Walter Greatshell

I love this book! Not at all what I was expecting, with its elegant writing, Islamic Beatles tribute band (allah ackbar, indeed), characters affecting over-the-top New England accents, and plucky pre-pubescent heroine. I know, it sounds like a joke, but I'm really glad I added this to my "undead" collection, despite the unfortunate title and cover art. Really, I'm surprised this received such a low rating...although the "xombies" are not the flesh-eating, slow-moving creatures you'll find in show more the works of authors following the so-called "Romero Rules". This book is a treat to read...surreal and compelling. Rock on, LuLu! show less

While technically a zombie book, the 'x' aside, this mostly reads more like a dystopian or post-apocalyptic book, bridging adventure and survival for the majority of the work. There are some spats of great zombie action, but considering the supposed genre, they're few and far between. Regardless of genre, however, the book reads as quite a bit more dated than I'd expect of a book written in 2004. A big part of that is the dialogue, which veers between folksy for some characters and stilted show more for others; another part is the fairly stereotypical behavior aligned by gender, which is somehow all the more obvious with only a few women in the book, as dictated by plot device. In truth, though, it's the rough dialogue that made me think about giving up on the book early on.

All told, I'm not entirely sure why I kept going with the book, and although there were some entertaining moments and twists, this isn't one I'd recommend for any but the most devoted zombie-book fan. show less

This is what happens when you are half way through your novel and you resort to hallucinogenics to finish it. What starts out as a pretty good creepy secret society - cult novel gets washed ashore by handing out too much mythos and too little plot. I don't particularly care if Greatshell took his ideas from existing mythology, Jung, or Joseph Campbell and neither do we when subjected to chapter after chapter of detailed pointless cult ritual.

When Henry literally finds out he's The Man, we show more don't care except to ask what happened to Greatshell's nifty little idea about identity stealing cultists on Catalina Island. When we finally get the twist we will wonder whether this was meant as self-parody or a practical joke that went on too long.

On top of it all the setting left my believability button unpressed. show less

Odd and unusual twist to the usual zombie apocalypse theme. This time, they're blue. The color, not the emotion. Women of childbearing capacity are turning into cobalt killing machines. However, even their mode of death is odd and unusual. Instead of ripping their victims apart and eating them, they grab them and plant the kiss of death on them. Yep.

Enter Louise, who at 17, has some sort of 'medical condition' and has yet to menstruate. She and Mom are on the run from bill collectors and show more currently stalking the man who may or may not be Lulu's father. They are in a tiny beach town that has pretty much closed up for the winter. It's isolated and they know nothing about Agent X or the mayhem occurring around the country. So when her mother turns into a Blue Meanie and Lulu barely escapes from a trailer crawling with Xombies, she is rescued by the man her mom has identified as her father. They end up on a submarine. I kid you not.

From there, you have the usual trying to find sanctuary from these things while finding your place in your surroundings. It was pretty interesting and I have to say that I liked it.

Then they ended up somewhere and things got too weird for me. Between the rich and powerful, the baboon named Don Ameche and everything else going on, it lost me. Literally. I have no idea what happened at the end. Even so, I did enjoy the book, although not enough to continue reading it since it is apparently a series. I'll stop with this one. show less