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Resident Evil #1

Resident Evil: Genesis

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When a lethal virus created in the Hive, a subterranean genetic research center operated by Umbrella, a powerful corporation, infects the inhabitants of the facility, only one young woman who cannot remember who she is can stop these mindless, hungry zombies from unleashing their horror.

277 pages, Paperback

First published June 29, 2004

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1576 people want to read

About the author

Keith R.A. DeCandido

360 books851 followers

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5 stars
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228 (19%)
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 62 reviews
Profile Image for Leo ..
Author 14 books413 followers
April 13, 2018
Love these games and books. Ada Wong is my favourite character. I wonder if Alice played by Mila Jovevich is based on Ada Wong?👍🐯
Profile Image for Aishu Rehman.
1,093 reviews1,079 followers
August 20, 2020
This is def. for you if you are a resident evil fan or if you liked the movie. It is much better then the movie. It provides a more detailed background on the characters. Some of the scene from the movie are different or extended or brand new. If you have watched the movie as much as I have you can actually picture the whole movie in your head when reading this book.
Overall if your a resident evil fan or a fan of the movie series you will not be disappointed.
Profile Image for Craig.
6,333 reviews180 followers
November 22, 2025
Resident Evil began as a Japanese video game in 1996, which spawned a bunch of other video games, comics, cartoons, movies, and novels. I've never played any of the games, nor watched more than a couple of the films, nor read very many of the books, but I did enjoy DeCandido's novelization of this initial film, which was based on the script written by Paul W.S. Anderson. It came out just a couple of months before his second novelization, Apocalypse, was published, so the two fit together quite well. He provided more background and explanation, which explained some of the film which had left me unsure. Evil Umbrella, zombies in Raccoon City, how can you not sympathize with a character named Alice in zombie-wonderland? And wow, -lots- of zombies... it's a fast-paced/enjoy-the-ride narrative, much better than a video game to my way of thinking.
Profile Image for Joss loves Jace.
9 reviews
October 22, 2016
AWESOME!! Did you know they came out with Resident Evil books? ESpecially you zombie lovers!
Profile Image for chucklesthescot.
3,000 reviews134 followers
October 19, 2019
I know that I took notes for this book and reviewed it on Goodreads many years back. I can remember doing it yet when I looked at it recently, the review was gone. Luckily I liked the book enough to keep it and I have skimmed through it to get enough notes to do my review again. As backup, I have decided to put the review on my blog, Goodreads and Amazon.

In Raccoon City, an underground complex called the HIVE contains 500 men and women working on a range of secret projects, including a dangerous set of bioweapon experiments using the recently discovered T-Virus. Hailed as a medical breakthrough, it is now being tested in ways that its creator never imagined. Now a deliberate act of sabotage has unleashed the virus in the HIVE and the AI, aka The Red Queen has sealed the HIVE and killed all of the people inside to prevent the T-Virus escaping. Umbrella want to know what happened and decide to send in their special forces team to investigate and deal with the Red Queen. It is only when they enter the HIVE that they realise the extent of their problems as they are faced with the traps of the Red Queen and the hungry zombie employees.

This book is based on the first Resident Evil film screenplay. It sticks pretty closely to that story, which I liked, as I hate it when the novel writer takes it upon themselves to change the whole essence of the film and do their own film with it. If you have watched the film countless times like I have, it is easy to picture the story from the book in your mind as if you were re-playing the film. What this book seeks to do is go a bit more behind the scenes with the main and supporting characters and give you a bit of their story. We get more about the commando team led by the enigmatic One, we find out about Mark, the man the coffee is spilled on and the sympathetic Ella, we discover why Anna and Mariano, the scientists in the flooded room were bickering just before the room sealed. We get a lot more background on Matt and Lisa, and the relationships that Alice has with Spence and Lisa and how things developed.

Matt is a retired Federal Marshall and has a plan to bring down the evil Umbrella Corporation from the inside. His sister Lisa, a computer and internet safety expert was once offered a job with the company but turned it down. Since then she has become divorced and is gunning for Umbrella for being responsible for the death of a friend. Mahmoud's simple ulcer operation went wrong, performed by a company connected to Umbrella and as well as medical complications, had to endure bullying and intimidation when he took legal action. Lisa is now eager for a chance to go undercover, telling Umbrella she is ready for a new start if the job offer is still open. Umbrella are pleased to hire her and now she needs to use her time there to start digging for dirt that they can use.

