Imagine, if you will, a world. A world filled with people who have been cured of a virus that turned them into a zombie. A world where the Immune (who never suffered the disease) are living alongside the Cured (who were zombies not all that long ago). Imagine a world where a greater disease may be lurking hidden.. Imagine, in short the world of Deidre Gould's After the Cure. It is a well conceived world which contains enough plausibility that it actually seems possible. It's a world that I'll never forget. It's also a world that gives me nightmares.
I love post-apocalyptic fiction. I always have. Usually though, there's enough distance between the real world and what I'm reading that it doesn't really soak in past my defenses. I read it, enjoy it and then move on. This one got into my mind and soul hardcore. The premise is that a virus was released accidentally by a scientist who broke protocol and spread before it could be detected. Everything in the ATC universe springs from that one action. What made this one scary to me is that it seems way too possible.
I recently reviewed The Wasteland Chronicles Omnibus by Kyle West. I love it. The difference here though is in real world possibility. The Wasteland Chronicles twisted the Sweet Meteor of Death with an alien invasion. I was well able to suspend disbelief while I was reading the books but once I put it down it didn't really haunt me. After the Cure isn't like that. I'm not against genetic engineering at all. Every fruit known to humanity, including so-called "organic" fruit, has had it's genetics altered through selective breeding for at least centuries if not millennia. The fact remains that protocols exist for a reason and it's way too easy to believe that a scientist would break them because they were overzealous. It hits really close to home.
Gould's characters come to life as well. Our heroine is Nella Rider, an Immune psychiatrist who has been hired to interview two of the scientists who were on the team that invented the virus that destroyed the world. She ends up being a lot more intrepid and resourceful than I would expect out of a big city doctor stuck in a fallen world but that's a good thing. She would not have made it otherwise. I teach my daughters to be strong, proud, tough, smart and brave. Nella is the type of woman I have in mind when I teach the girls that. She is someone I admire and what I want my daughters to be. If there is a higher compliment, I don't know what it is.
Her partner throughout the book is Frank, the defense lawyer. He is a member of the Cured. The book goes through some of the things he experienced while infected (which I won't spoil) and it's not pretty. He is still capable of great acts of intelligence and bravery but his memories are just plain disgusting. What amazes me about this character is how well Gould manages to keep us sympathetic to him while still revealing some of the revolting things that he has done. It helps that he contracted the disease by trying to be a nice guy but I'll be reading this one and trying to extract some techniques for my own writing. Gould really impressed me with this character.
The rest of the cast is impressive as well, both as zombies and just normal people. Something a lot of post apocalyptic fiction forgets is that a lot of the world after an apocalypse would still be just trying to get along. I loved, Mad Max but even in that type of a setting not everyone would be a bad ass. Gould remembers that. There are certainly brave good guys clearing out/ curing the infected and bad guy looters who would probably be good with a gun, but there are also neighborhoods full of people who just want to make a living in their new reality. I like that. I love heroic fiction but it's good to remember that not everyone is a super hero.
Gould also makes the Cured react with revulsion to what they've done. She mentions repeatedly a high suicide rate among those who have survived because of their memories. This is horrifying but it's true to life. Anyone who had been through what these people have gone through would have been damaged by it and they have. It just makes sense. It also adds to the believability of the story. I get the feeling she may have studied some psychology while writing this or before. It shows. She has thought through the consequences of her world and it works.
Speaking of the consequences of the world, Gould does a really good job in other areas as well. There is a clear divide between the some of the Cured and some of the Immune based on attitude. A lot of Immune can't forgive the Cured for what they've done while they were out of their minds and sick. A lot of the Cured can't forgive the Immune for killing infected individuals to protect themselves when the infected could have been cured. There are the predictable shortages that would occur in a fallen world. Perhaps most importantly for the book, all of the above happen to the main characters. This is a way a Chosen One (actually, probably Chosen Two) story, but that status doesn't prevent them from dealing with the same problems everyone else has to.
Somehow I've managed to avoid the fact that this is really a mystery novel with a SF background. That's what makes it great. I don't want to reveal too much and spoil the story. I will say that solving the mystery is not just a personal goal. It has ramifications for literally the entire world. So what we've got here is a cross between SF (zombies) a mystery (the whole plot) and my favorite thing about epic fantasy (literal world ending consequences). It's no wonder I enjoyed it.
