Walk like a zombie - special event!

To celebrate the launch of Blue, a debut zombie novel by Aucklander Brandy Wehinger, there'll be a zombie shamble down Queen Street.

I am not making this up.

Dress as a zombie or just walk like one from Britomart to the Auckland Central Library on Lorne St this Friday, October 11 at 12.30pm. The walk will be followed by a fun and *free* event at the library at 2pm, and you'll get to meet Brandy herself.

According to the publicity from Random House: "Blue is set in a post-apocalyptic world, where humans live in colonies high above the ground and have forgotten a lot of what pre-zombie life was like. For instance, there are no cell phones or internet etc.

The main character, Blue is a half-zombie, half-human. The Blue is an interesting state of being: somewhere between ‘normal' and a walking corpse. The Blue is mostly immortal, yet desperately alone.

Apocalypse, zombies, shopping malls – Blue has it all! Told by multiple narrators of different genders, ages and ideologies, it's both a gripping, visceral thriller and a philosophical and lyrical love story." (It's also supposed to be quite funny.)

Brandy works in appearance medicine (what is that exactly?) here in Auckland, although she originally hails from California, traditional home of the zombie apocalypse. She'll be happy to answer your questions at the event. It's one thing you might want to be caught dead at...

Meanwhile, whet your undead appetite with these recommendations:

• Plague Town - Dana Fredsti
• Cryonic: a zombie novel - Travis Bradberry
• Is Your Neighbour a Zombie?: philosophical riddles, paradoxes and conundrums to stretch your mind - Jeremy Stangroom
• The End Games - T. Michael Martin
• Unnatural Acts: a Dan Shamble, Zombie PI novel - Kevin J. Anderson
• Zombie Makers: True Stories of Nature's Undead - Rebecca L. Johnson (suitable for children)
• The Golden Age of Death - Amber Benson
• Zombies of Byzantium - Sean Munger

and my personal favourite...

• The Farting Dead - Stefan Petrucha

Just a little out there...

This post celebrates the quirks and queernesses of today's literature, with some of the oddest titles and concepts in print. These can give us a laugh on a quiet day in the office - hope they bring a grin to your face too.

You've all heard of Pig Tits and Parsley Sauce (and if not, where have you been?) It's a guide to scrimping and saving in these tough times, and generally using baking soda for everything short of contact lens solution. The book is proving very popular - which just goes to show the power of a what the _?! title.

Now let me introduce one for the kids: The Perplexing Pineapple. It's actually short for The Cryptic Casebook of Coco Carlomagno and Alberta: The Perplexing Pineapple. Try squeezing that on the spine of a book with just 68 pages. While I'm intrigued by the idea of a perplexing piece of fruit, I'm rather at a loss. I mean, what's wrong with it? Is it a purple perplexing pineapple? Does it tap dance across the table? Out next year - The Loquacious Loquat, featuring a fruit that won't shut up. Followed by The Irritable Bowl.

For non-fiction nuts, here's The Nazi Occult. It's all about the crazy experiments Hitler
encouraged into things like werewolves, mythical spears that make you invincible, the Holy Grail and the like. Because watching Disney's Snow White every day wasn't lala enough.

Now for the title that I liked best: I Know What You Did Last Supper. Regardless of your views on the Bible, it's a fabulous concept, and a great cover too. Judas receives a note shortly after the crucifixion of Christ saying I KNOW WHAT YOU DID. With the note is an eye, and a tooth. As his friends are murdered in mysterious - and extremely gruesome - ways, Judas must find a way to atone, and track down the killer. Not recommended for those with weak stomachs.

Or if you want to live a gluten-free life, there's Gluten is My Bitch, featuring wit and recipes for coeliacs. Who said health books can't have a sense of humour?

Last but not least, here's a book I found on the prescribed reading list for my trends in children's literature paper:
Brains for Lunch: A Zombie Novel in Haiku. It details a school where zombies, humans and chupacabras are forced to co-exist. All in three-line verse.

Rejoice, all - for creativity is undead.

The Deeply Paranoid, Zombie-Killing, Anti-Establishment Breakfast Club (no deathbots!)

Death comes to us all, eventually. The latest trend in youth fiction is to stare it in the face - then jab it in the eye. Mean girls and jocks usually come armed with more than a sharp tongue and a wet towel - and failing a test can be lethal.

Time for a new list of fiction for teens that takes the reader to dark places, and out the other side. Fans of The Hunger Games, rejoice!

Black Helicopters - Blythe Woolston

The recent kidnapping and hostage drama involving a small boy in Alabama shows just how dangerous anti-Government extremists can be. What if you were brought up by one? Meet Valkyrie White. She's fifteen. Her whole life, she's hidden in an underground den with her brother Bo while Da is working, because Those People will kill them like coyotes. But now, with Da unexpectedly gone and no home to return to, Valkyrie and her big brother must bring their message to the outside world. They're stupid out there - little boys wear their names on their backpacks and people don't pat down strangers before offering a lift. Valkyrie and Bo are going to wake them all up...Or will they be the ones to wake up? Explosions are promised.