Alice is the head of HIVE security and is now stationed in the mansion that guards the entrance to the underground facility. She is posing as part of a reclusive married couple, along with fellow agent Spence as part of her cover. She discovers that Lisa is not what she seems but instead of turning her in, Alice decides to cut a deal to help her expose Umbrella. Lisa has already stumbled across the T-Virus and is startled to be found out so easily but when Alice offers to assist her in getting past security and getting an actual sample smuggled out, she knows she will have to trust Alice and agree to work with her. But before Alice can do anything, someone else decides to steal the virus and covers his tracks by setting off the T-Virus in the HIVE and condemning everyone to a fate worse than death.

The book goes in to the main story with Alice waking up with amnesia after the defense system in the mansion is triggered, and how her encounter with Matt who is coming to investigate is interruped by the arrival of One's team. We then follow the team into the HIVE where the amnesiac Spence is found. I enjoyed reading about the attack the Red Queen does on One's team to take them out of the equation and the exploration of the HIVE. Alice is slowly regaining her memory about Lisa but is reluctant to initially admit it to Matt on discovering that is his sister. The action scenes with the zombies are well written and tense, as with the clock slowly ticking away and threatening to trap the survivors underground forever.

This is one of the better books based on screenplays that I've read because it keeps the bulk of the story and just adds a bit more depth to it rather than destroying the content of the film. I liked finding out a bit more about the people that we see so briefly in the film. I liked having a reason why Matt and Lisa wanted to bring down Umbrella and seeing Alice plotting to help them. This is one of my favourite zombie films and I was pleased to get a good book version to read too.
Profile Image for Gina Lamm.
8 reviews
September 20, 2008
This book is full of scary things like zombies, lickers, zombie dogs. What sucks about this book is that Alice hardly fought anything in the beginning and the beginning was really boring like the first 5 or 10 chapters! After that, the action began. This book belongs to the zombies. The coolest part is when Alice is fighting a monster called the Licker. The end of it was really creepy.

An underground labratory called the Hive, where scientists are using a virus called the T-virus for experiments and worked for Umbrella. Someone named Spence grabbed a container which contains the T-virus and threw it on the floor. It spread into the air and went into the vents. The Artifical Intelligence computer called the Red Queen detected it and sealed all the exits. Spence grabbed the suitcase which contains the anti-virus and got out of the lab just in time. The Red Queen killed everyone using gas or drowned them. A woman named Alice Abernathy worked for Umbrella. She was gassed by the Red Queen making her lose her memory. A SWAT team broke in to her mansion, find Alice and a cop named Matt, and asked Alice what happened in the Hive. Alice told them she couldn't remember. They also found Spence who was also gassed and lost his memory. They took them into the Hive to find out what happen. Most of the members went into a corrider and killed by lazers. Only three members were still alive plus Alice, Matt, and Spence. They encountered zombies and ran for a safe place. One of the members was killed by a zombie. Rain who was one of the members told the rest that the Hive is going to shut down forever in two hours keeping them in the lab forever. Spence remembered who they were and they all found out that Spence was responsible for the outbreak in the lab. Spence ran towards the train that would lead him to the exit of the Hive. He was attacked by a creature called a Licker. Alice and the others got on the train and found the anti-virus which was on the train. One member got attacked by the Licker and Matt got scratched from it and now is infected. Rain turned into a zombie and was shot by Matt. Alice and Matt escaped the Hive along with the anti-virus. Matt was mutated and was taken away by Umbrella. Alice also was taken away by Umbrella. Alice woke up naked on a chair in a hospital. She had two cloths cover her front and back. Tubes were attached to her and she tooked them off. She didn't know what Umbrella had down to her or what they did to Matt and what happened to the anti-virus. She put a lab coat on and walked out of the hospital. Everything was destroyed and abandoned. There was blood on buildings, on cars, and streets. She took a shotgun out of the police car and was ready to fight some zombies.
Profile Image for Ana Mardoll.
Author 7 books369 followers
September 27, 2012
Resident Evil: Genesis / 9780743492911

I adore the Resident Evil film series, and I'm a sucker for a good film novelization, so unsurprisingly this book was right up my alley. This is a straight-up "book of the film" translation, with everything captured precisely as it was on-screen, but with deeper characterization, back-story, motivation, and internal emotional snap-shots. As I consider that to be basically the gold standard for film novelizations, I can strongly recommend this book to fans of the film.

