World
War Dead
by
TS Alan
Genre:
Apocalyptic Horror
World
War Dead is a four-part zombie novel, in which military and health
organizations around the world battle time and the undead in an
attempt to get valuable research data to the US Army Medical Research
Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Maryland. There, an
antiviral for the Acute Reanimation Syndrome (ARS) virus is being
developed.
The novel has main characters from each region, two of
which are half-zombies, and all the stories are intertwined with one
another.
Part
I: War of the Dead
A zombified Marine lieutenant injected with
the antiviral is brought back to half-life but finds himself caught
between human and zombie, and reconsiders which side he should fight
on.
Part
II: Escape from the Dead
With
time running out, a European CDC security team faces insurmountable
odds against zombies and a hostile military faction attempting to get
their antiviral to an awaiting military transport plane that will
take them to a US military base.
Part
III: Call to Arms
A Canadian helicopter team arrives at a US
military outpost for an exchange to acquire a batch of antiviral but
finds themselves betrayed and stranded. Having learned of High
Command’s treacheries, a rogue team of Marines led by a sympathetic
master sergeant comes to the Canadians rescue. The master sergeant
hopes to enlist the Canadians, along with a brigade of half-zombies,
as part of a strike force to overthrow a forced labor camp in
Gettysburg run by the military.
Part
IV: War of the Dead
A former Army sergeant, who finds her
half-zombie condition has left her infertile, leads a discontented
group of half-zombies on a war against humanity and zombies alike.
Will the remaining military, the work camp survivors, and the
lieutenant’s half-mute brigade unite in time to stop the dissident
half-mutes from executing their elaborate plan of genocide, or will
humankind finally meet extinction?
Part
I, Chapter III
When
Keith Saunders awoke his skin was drawn and sickly like a corpse and
his mind was blank, except for one driving thought: Meat — fresh
meat. Atop of him was a reanimate corpse with a severe gunshot wound
to its head; he pushed it off, rose and joined the others of his
kind. The large group of reanimates bumped into one another as they
aimlessly roamed the lobby.
Up
and down, from lobby to maintenance tunnel level the errant freight
elevator came and went, which attracted the attention of some of the
reanimates, including Saunders. As the elevator door opened again, he
and seven others stepped into the car, and it descended once again.
Part
II, Chapter IV
Home
Guard Corporal Jaakko Manninen was a seasoned soldier and had combat
experience, but when he caught sight of the wretched face of the
flesh hungry corpse of the young red-haired girl outside the driver’s
window it frightened him beyond all reasoning. Manninen panicked. All
he wanted was to get away from the horrid faces of the dead that
surrounded him, the soulless ones that desired to rip him apart for a
meal. Corporal Jaakko Manninen slammed his foot on the fuel pedal and
the vehicle charged backward up the incline, thunking over the
reanimates and rocking the vehicle, until Manninen lost control. The
APC had somehow managed to make it to the top of the rise, right near
the entry to the pen of the dead, when it veered left off the road,
careened over a light pole, and then plowed into a medium sized tree.
The back axle broke as it lodged on the fallen tree under its
chassis, the APC’s rear end uplifted and the vehicle pitched to its
left side at a precarious angle.
For
a moment everyone in the crashed Patria was dazed from the impact and
the abrupt halt. A moment was all it took for a swarm of reanimates
to grab onto the stunned and semi-conscious Corporal Jaakko Manninen,
who was partially hanging out the driver’s door that had been
jolted open by the collision.
ECDC
Security Officer Risto Paloposki was in the passenger seat of the
crew cabin. He tried desperately to grasp onto Manninen as a myriad
of corpse-like hands grabbed onto the corporal, but Paloposki could
neither get a firm hold on Manninen with his left hand nor had he the
ability get a second hand on the man to pull him back before the
reanimates tore off Manninen’s left arm. By the time Paloposki
unbuckled himself, Manninen’s head had been torn off and the
reanimates were tearing at the mutilated man’s torso. As the
security officer moved to exit from the cabin into the troop
compartment, a loud crack from the downed tree resonated inside the
vehicle. The truck jolted and pitched further on its left side as the
earth under the vehicle’s left wheels slid down the slope.
Part
III, Chapter V
Lance
Corporal Peters interjected, “That the dead can talk!”
“Really? And
how is it possible a biter can speak?” Bahr asked Jackson, doubting
the lance corporal’s abrupt disclosure.
“It’s
too complicated to give you the long of it, so I’ll give you the
short,” Jackson told Bahr. “Whether by an act of God or a
legitimate scientific occurrence, injecting the antiretroviral into
the cornea of a zombie brings them back to a partial cognitive
state.”
“And
you know this how…?” Bahr asked, wanting further clarification.
Jackson
had crossed the threshold of the barely believable and stepped into
the Twilight Zone with his confirmation that the
dead could talk. Now he just had to convince his men along with the
Canadians that he wasn’t insane and that the reanimates could truly
speak. Although his admission was absurd, how much more ridiculous
would it be to truthfully disclose how he knew the dead could speak?