Of course, After the Cure suffers from the same problem just about every other novel of this type does. Her virus affects the brain and produces a zombie like brain disability. I guess maybe it's just the nerd in me, but I'd like to see something about how it happens in the book and I don't. There is a characters whose brain is eaten by the virus but that doesn't make much sense either. I could be wrong here, and if so I apologize, but I don't think viruses act like that. If someone's body parts are eaten by a microscopic organism it's generally bacteria and not a virus, but then I don't claim to be a biologist or a doctor so I could be wrong here. Then again, even if I'm right the problem is well within the author's rights to adapt reality to the necessity of story. It's a lot less egregious than what Hollywood commonly does with history on a regular basis. These are all minor gripes though and I intend to hie me off to Barnes and Noble to purchase the rest of the series on payday. The first one was that good.
Bottom Line: 4.5 out of 5 Missing Bacteria Cultures
After the Cure can be purchased at the link below:
Showing posts with label Zombies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Zombies. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 26, 2016
Sunday, August 9, 2015
Mark Terence Chapman's Aliens Versus Zombies
Remember when you were a kid and you used to have all kinds of silly arguments about who would win in a fight? Would Superman win a fight against Green Lantern? Could an alligator eat a bear or would the bear eat the alligator? What would happen if an elephant fought a tiger? I don't know that I ever argued about aliens and zombies, but those arguments are the first thing that I came to mind when I read the title to this book. I was happy too, because we actually do get to see the aliens and zombies duke it out. It was a childhood dream come true. And yes, Zombies Versus Aliens really does deliver. It's a rock-em sock-em gorefest and it doesn't let up.
I'll be honest in stating that the thing that I love about this book will leave some readers cold. ZVA is a book about an alien invasion done right. It is a rollicking good time. Translated into English for the awareness impaired: If you're looking for weepy literary message fic with the proper message and no plot look somewhere else. If you want a story where the good guys are the good guys and they use guns look here. This is a story about people doing their best to survive in a jacked up situation that gets even worse when the aliens show up. They travel around doing everything themselves and improving their situation however they can. These people work hard. They literally go to war.
Chapman very obviously comes from the George RR Martin school of character development. I'd also be willing to bet that he's watched more than one episode of The Living Dead. He has added what I view as a necessary element of pretty much any zombie story: He will let you get close to a character and then kill them. He has no problem doing so. Given the type of story this is, he needs to. I've always been a big fan of that kind of gritty writing. That kind of story development builds suspense. When I'm not sure if the point of view character that I'm currently reading about; is going to be alive on the next page I get into the story more. I can't help turning the page to find out how things turned out and where the author is taking me next. Chapman delivered a story that kept me engaged and wanting more.
The characters in the book are in some ways more accurately portrayed than what I'm used to and that's a good thing. These are not all-knowing supermen. They are living in a zombie apocalypse at the beginning of the book. They fight, they travel and they loot. It makes sense. They don't necessarily know how to do everything right. When they find a horse most of them don't know how to care for it. They're not expert riders their first day. It drives me crazy when you see a city boy (no offense, I am one.) just jump up on horse and start growing things out of nowhere. When they find an alien gun, they can't figure out how to use it because it doesn't work like a gun that humans would build. They eventually do figure out how to drive an alien vehicle but they get spotted because they suck at it. When they try to blow up an electrical tower it doesn't work at first and they have to try again, etc. They know enough to survive but not much more. I enjoyed that.
Chapman's characters are believable in another respect: They react the way that they should. When two sixteen year old boys go off to fight the aliens they're excited. The veteran in the group tries to calm them down. They fall in love with people of inappropriate ages. They bicker among themselves. Things are never perfect.
Chapman has joined a group of zombie writers that I have seen emerge recently and I really like: His zombies are not some mystical, magical creation. They have become zombies through an airborne contagion that damaged their brain. There is no doubt that a headshot would drop one, but headshots are not necessary. Shot to the torso will kill them and a hit on an arm or a leg leaves them wounded. They're also smarter than zombies in many other stories and learn to use weapons and true ambush tactics. This makes them not only more credible opponents in a fight but also more fun to read about. When the zombies go at it with the aliens it makes sense that they could take a few down. Chapman's zombies move quickly and they can -somewhat- think. It takes a bit of getting used to but it adds a dimension to the story that most other zombie stores miss.
The aliens in the book are believable as well. They're not just cardboard cutouts, but "real" people with real motivations who make mistakes. One of their mistakes comes back to bite them in a major way. They have a lot of advantages but they're not unbeatable even if it takes awhile for them to realize it. They do have the advantages of technology and numbers (remember, humanity has been nearly wiped out by a zombie plague) but they pay the price when they screw up. They get cocky. They fail to do the one thing that would have ended the book in the first chapter but they have a good reason for doing so. They really work.
I'll say this about the book as well: It includes a prologue that I enjoyed and that is also relevant to the later story. Chapman names it "Chapter 0" but a prologue is what it clearly is. It is entertaining, relevant and short all things that a prologue should be. I wasn't happy when realized it had a prologue (I'm not generally a fan) but after I read it I realized that it needed to be there.