The only thing that didn't resonate perfectly with me is that this is a film series that really focuses on its female protagonists to a wonderful degree; I can't think of another film series (let alone an action series) that has such a wide cast of women, and from so many backgrounds and dispositions. This installment alone has three major female POV protagonists, as well as a couple quick chapters from minor female POV characters. So it's a bit unsettling at times to read from the POV of all these women and yet have certain things feel a little ... off, I presume because of the male author. DeCandido seems to be a very competent writer based on what we see here in this novel, but there is some clunkyness around the beginning, as though the book has big "This Is The Flirting Section" and "This Is The Sexual Harassment Section" signs all over it.

An example that comes to mind is the chapter in which Alice meets Spence for the first time. Alice is established as stunningly beautiful in a male-dominated career where she's experienced her fair share of sexual harassment and unfair glass ceilings. We understand intuitively from this background that Alice is presumably very used to being hit on by the men in her workplace. So when Spence -- a man who has been assigned to live alone with her in an isolated mansion for three solid months -- immediately makes three pointed suggestions about her body, it's a little strange to see Alice treat what has been established as a normal thing in her life (co-worker getting handsy with his eyes) as something deeply complimentary and worthy of flirty reciprocation with little "oh, YOU" rejoinders and shooting Obviously Fake Glares at him before leaping into bed with him. I would assume this is meant to establish Alice as sex-positive, but it just doesn't seem to fit well against her otherwise very cautious and careful demeanor and background.

Little speed-bumps like the above are littered sparsely across the first half, but once the T-virus hits the fan, it's a race to the finish and everything falls into perfect place, writing-wise. I give this book a solid 4.5 stars and recommend it happily if you can get past the beginning.

~ Ana Mardoll
Profile Image for Santiago.
6 reviews2 followers
October 23, 2016
Actually when I read this book, which at the time was one of the best known for his scenes of violence and biowarfare, I liked being a hothead and much corrosion to the man book. I am already passing fashion but I recommend it.
Profile Image for Dika.
125 reviews25 followers
October 18, 2023
4.6/5.0

Its honestly a crime to NOT include more of Matt and Lisa relationship and motivations as well as Alice past before the start of the movie.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for Denyse.
21 reviews30 followers
April 23, 2024
I really enjoyed the character building in this. But it spent nearly the first half of the book building up Matt, Lisa, and Alice before the events of the movie start taking place. From there, the entire movie plot just seems to be rushed.
1 review
April 18, 2013
The book starts out giving background details of the characters and how each got to where they are in the Umbrella Corporation. Alice figures out Lisa's true intentions and confronts her while unknowns to them, Spencer is ease dropping on their conversation and the wheels are set in motion to steel the T-Virus.

Alice wakes naked on the shower floor with short term memory loss from halon gas that was released by the AI: Red Queen due to a breach in the Hive’s security. Before One and his team secure the mansion, which is one of the Hive's secured entry ways, Alice encounters Matt.​

One and his team along with Alice and Matt enter the train station that leads down to the Hive were Spencer is discovered in the train apparently unconscious by the halon gas and suffering the same effects as Alice.

Entering the Red Queen’s chamber, One and 3 members of his team are decapitated by the security system leaving Alice, Matt, Spencer, J.D., Kaplan, and Rain. After shutting down the Red Queen and removing her Motherboard with her Operating System, they head out to return to the surface but are greeted by the now dead employees of the Hive that are animated by the T-Virus craving flesh.​

Alice reboots the Red Queen for assistance to get herself and the others out of the Hive.
​
I really enjoyed reading this book. It filled in a lot of the holes that were in the movie such as how Alice came to know Lisa and some of the history between one's team. The book also tells us that the Umbrella Corporation had used the T-Virus to create an anti-aging skin care product that was not mentioned in the movie. With a more in-depth knowledge of the character as depicted by the book we get to know the characters more and can relate to them. I also like the fact that there are a lot of strong female characters. This book has made my keepers list.​
16 reviews
Read
June 11, 2008
when I first read this book, I had no idea what was going on. They immmediately introduce you to Alice, who is the protagonist of the story. She wakes up in a mansion, all by herself and she finds a red dress. (As if that werent creepy enough!) She continues to find the deep roots of Umbrella Corporation, and when I say deep, I mean deep! She meets up with a team of commandos to investigate an outbreak of a virus created by Umbrella. Alice has no memory of what has occured before the event, but as she goes along with the team of specialists, she explores the evil created by Umbrella and slowly begins to uncover some truth behind her origins as well as the beginnings of this incredible outbreak. But as she does so, she must fend off the awaken dead created by the virus and try to stay alive. This book is packed with raw action and they never let up.
Profile Image for Mariel.
286 reviews18 followers
December 30, 2016
3/5.

