The Book Plank

The Boy on the Bridge by M.R. Carey, The Girl with all the Gifts #2.  Once upon a time, in a land blighted by terror, there was a very clever boy. The people thought the boy could save them, so they opened their gates and sent him out into the world. To where the monsters lived. You should know M.R. Carey by now from his stellar The Girl with all the Gifts  from back in 2014, which is by the by translated into a major movie production. If not I urge you to start reading his books. The Boy on the Bridge is the second book in the universe of The Girl with all the Gift, so there was a whole lot to live up to...  The Breakdown has ravaged the lands of Britain leaving it empty of human life and full of the hungries. Hungries in case you missed it from the first are the interpretation of zombies in this series. Its not due to a virus outbreak or such but by a much more interesting pathogen, but there has to be a cure somewhere. And there you are thrown in the story follow...

Zombie Apocalypse: Acapulcalypse Now by Allison Littlewood The Hotel Baktun is an exclusive vacation complex that is about to open on the coast of Acapulco, Mexico. Owned by a mysterious multi-millionaire businessman, it is shaped like an ancient Mayan pyramid and its halls are lined with rare and expensive artefacts. For Stacy Keenan, the hotel's new Head of Security, things are already chaotic as the locals continue to put the finishing touches to the festivities while VIPs begin to arrive for the grand opening. When a Russian cruise ship turns along the shore and disgorges its cargo of flesh-eating zombies, the guests and staff soon fragment into various factions as they struggle to withstand the spread of HRV (Human Reanimation Virus). As the armies of the dead conquer all that stand before them, and the human survivors prepare for a final battle against an unstoppable enemy, a horror even more ancient and terrible is revealed when 'The Death' comes to ...

Chapter Six by Stephen Graham Jones   "Chapter Six", by Stephen Graham Jones, is an anthropological zombie story about Crain, a grad student, who has a theory of mankind’s evolution. As he and his former professor scavenge on bone marrow left behind by the local zombie horde, he makes his well-reasoned argument. I was really in the mood for some scary fiction, browsing to my reading list for something in those lines and came across Chapter Six by Stephen Graham Jones,  I was really taken by the idea of something antropological. I have read plenty of stories and watched movies where you have a high focus on a zombie invasion but I felt that this story might just give me more. And it did. Very much. The story of Chapter Six picks up with Crain who is out and about with his professor Dr. Ormon. Yes his professor, Crain is a grad student who is doing research on zombies. It is still possible after an apocalytpic event. Crain and Dr. Ormon are out in the field gathering...

Guest Post: When is a zombie not a zombie? by Seth Patrick You must have noticed it. In zombie movies, the word ‘zombie’ is often treated like a swear word. In Sean of the Dead, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost joke about not using the Z-word; in World War Z, the military use the term ‘Zack’ instead.  In The Walking Dead too, the Z-word is avoided, calling them ‘Walkers’. The intention, according to series producer Robert Kirkman, was that the world of The Walking Dead is like our own except that nobody ever came up with the concept of zombies – at  least not in the George Romero sense. It’s a hard thing to pull off without it just seeming like the characters have really not been paying attention all their lives. This whole idea even has its own entry in TVTropes:  http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NotUsingTheZWord In the French TV series The Returned (my novelisation has just been released, plug plug), people living in a remote Alpine town are...

The Girl with All the Gifts by M.R. Carey Melanie is a very special girl. Dr Caldwell calls her 'our little genius'. Every morning, Melanie waits in her cell to be collected for class. When they come for her, Sergeant keeps his gun pointing at her while two of his people strap her into the wheelchair. She thinks they don't like her. She jokes that she won't bite, but they don't laugh. Melanie loves school. She loves learning about spelling and sums and the world outside the classroom and the children's cells. She tells her favourite teacher all the things she'll do when she grows up. Melanie doesn't know why this makes Miss Justineau look sad. The Girl with All the Gifts was Orbits biggest release last January and I was dying to read it! If you read the synopsis closely it already raises a lot of questions, the special girl Melanie, army officers raising a gun to Melanie when she is strapped in a wheelchair... what is this all about! If you...

Ex-Patriots by Peter Clines, Ex-Heroes #2 It's been two years since the plague of ex-humans spread through the world, and the last of America's superheroes continue to hold the line against the undead... but even they can't hold out forever. Hope comes in the form of a military drone bringing new of 'Project Krypton'. But will salvation come at a price? Ex-Patriots is the second book in the Ex-Heroes series written by Peter Clines. The first book in the series, Ex-Heroes, introduced us to quite some cool stuff. The first being superheroes, the second being zombies and not to forget chock-full of action! In Ex-Heroes , Peter Clines had created a interesting view upon both genres and his envisioned superheroes weren't cliche at all, he gave each one of them a bit of twists and turns (and yes, you will undoubtly see familiarities with the more famous ones). But Peter Clines does drop a few humorous and mocking hints in the story.  In Ex-Patriots the story ...

Author interview with David Towsey One of the most genre-bending novels out this year is Your Brothers Blood from David Towsey. Like I mentioned in my review I was expecting something totally different with a book set in the zombie genre, they lend a hand to create a horrific, gruesome story. In Your Brother's Blood David Towsey changes the perspectives of a lot of elements, just for starters the main protagonist Tomas is one of the Walkin' (an undead yes) this change put the story into a completely different daylight, but moreover there is a strong current of humanness making you to abandon some of the stereotypical thoughts about this genre. Your Brother's Blood is a definite recommendation. Read my full review here Author Bio: David Towsey is a graduate of the Bath Spa Creative Writing Masters programme. He is continuing his studies as a Ph.D. student at Aberystwyth University, where he lives with his girlfriend and their four cats. His first n...