Review: Books 1 & 2 Great value!
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 03 1, 2014
The Unwashed Dead: Ok, let's start with the negatives... YES it has some typos and yes it could possibly have been tweaked a little here and there to make it a tad more polished.... BUT this is soon to be a thing of that past as of 10/12/2013 Ian Woodhead has a wonderful new editor and it should soon shine like it supposed to!IW has some great, fresh ideas that he brings to the zombie story genre.Wham! What a great way to start a horror book with some poor bloke, who I secretly hated (!), getting his manly bits bitten off!If you are squeamish or scared of swearing then this author and series of books is NOT for you!Set "up North" in the UK, it's rough and tough stuff, and I'm pleased to note that he does not dumb his dialogue down for others to understand; if you don't get a certain phrase, look it up, haha and eeew will spring to mind often!Personally I thought the death and reanimation timings were a little too fast.Amongst the general goings on of a zompoc are these weird, not so wonderful, characters - such as Dennis who goes on a full serial killer jaunt whilst loving the impending apocalypse.A few sporadic little personal stories that usually don't end well gave me a sense of fullness to the whole story, such as poor Jacob, to be finally socially acceptable only to succumb to parental control.IW is a master at creating some really detestable characters and his gore descriptions are enough to make you wince. In his world nobody is perfect and we all have a little edge to us, especially if the zombies start to invade (although I would like to point out I have never buried anyone locally!)As the remaining survivors meet up the tensions are high and IW leaves this book on a real cliffhanger.What is following them? Will Dennis survive his encounter? Is his theory correct?I really enjoyed the British element such as the snooker cues must be used against zombies instead of just an endless supply of bullets (the world is ended where are they all coming from?)This book romped, or should that be groaningly shuffled, along with good pace, I am so looking forward to rest in this series.Walking with Zombies: IW has the ability with his writing skill to make you love or loathe his characters, with the reality and emotions that he gives them.He reminds me of the late, great James Herbert in his character building; devoting a whole chapter to a back story only to kill them off in some gruesome way but still managing to add to the story in a subtle way.This second book throws a whole new twist into the mix, a new breed of zombie? The character of Talbot has a nasty thread but where will it lead?This time IW concentrates most of the action on a small night club, which has amazing pies, made me hungry! Very random.New people are thrown into the mix and the clashing of personalities brings a new element to the story.The final showdown is pretty tense and the outcome is another cliffhanger moment begging you to read book no.3.I did wonder why there was no mention of the group of survivors from book no.1