I just read World War Z by Max Brooks, a much-ballyhooed story about the way the entire world copes with a zombie plague.
Much as I love zombies, they've become overexposed in recent times. Too many movies, comic books, stickers, cultural events... Zombies have become the new vampires. All we need now is for some dismal emo kids to decide they're sexy and start dressing as them for fetish. (If it's already happening, please don't tell me.)
You probably know all about this book: a guy travels the world getting first-hand oral accounts of the zombie war that's just finished. Brooks is a talented writer, and each of the many narrators has a distinct voice and character. George Romero probably wishes he had written something this good.
Though not without black humour, the book is in no way a send-up. Brooks is telling a serious story about the human condition. The zombies themselves are out of focus for much of the book; it's really about how people react to the crisis. The social comment and political satire is sharp throughout, and Brooks is particularly convincing when he describes the perfectly understandable bad decisions people keep making.
The real villains of the piece are not the zombies but the various governments and military leaders of the world, who react much as they do to current, more mundane crises with disastrous results. I found the guy who makes a fortune selling a fake cure to be particularly chilling, and very relevant to the state of today's pharmaceutical industry.
This is not a book that will please those who buy into free-market rhetoric, religious fundamentalism, or whiz-bang militarism. If you don't fall into those groups, I recommend World War Z whole-heartedly.
Unrelated: so what's with this "nerd thriller" thing that's been leaked onto the net - is it really Neil Gaiman's pseudonymous new book, or a hoax? My money's on hoax.
Posted by pearce at February 24, 2008 2:23 PM