City of a Thousand Dolls - Miriam Forster
Nisha was abandoned at the gates of the City of a Thousand Dolls when she was just a child. Now sixteen, she lives on the grounds of the isolated estate, where orphan girls train as musicians, healers, courtesans, and, if the rumors are true, assassins. Nisha makes her way as Matron’s assistant, her closest companions the mysterious cats that trail her shadow. Only when she begins a forbidden flirtation with the city’s handsome young courier does she let herself imagine a life outside the walls. Until one by one, girls around her start to die. Before she becomes the next victim, Nisha decides to uncover the secrets that surround the girls’ deaths. And may end up paying with her own life.

The Infects - Sean Beaudoin

Seventeen-year-old Nero is stuck in the wilderness with a bunch of other juvenile delinquents on an "Inward Trek." As if that weren't bad enough, his counsellors have turned into flesh-eating maniacs overnight and are now chowing down on his fellow miscreants. These kids have seen zombie movies. They know the rules. Unfortunately, knowing the rules isn't going to be enough.

Freakling - Lana Krumwiede
In twelve-year-old Taemon's city, everyone has a power called psi -- the ability to move and manipulate objects with their minds. When Taemon loses his psi in a traumatic accident, he must hide his lack of power by any means possible. But a humiliating incident at a sports tournament exposes his disability, and Taemon is exiled to the "dud farm". It's not what Taemon expected, though: people are kind and open, and they actually seem to enjoy using their hands to work and play and even comfort their children. But gradually he discovers that there are mysteries, too -- dangerous secrets that would give unchecked power to psi wielders if discovered. When Taemon unwittingly leaks one of these secrets, will he have the courage to repair the damage?

The Farm - Emily McKay

For Lily and her twin sister Mel there is only the Farm...It's a prison, a blood bank, a death camp - where fear and paranoia rule. But it's also home, of sorts. Because beyond the electric fence awaits a fate much, much worse. But Lily has a plan. She and Mel are going to escape - into the ravaged land outside, a place of freedom and chaos and horrors. Except Lily hasn't reckoned on two things: first, her sister's ability to control the horrors; and, secondly, on those out there who desperately want to find and control Mel. Mel's growing power might save the world, or utterly end it. But only Lily can protect Mel from what is to come...

Shards and Ashes
Powerful original dystopian tales from nine bestselling authors offer bleak insight, prophetic visions, and precious glimmers of light among the shards and ashes of a ruined world. Stories from: Kelley Armstrong, Rachel Caine, Kami Garcia, Nancy Holder, Melissa Marr, Beth Revis, Veronica Roth, Carrie Ryan and Margaret Stohl.

The Disappeared - C. J. Harper

In a future where children are segregated into institutions that range from comfortable “Learning Communities” to prison-like “Local Academies”, seventeen-year-old Jackson is an academic high flyer, living in a top Learning Community and destined for a position in the Leadership. But when he and his best friend Wilson are sent to deliver a package to a factory block, they are attacked, leaving Wilson dead. And now Jackson's teachers claim not to know him. Sent to an Academy set up to train factory workers, Jackson finds himself immersed in a world that couldn’t be further removed than the life he’s used to; where the students have created their own hierarchy based on fighting ability. He starts to realise that his whole life has been based on half-truths. In order to survive, he needs to expose the lies that surround the Academy and find out the truth about who he really is.

When We Wake - Karen Healey
Dystopian fiction by a Kiwi author. Sixteen year old Tegan was loving life: she was joining her friends to protest the wrongs of the world, she was playing guitar, and she thought she might be falling in love. She didn't plan on the best day of her life being her last. When Tegan wakes, a hundred years in the future, locked in a government facility, she has no idea what happened. The first person to be cryonically frozen and sucessfully revived, she is an instant celebrity - but all she wants is to rebuild some semblance of a normal life in this strange new future. When appalling secrets come to light, Tegan must make a choice: should she keep her head down and survive, or fight for a better future?

Revolution 19 - Gregg Rosenblum

Twenty years ago, the robots designed to fight our wars turned their weapons on us. Nick has spent his whole life in a community in the wilderness, hiding out from the robots that have enslaved mankind. But when the bots discover the community's location, he, his tech-geek younger brother, Kevin, and adopted sister, Cass, barely make it out alive--only to discover that their home has been destroyed and everyone they love is missing. All survivors were captured and taken to one of the robots' Cities. Determined to find out if their parents are among the survivors, Nick, Kevin, and Cass venture into the heart of the City. As they live among the bots for the first time, they realize they're fighting for more than just their family. The robots have ruled for too long, and now it's time for a revolution.
If you like this one, I recommend the Tripods trilogy by John Christopher - a classic.

Attack of the Munchies i.e. Zombies Take Over the World

I've recently developed a relationship with The Walking Dead.

And surprisingly I mean that quite literally.

Now I've never been much of a horror fan.  All that blood and guts and gore just freaks me out and not in a good way.  And yes I know it's kind of weird considering how much I love Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BTVS), The Vampire Diaries (VD...mmm unfortunate acronym) and Supernatural.