That wasn’t a question that needed pondering. His men needed to
know the truth before they went to Fort Detrick.
“I
know this because I had a hand in it,” Jackson revealed with a
serious tone.
Part
IV, Chapter III
It
was to be a long trip back to where she had started, and the arduous
journey only made her hate for the living and the reanimated dead
fester and grow more deeply. When first rejected by the ungrateful
humans, who she had helped to save, she blamed the reanimates for the
humans’ fear of her kind. She had once been a zombie, so it was
understandable the trepidation a half-dead could invoke in fearful
humans. As time passed at Fort Detrick the rejection began to
embitter her. When 1st Lt. Saunders decided it was time for the
zombie menace to be eliminated, Brooke had been assigned to lead one
of the combat teams. At first destroying reanimates was cathartic for
her, and put purpose back into her life. After all, she was a soldier
and though she could no longer comprehend all the intricacies of
being a Systems Supervisor for the 114th Signal Battalion, she
still knew how to kill. However, after a month of zombie eradication
it had grown tiresome, and it had only temporarily distracted her
from her growing hate for humans. She decided that soldiering and
cleansing the countryside of the reanimated dead gave her no meaning
in life. Brooke discovered she was not the only one that felt this
way. There was dissension amongst her group and she wasn’t the only
one that felt that the humans had wronged her kind. Brooke was the
first that wanted to leave, and Saunders knew that keeping someone
confined to Fort Detrick was almost like what Mound had done to the
survivors at Camp Hope. Saunders gave Brooke her freedom and thanked
her for her service. However, freedom had not given her the emotional
connection to her human past that she desired.
As
the days passed and her abhorrence and resentment grew for humans,
she began to punish the living, first by leading the reanimates to
where they could be found and watching the death struggle while
reveling in the pain and suffering the living experienced being
ripped apart and devoured. It was entertaining and broke the boredom
in her travels. However, it was soon not enough and she began to take
her hate directly out on the living, butchering and devouring their
flesh, feeling pleased from the sensation of its texture and
nourishment. Even eating the living did not alleviate her ache for an
unfulfilled life as a half-dead. If she could never become fully
human again, then perhaps she could at least find a way to be more
human.
World War Dead is told in four parts with zombies, half-zombies and
the ones who are still alive. Each part is told in different points
of view two of which are half-zombies. World War Dead has a new take
on zombies. The zombies or re-animated as they are called in the
World War Dead world they fight, feel and lead their own team into
battle.
World War Dead starts with a bang and ends the same way as there is
action on every page from beginning to end. World War Dead opens as
the zombies are breaking out and I assure you there is action on
every page as the living and the undead alike fight to be on the top.
In the first part titled War of the Dead is where the twist on the
zombies take place and we learn what it is like to be a zombie or
half-zombie that is. Soldiers fight their way out of an underground
bunker.
In part two Escape from the Dead a European CDC security team go up
against the zombies and hostiles as they make their way to a military
base in the US
In part three Call to Arms a Canadian helicopter team arrives at a US
military outpost and are asked to join together with a team of
half-zombies to help infiltrate a labor camp.
In part four War of the Dead a female army sergeant finds herself to
be one of the half-zombies and is looking to be a zombie mother but
the babies father must be human. Obtaining a live person to
impregnate her is not going to be easy but she will do whatever it
takes to be a mother.
As a zombie fan World War Dead grabbed my attention form the first
page and never let go. With all the action and the twists and turns I
was hooked. World War Dead takes you behind enemy lines as the live
fight the undead and the undead fight back. World War Dead takes us
into the minds of a half-zombies.
World War Dead is a very intense and enthralling read that will keep
the pages turning and the adrenaline pumping even when there is no
action. I loved the new take on the zombies and would love to see
more from this world of the re-animated.
I definitely recommend World War Dead to all zombie fans. If you are
a fan of The Walking Dead or Z Nation then you are going to love
World War Dead. One click your copy today!
Author
and Co-Founder of ZombieEducationAlliance.com.
TS
Alan is an American author of horror, supernatural fiction, and
suspense, but also frequently incorporates elements of fantasy,
science fiction, mystery, and satire. Alan has published two novels,
and six short stories.
Alan
was born outside Buffalo, NY. He is the son of divorced parents. He
was educated at Williamsville South High School, Niagara Community
College and the State University College at Buffalo.
Alan
is an author of contemporary horror/fantasy. He is most known for his
zombie stories. His first published novel was The Romero
Strain (2014), which was published by Books of the Dead Press.
His sequel The Romero Strain: The Dead, the Damned, and the
Darkness was independently released in November 2017.
As
influences on his writing, Alan lists Clive Barker, Dean Koontz,
Stephen King, Edgar Allen Poe, and O. Henry, among others.
1 comments:
Awesome review. Thank you.
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