Review: Trio of short stories whets the appetite for Zombie A.C.R.E.S.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 06 4, 2012
This lovely  trio of stories about zombies has hooked me -- I definitely want to read more about Zombie A.C.R.E.S.Joshua Cook gives us a yummy sampling of stories from his upcoming Alice in Zombieland books (may already be out there, don't trust me on this one).  In the first story, William Lohman uses the media to tell people how he came to be a zombie, and he points a finger at the world's largest pharmaceutical company, Roslun.  His announcement shocks the world, but in the end, not much changes, since this isn't a typical zombie apocalypse/invasion.  Things haven't started to affect the 'everyman" living in the suburbs yet. Yet.A second story features a brave young woman named Georgia "Gee" Marie who comes home to a horrific scene of zombie attacks within her own family.  She manages to rescue her younger half-sister, but now the two must face a frightening, dangerous world on their own.The final story, "The Boy Who Cried Zombie" is actually humorous, in my rather twisted opinion.  Sam is obsessed with zombies, at least that's the opinion of his fiancee, Heather. He obsessively watches Zombie movies with his friends, he plays endless video games about zombies and so on.  So when Sam sees a real-life zombie shambling toward his garbage cans, he hops on his moped and dashes off to save Heather.  It takes some convincing to prove that he is not just imagining things, and before long, Heather has the proof right in front of her.Cook writes well and all the characters come through strong.  It's not all about the drooling, face-munching zombies, Cook also shows how incredulous most of us would be when someone says "Hey, I just saw a zombie!"  We wouldn't instantly run for an ax to chop their head off, we'd just have to peek out the front door to see for ourselves, right?  And maybe a decaying hand would be waiting to yank us out to the waiting zombie horde.  I highly recommend this collection of three short stories.