Review: Muddled like a Zombie's Mind
Rating: 1 out of 5
Date: 08 9, 2011
As a big fan of post-apocalyptic fiction, I am astounded by how much is being written in the genre. However, a great deal of the efforts out there are amateurish, unoriginal, and incredibly repetitive. That is certainly the case in the zombie sub-genre. Self- and e-publishing has the benefit of opening up access for writers but has the very real downside of poor quality. One of the reasons why the traditional publishing industry existed was to coax an author through the creative process and to ensure a professional result. Now I read books that cannot even be termed "manuscripts". Plot, pacing, characters, clarity and consistency can be missing as can even basic grammar and spell check.That is certainly the case with Stay Dead. There are the requisite zombie scenes; chases, bites, betrayals, and exploding heads. Yet, the plot is quite muddled and characters pop in and out like whack-a-moles so it is disjointed and confusing. And like so many recent zombie novels, we cannot help but pull for the undead as the human characters are incredibly unappealing and garner no respect or empathy. We need Cormac McCarthy to write a zombie novel and lift the genre up as he did with The Road in broader post-apocalyptic literature.