My one complaint about this book is the ending. I won't spoil it, but suffice it to say that I had seen it before. I knew exactly where too and one of the characters in the book points it out. I was a bit disappointed by that. It was well foreshadowed and it fit with the story but it left me a little empty. Once for that ending was enough. It almost felt like a cop-out. That much being said, it was still a really fun story.
Bottom Line: 4.5 out of 5 Exploding Alien Heads
Aliens versus Zombies
Mark Terrence Chapman (http://MarkTerenceChapman-Author.com)
Empty Sea Intergalactic Enterprises, 2015
Aliens Versus Zombies is available here:
I'll be honest in stating that the thing that I love about this book will leave some readers cold. ZVA is a book about an alien invasion done right. It is a rollicking good time. Translated into English for the awareness impaired: If you're looking for weepy literary message fic with the proper message and no plot look somewhere else. If you want a story where the good guys are the good guys and they use guns look here. This is a story about people doing their best to survive in a jacked up situation that gets even worse when the aliens show up. They travel around doing everything themselves and improving their situation however they can. These people work hard. They literally go to war.
Chapman very obviously comes from the George RR Martin school of character development. I'd also be willing to bet that he's watched more than one episode of The Living Dead. He has added what I view as a necessary element of pretty much any zombie story: He will let you get close to a character and then kill them. He has no problem doing so. Given the type of story this is, he needs to. I've always been a big fan of that kind of gritty writing. That kind of story development builds suspense. When I'm not sure if the point of view character that I'm currently reading about; is going to be alive on the next page I get into the story more. I can't help turning the page to find out how things turned out and where the author is taking me next. Chapman delivered a story that kept me engaged and wanting more.
The characters in the book are in some ways more accurately portrayed than what I'm used to and that's a good thing. These are not all-knowing supermen. They are living in a zombie apocalypse at the beginning of the book. They fight, they travel and they loot. It makes sense. They don't necessarily know how to do everything right. When they find a horse most of them don't know how to care for it. They're not expert riders their first day. It drives me crazy when you see a city boy (no offense, I am one.) just jump up on horse and start growing things out of nowhere. When they find an alien gun, they can't figure out how to use it because it doesn't work like a gun that humans would build. They eventually do figure out how to drive an alien vehicle but they get spotted because they suck at it. When they try to blow up an electrical tower it doesn't work at first and they have to try again, etc. They know enough to survive but not much more. I enjoyed that.
Chapman's characters are believable in another respect: They react the way that they should. When two sixteen year old boys go off to fight the aliens they're excited. The veteran in the group tries to calm them down. They fall in love with people of inappropriate ages. They bicker among themselves. Things are never perfect.
Chapman has joined a group of zombie writers that I have seen emerge recently and I really like: His zombies are not some mystical, magical creation. They have become zombies through an airborne contagion that damaged their brain. There is no doubt that a headshot would drop one, but headshots are not necessary. Shot to the torso will kill them and a hit on an arm or a leg leaves them wounded. They're also smarter than zombies in many other stories and learn to use weapons and true ambush tactics. This makes them not only more credible opponents in a fight but also more fun to read about. When the zombies go at it with the aliens it makes sense that they could take a few down. Chapman's zombies move quickly and they can -somewhat- think. It takes a bit of getting used to but it adds a dimension to the story that most other zombie stores miss.
The aliens in the book are believable as well. They're not just cardboard cutouts, but "real" people with real motivations who make mistakes. One of their mistakes comes back to bite them in a major way. They have a lot of advantages but they're not unbeatable even if it takes awhile for them to realize it. They do have the advantages of technology and numbers (remember, humanity has been nearly wiped out by a zombie plague) but they pay the price when they screw up. They get cocky. They fail to do the one thing that would have ended the book in the first chapter but they have a good reason for doing so. They really work.
I'll say this about the book as well: It includes a prologue that I enjoyed and that is also relevant to the later story. Chapman names it "Chapter 0" but a prologue is what it clearly is. It is entertaining, relevant and short all things that a prologue should be. I wasn't happy when realized it had a prologue (I'm not generally a fan) but after I read it I realized that it needed to be there.
My one complaint about this book is the ending. I won't spoil it, but suffice it to say that I had seen it before. I knew exactly where too and one of the characters in the book points it out. I was a bit disappointed by that. It was well foreshadowed and it fit with the story but it left me a little empty. Once for that ending was enough. It almost felt like a cop-out. That much being said, it was still a really fun story.
Bottom Line: 4.5 out of 5 Exploding Alien Heads
Aliens versus Zombies
Mark Terrence Chapman (http://MarkTerenceChapman-Author.com)
Empty Sea Intergalactic Enterprises, 2015
Aliens Versus Zombies is available here:
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