The Book-a-Week Project, Week 5

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
Max Brooks

[For the record, I actually did finish this last week. I’ve just been damn busy. What? You wanna throw down, bitch? Let’s get it on then, poopsie!]

Zombies are great. Rather, films and books about zombies are great. Zombies themselves like to eat the living, among whom I count myself, and are therefore not great. The concept of a zombie is ridiculous – a human afflicted with some sort of blood-borne disease that causes illness and death, then reanimation and a ravenous hunger for living (usually human) flesh. At the same time, the zombie is really only an exaggeration of the worst aspects of humanity. Emotion, critical thought, and memory disappear, replaced by a desire to consume those who still possess those abilities.

Wait. The worst aspects of humanity? Hell, that’s most humans. Have you ever been in a New York subway car during rush hour? Death has already found everyone in that shuttle to hell, they just don’t know it yet. And by the time they figure it out, they’re gonna be real hungry.

Max Brooks is also the author of The Zombie Survival Guide, which goes into great detail about the “zombie virus” and every conceivable technique for making it through the zombie apocalypse. In the world of World War Z, published after that ten-year struggle, Brooks’s Survival Guide was the primary civilian manual for protection from the undead. Brooks travelled around the globe to China, Israel, Cuba, and just about everywhere else to interview business magnates, military commanders, K-9 handlers, and anyone else crucial during that period.

Every conceivable aspect of the war is covered: how the virus emerged; how it spread; how it was managed (or mismanaged) in most nations by politicians, civilians, filmmakers, religious leaders, entrepreneurs, and the military. Every voice sounds authentic to the nationality, gender, and age of the interviewee. There are heroes, cowards, profiteers, and people whose minds buckled and cracked from the horror.

The entire book is a pleasure to read. Every detail is fascinating and, as good zombie literature (and film) should, it uses zombies to cast critical light on the nature of the living. The film rights have already been purchased. It would be great to see this realized as a mockumentary interspersed with footage of the war.

I hope Max Brooks continues to fill the conspicuous void of quality zombie fiction. He’s doing God’s work. Highly recommended.

Next: The Lone Surfer of Montana, Kansas by Davy Rothbart (of FOUND Magazine).