Then again none of these shows have much to do with horror and instead are all about great characters, great story lines and great music.  The blood letting is in fact quite minimal, which is just the way I like it.  Gore has never been my thing and I've mostly kept away from anything stomach churning.  I know, it's very wussy of me and wuss that I am I've avoided watching The Walking Dead.

Until recently that is.

It's a love/hate relationship at best. 

I love the tension and excitement and some of the characters and hate all the rest... you know the blood and guts bits... of which there are several... which of course means that I generally watch the show with my eyes half covered and my fingers in my ears because yes the sound effects can be pretty yucky as well, all that squishing and oozing and splashing of blood well it's enough to give you nightmares... which again  means I generally watch this show in the daylight.

As I said it's all very wussy of me. 

As my good friend Xander (from BTVS) would say "I laugh in the face of danger and then I hide until it goes away"

Of course this new found love/hate of The Walking Dead has led to some rather strange conversations with my other half, such as me informing him that if he were to ever become a zombie I wouldn't hesitate to shoot him in the head, which he thought was a) rather sweet and b) just a tad worrisome...

I, of course, would probably be first on the menu.  The life of a wuss never ends well.

The Walking Dead

"After an epidemic turns people around the world into zombies, a police officer leads a band of survivors as they look for safety and try to find a cure."

Based on the hugely successful comic by Robert Kirkman, The Walking Dead craze has taken over the world.  Gory it is, but it is also exciting and tension filled, with characters that you either loathe and wish the munchies would just take a bite out of or love and cheer on as they fight for survival.

Zombieland

A zombie movie that is funny too, featuring the always awesome Woody Harrelson as a gun-toting zombie slayer, a guess appearance by Bill Murray and Jesse Eisenberg as a wuss who learns to fight back.

Now this is my kind of zombie movie, violent yes but low on gore and with a sense of humour.

The Return Man / V. M. Zito.

"The outbreak tore the USA in two. The east remains a safe haven. The west has become a ravaged wilderness. They call it the Evacuated States. It is here that Henry Marco makes his living. Hired by grieving relatives, he tracks down the dead to deliver peace. Now Homeland Security wants Marco, for a mission unlike any other."

A serious zombie book, if you can have such thing, and one that is really good.

Outpost / Adam Baker.

"They took the job to escape the world, they didn't expect the world to end. A derelict refinery platform moored in the Arctic Ocean with a crew of 15 who must battle not only the elements but the hell that awaits them on the mainland."

Personally I think if a zombie apocalypse broke out, the last thing I want to do is to stay on the mainland and an oil refinery in the middle of nowhere sounds like a great haven to me, then again wuss here speaking so you'd know I'd be the first one heading for the hills if things went bad...

World War Z: an oral history of the zombie war / Max Brooks.

"The Zombie War came unthinkably close to eradicating humanity. This is a firsthand account of the experiences of the survivors from those apocalyptic years."

Considered one of the greatest zombie books ever written this classic (can a book that is only 6 years old be considered a classic?) is now headed to the big screen with a highly anticipated release due out next year.

Rot and Ruin / Jonathan Maberry

"In a post-apocalyptic world where fences and border patrols guard the few people left from the zombies that have overtaken civilization, fifteen-year-old Benny Imura is finally convinced that he must follow in his older brother's footsteps and become a bounty hunter."

The first in a series of three this book aimed at teens but more than suitable for adults follows the tale of Benny a teenage zombie hunter and saviour of the world. 

And we thought our life as a teenager was hard.

Knit Your Own Zombie: over 100 combinations to rip 'n' reassemble for horrifying resullts / Fiona Goble.

"Forget stress balls: next time things get tough, express your feelings by ripping a zombie apart. No need to feel guilty about it afterward, either - fitted up with Velcro strips, its just as easy to put him together again. 8 full zombie characters are laid out here in neat little sets, each part knitted quickly and separately."

Feeling the need to cuddle up with your very own zombie, then look no further.  These zombie toys are the perfect Christmas present for that Goth Girl (or Guy for that matter).

Zombigami: paper folding for the living dead.

"Easy to follow, step-by-step instructions show you how to fold simple origami paper into some of the most revolting creatures of the night. This origami crew of the undead includes Starvin' Marvin who hungers for a sip of fresh blood; Idle Hands, whose hands are no longer attached to his body and Suzie Gravemaker, everyone's favourite zombie mum!"

And the zombie craze continues with this origami book.  Why you would want to I have no idea but each to their own.

Zombies Hate Stuff / Greg Stones.

"Zombies hate clowns. They also hate hippies, penguins, nudists, weddings, and kittens but strangely don't mind Canadians. Each ghoulishly colorful painting reveals a funny and unexpected scene of zombie disgruntlement, cataloging the stuff that really riles up the walking dead with wit, humour, and, of course, brains."

Just when you thought the zombie craze couldn't get any stranger a book like this comes along. 

Forget about vampires, Zombies are taking over the world.