The Laughing Corpse recap

Anita refuses millionaire Harold Gaynor's request to raise an ancestor because a corpse that old requires a human sacrifice. At the same time, Dolph's police team asks her to examine a series of deaths caused by an abnormally powerful zombie. Her inquiries lead through vaudun practitioner Dominga Salvador, Anita's former teacher Manny Rodriguez, newcomer John Burke, and Wanda, a woman with knowledge of Gaynor's plans. Anita learns that Gaynor wants a secret from his ancestor and is prepared to supply the necessary victim, while Dominga's forbidden work lies behind the killer zombie. Gaynor's men seize Anita and use Wanda's death to power the final raising. Anita draws on that power to call the cemetery's dead and turns them against Gaynor and his enforcers. The murder case and Gaynor's scheme end, while Anita remains marked by Jean-Claude and troubled by the destructive reach of her own abilities.

Previously: Anita Blake raises the dead professionally and serves as a court-authorized vampire executioner in St. Louis. While investigating vampire murders, she was coerced by Nikolaos, the city's master vampire, and worked uneasily with vampire hunter Edward and the vampire Jean-Claude. The killer was an animator sustaining his own continued existence through the deaths, under Nikolaos's protection. Anita and Edward destroyed the operation, and Anita killed Nikolaos. Jean-Claude survived and became St. Louis's new master. During the case he placed two mystical marks on Anita. He treats the bond as the beginning of a human-servant relationship; Anita rejects that interpretation and remains determined to control her own life.

Harold Gaynor offers Animators, Inc. a very large fee to raise one of his ancestors. Anita explains that a corpse dead for that long cannot be called back by ordinary methods: the ritual would require a human sacrifice. She refuses, despite her employer Bert's interest in the money. Gaynor does not regard her refusal as final. The request establishes both his object - information held by the dead relative - and his willingness to seek an animator who will cross a boundary Anita considers absolute.

Dolph brings Anita into a police investigation after deaths at a family home show signs of a supernatural attacker. Anita concludes that the killer is a zombie of exceptional strength, which implies that someone used a human death to raise it. Seeking expertise, she visits Dominga Salvador with her former teacher Manny Rodriguez. Dominga's command of vaudun is formidable, but Anita finds evidence that she binds human spirits into obedient dead bodies and refuses her proposed cooperation. Manny admits that his own past with Dominga included practices he abandoned. The police case and Gaynor's demand now share the same central question: who is willing and able to spend a human life for a powerful raising?

The killer strikes again, and the police struggle to contain something that does not behave like a decaying, mindless corpse. John Burke, a strong vaudun practitioner newly arrived after his brother's death, becomes a possible suspect because he has the necessary knowledge, but Anita finds no reason to treat power alone as proof. Jean-Claude continues pressing her to accept the two marks linking them and the status he says follows from them. Anita keeps the vampire dispute separate from her work while comparing the murder scenes, Gaynor's request, and Dominga's hidden practices.

Wanda, a former companion of Gaynor, helps Anita understand why he is determined to raise his ancestor: he expects the dead man to disclose a valuable family secret. Gaynor's enforcers, Bruno and Tommy, apply increasing pressure and make clear that he is prepared to provide the sacrifice Anita refused to make. Evidence also narrows the police inquiry toward a commissioned raising rather than an uncontrolled natural event. Anita's attempt to protect witnesses and stop the next killing puts her directly against Gaynor's organization.

Anita connects the murderous zombie to forbidden vaudun work and to the same circle serving Gaynor's plans. Dominga's respectable public position conceals an operation that can create and command dead bodies through human sacrifice. Gaynor's interest is narrower but equally dangerous: he wants the ancestor raised regardless of who must die. Wanda's cooperation places her in immediate danger, and Anita's efforts to stop the ritual end with Gaynor's men taking control of the location and the people needed to perform it.

Dominga Salvador is exposed as the practitioner whose forbidden methods produced the powerful killer zombie, while Harold Gaynor is the client willing to fund and exploit human sacrifice for his own family secret. After Wanda helps Anita, Gaynor has her killed and uses the death to force the cemetery ritual. The sacrifice gives Anita enough power to raise far more than the single ancestor Gaynor requested. She calls the cemetery's dead and directs them against Gaynor and his enforcers, ending his scheme and the immediate threat. Dominga's operation is broken and the police killings are explained. Anita survives with a clearer understanding that her animator power can become immense when fueled by a human death. Jean-Claude remains the city's master and continues to call her his human servant because of his two marks, a claim Anita still refuses.

The force behind the killings is traced to Dominga Salvador's forbidden vaudun work and Harold Gaynor's effort to obtain a family secret from a long-dead ancestor. Gaynor has treated human lives as material for the sacrifice required by that animation, and Wanda is killed after helping Anita. Gaynor's men hold Anita at a cemetery and force the ritual forward. The fresh sacrifice gives Anita far more power than an ordinary raising. Instead of producing only the ancestor Gaynor wants, she calls the cemetery's dead and turns that power against her captors. Gaynor and his enforcers are overwhelmed by the dead they sought to exploit. Dominga's role in creating and controlling the murderous zombie is exposed and her operation is ended. Anita solves the police case and prevents Gaynor from obtaining the information he wanted, but she does so by using a scale of power that confirms how dangerous her own animator abilities can become under the wrong conditions. Jean-Claude remains master of St. Louis and continues pressing his claim that Anita is his human servant; she continues to reject it.