I do love a good zombie story. As long as they are well told they can capture a lot of the thrill of reading adventure books, while making it a lot grittier. So I was delighted when I saw that The Dead by Charlie Higson was on a 'buy-one-get-one-free' offer at Tescos.
The second in the series The Dead is technically the prequel to The Enemy, which was set a year later. The basic premise of the books is that all the adults over the age of fourteen have been struck by a mysterious illness and have been either killed or turned into zombies, leaving only the children left to fend for themselves. Sort of like an even creepier version of the Pied Piper. While in The Enemy the kids have been around for a bit, have got organised and can generally look out for themselves, in The Dead the virus has only just struck a month before and no one really knows what's happening or how they're going to survive.
One of my favourite things about this series is that no one is safe. Higson is more than willing to kill off main characters if and when it's necessary. This is great. It keeps the reader on their toes, makes them more involved in the story and evokes greater emotion when someone that they've seen grow and struggle gets struck down as if by random.
The plot itself is immersive and fast paced. Higson puts a lot into his writing. There's drama, relationships, planning and religion, all set on the background of an apocalyptic zombie filled London. You run into some familiar faces from the previous book and you learn a little more about the disease, though there's still no-one who has a clue about it. In some ways their life is easier as there's more food lying around but they're still growing used to the new world around them and aren't really properly watching out for danger. It was released recently as well, on the 16th of September last year, so there's a lot of references to modern things, like Lady Gaga. One of the characters is obsessed with books and at one point we find him reading Fever Crumb, which was the first book reviewed by this blog. It's little things like that which make it more realistic for me.
I heartily enjoyed the book. It was just what I was looking for, a little creepy and more zombie filled than the previous one. As I said previously it was easy to find a character you could connect with and the suspense was gripping. It wasn't really a scary book, though it had scary parts in it. But full of adventure and a plot that makes sense. I'd give it a six out of ten and recommend anyone buy it. You don't need to buy the previous book but if you read it out of order then you might get a shock at who you recognise.
Amazon link: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Dead-Charlie-Higson/dp/0141384654/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1302457652&sr=8-1
Also included at the end is a preview of the next book, The Fear. Since it is part of the book I'll be reviewing that as well.
Well, it's creepy. The small segment you see is from the perspective of one of the zombies. At first it seems harmless enough, just living in a cellar surrounded by broken computers. You get the feeling that undeath hasn't changed it that much. Then it goes out and becomes a lot more sinister. The Fear is a good name. And it looks so be a good book, so you might want to get it when it comes out, which seems to be the 15th of September of this year. So read and enjoy.
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