Me gustó muchísimo conocer de fondo a varios personajes de los que apenas y se ve algo en la película. Fue una grata sorpresa ver el cambio de puntos de vistas en cada momento que se necesitaba: Creí que Alice sería la única narradora.

Sin embargo, no me gustó mucho como escribió el autor: Las descripciones eran MUY básicas. Dejaban demasiado a la imaginación, supongo que como está basado en la película; cualquiera que ya la haya visto no se perderá mucho.

No sé si es porque ya vi la peli pero no me causo nada de tensión. :(

Para una tarde sin que hacer. Para lxs que no jugamos pero tenemos curiosidad sobre saber de la saga de Resident Evil. -Recomiendo muchísimo los libros que están basados en los videojuegos. Buenísimos!–
Profile Image for Cristina (bibliotecadepueblo).
198 reviews66 followers
November 11, 2012
La historia es totalmente igual a la de la película, es lo que tiene que sea una novelización del guión, pero con el añadido de que está mucho más desarrollada y profundiza más en ciertos personajes y detalles que en la película no aparecen. Me ha gustado mucho y le daría 4 estrellas pero se va a quedar en 3 por culpa de la traducción, que deja bastante que desear en gran parte del libro. Un desastre en ese aspecto.
Profile Image for Vita Tomsone.
12 reviews
October 23, 2014
Nothing makes my better to read a book for example where a woman's head gets stuck in elevator and later it gets chopped off when elevator goes up. I liked the humor in the beginning too. So much jokes about one guys ass.
I really liked this book. It reminds me so much of the first movie I love. <3
Hope I will get to read other parts too if I get them.
Profile Image for Matt.
5 reviews2 followers
December 13, 2007
This book is about a biohuman created by the evil Umbrella corporation named "Alice" who is going around trying to stop their evil creations of the zombie race with other survivors that are still alive in "Raccoon City"
A really great book
Profile Image for for-much-deliberation  ....
2,689 reviews
June 30, 2008
All about this subterranean research facility called The Hive which is operated by Umbrella, who think that nothing can go wrong as regards thier operation, but something does go wrong with a virus getting out of hand.
Profile Image for Austin.
69 reviews
December 13, 2013
I love the game, and enjoyed the movie; thought I'd try the book out. It was written well, easy to follow. Felt it was almost a direct translation of the movie/script, so it wasn't too dynamic in nature.
Profile Image for Neha.
44 reviews3 followers
January 4, 2014
the only reason I started reading the resident evil series was because I loved the movies..and ass kicking Alice of course.. the book is right up there with the movie..not being confined to a time limit and all provided more space for story telling...which meant more action
Profile Image for Jina.
367 reviews7 followers
September 25, 2014
Novelizations of movies are either hits or misses. This one was a hit. It may have been the written version of the movie, but it also add depths to the characters, even ones that had five minutes screen time in the movie before they got killed by a homicidal computer or a zombie.
Profile Image for Alice.
603 reviews24 followers
August 4, 2017
I read this for the Book Riot Read Harder Challenge 2015. Challenge: 6. Someone whose gender is different from you.
Profile Image for Lenny.
98 reviews19 followers
May 13, 2012
I absolutely love all of the Resident Evil Books. I play all the games as well as watch all of the movies to. The books rock though and I read all of them quite a bit.
Profile Image for Raúl Reyes.
Author 7 books28 followers
July 14, 2012
Good reading if you haven't seen the film. It's basically the filmscript with some narrative and a bit of more backgroudn. If you have, well... forget about reading it.
Profile Image for Bea.
41 reviews5 followers
August 7, 2013
Wow. This adaptation actually makes a lot more sense and has less silliness than the actual movie. Thank you Mr. DeCandido for applying logic and solid characterisation.
13 reviews
August 31, 2013
good book. great companion to the movie. gives great backgrounds about characters and the thoughts they have.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 62 reviews

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