I am proud to say that I have always been a fan of zombies, not just in the last decade while these gruesome cannibals have become popularized. I remember being home sick from school in 5th grade and my dad would get me pop, soup, and a wide collection of horror VHS tapes (mostly zombie classics like Dawn of the Dead, 1978). Of course my mom never approved, but my dad would get them anyways. George A. Romero is the genius that turned zombies into flesh-eating ghouls.


I've become a huge fan of books by Max Brooks. Here is his website. He has written The Zombie Survival Guide, World War Z (which I believe is being written for film now), and The Zombie Survival Guide: Recorded Attacks. His books don't just deal with how to kill a zombie in a certain situation or "The Oral History of the Zombie War," but also help to explain why zombies are so popular during this time. One of the topics he brings up is how zombies are a manifestation of mankind's desire for immortality gone horribly awry.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is a hilarious read, probably because it's such an odd pairing of zombies and Jane Austin. Buy hey, it works! It's a love story between two zombie killers :D Since I’ve already read Pride & Prejudice & Zombies, I finally got a chance to finish reading World War Z. I absolutely love the story, and to top it off, it’s well written. I cannot even imagine all the research Max Brooks did in order to write the novel because I believe it’s almost all based in reality. It’s the world we live in right now, just… with a few million slow-moving, flesh-eating zombies thrown into the mix. I believe one of the major themes in the novel is the ability to survive (which is probably a given since his first book was the Zombie Survival Guide). The main characters need to learn what it takes to survive a disaster, and in this case it’s a zombie outbreak. This appeals to Americans because we believe that we can survive anything.

So… Just what is the metaphor being presented by the figure of the zombie in this novel P&P&Z? The simple answer is that, well, they’re us. Zombies are representational of us at our worst. I personally LOVE the scene in Shaun of the Dead when Shaun is walking down the block to get some ice cream, and is completely oblivious to the fact that zombies have appeared in Great Britain. It was kind of a wake up call about how so many people just go through their everyday lives blindly, just going by routine and not really experiencing life.

On a side note Steve Hockensmith writing a prequel to P&P&Z, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Dawn of the Dreadfuls, which I believe is supposed to come out this March. There's also going to be a P&P&Z graphic novel sometime this year.


Here is a list of must-see zombie flicks:


Dawn of the Dead (1978)
Dawn of the Dead (2004, remake)
Black Sheep - total spoof about zombie sheep, hilarious and stupid :)
28 Days Later
28 Weeks Later
Re-Animator
Evil Dead Trilogy
Shaun of the Dead


Artwork by Rachel Geiger