is Lily (April on television) who gets into a relationship with Philip. I won’t go into details but things out work very different between the book and the television series.
I also need to point out as a warning that this novel has a number of disturbing descriptions of sexual assault that some readers will find triggering.
The novel is able to describe the horror of the zombie apocalypse in a way that I didn’t anticipate. It was well done in terms of building the anxiety of the reader.
After a major plot twist, one that I did not anticipate, we get Philip Blake ready to step into his role of the Governor. Not a pure monster but a man who has been broken by his circumstances in such a way that nothing good can come from it.
