Rot and Ruin

'Rot & Ruin' was a wonderful surprise, deeply satisfying and completely unexpected.

I picked up 'Rot & Ruin' because it was a perfect fit for the Deadlands Halloween Bingo square and because I'd enjoyed listening to Jonathan Maberry's Audible Original novella The Werewolf’s 15 Minutes. If I hadn't been playing Halloween Bingo, I might have passed this over.

I mean, how engaging could a Young Adult novel about the zombie apocalypse be? Been there. Done that.

Except, it turned out I'd never done THIS or anything like it.

'Rot & Ruin' isn't the story of the zombie apocalypse. It's the story of the people who survived it and especially those, now in their teens, who grew up after it and who don't remember the world that everyone else show more mourns the loss of.

Benny, the teenage boy who is the focus of the story, has only the vaguest memories of 'First Night', the term everyone uses to refer to the first days after the dead everywhere spontaneously began to rise. His older brother, Tom, remembers life before First Night and is old enough to have had to take tough decisions during and after First Night. Benny struggles to understand his brother's behaviour and attitude, partly because Benny is so young and inexperienced, partly because Tom never talks about First Night and partly because Tom seems to be the odd one out amongst the Zombie Bounty Hunters that Benny admires.

One of the things I enjoyed about 'Rot & Ruin' was how it dealt with this experience-gulf between the generations. Without ever feeling overtly didactic, it got me to think through how an experience like First Night would affect the survivors. How, once the adrenalin had subsided, the immediate danger had passed and life had to continue, it would shape their decisions for the future. How they would yearn for order and structure and safety. How they'd want to create a new normal. How they'd mythologise the big picture of the past as they mourn for what they've lost but how they would remain silent about the things they did to survive in the days and months after the world changed. How they would try to convince themselves that they are safe by pretending that they are no longer afraid and how that pretence would lead to all of their decisions being driven by fear rather than hope.

For the survivors, the wire around their small settlement in the midst of the zombie-infested Rot & Ruin, the world that has been left to decay since First Night, is a sanctuary. As long as they look inwards, they see safety. For some of the younger people, the wire that they have grown up behind is a cage. They look outwards and see the possibility of freedom.

This seemed very real to me. It resonates with what you see with people fleeing war zones and with soldiers returning from war, all sealing their traumas in walls of silence and active forgetfulness.

Perhaps the most surprising thing about 'Rot & Ruin' was how it made me think about zombies. We all know zombies: rotting, walking, always hungry, predatory but stupid, undead. My Going-in Plan for any zombie apocalypse would be:

Figure out how not to get killed by zombies.
Figure out how to kill zombies.
Keep killing zombies until there are none left where I live.
That's the kind of plan all the video games and TV series have convinced me is the only rational response to the zombie apocalypse, other than hiding in a cave and hoping to survive and that never ends well.

Jonathan Maberry made me question my plan. He reminded me that all those zombies out there were once people. He also showed what happens to the humanity of Bounty Hunters who spend their lives in the lawless Rot & Ruin making their living by bringing back the dismembered corpses of zombies. Eventually, he convinced me that men could be more monstrous than zombies and that, bizarre as it may seem, one measure of a person's humanity is the compassion they show for those who were once people and are now zombies.

Ok. So those were the things that made me go, 'Wow, what a powerful idea!' or 'That's how you tell truth through fiction.' but that's not what kept me up late at night to finish this novel and it's not what has me keen to read the rest of the series. It was Jonathan Maberry's storytelling that swept me up and kept me completely engaged.

The book is packed with moments of great excitement as Benny faces up to a series of seemingly overwhelming threats. The many, many action scenes are compelling and vivid. They're filled with violence that feels real but is never glorified. Jonathan Maberry keeps the story moving at a tension-sustaining pace while deftly side-stepping clichés and making sure that choices have context and that their consequences are explored. All of which makes Benny and his experience feel real rather than making him into a character in a video game or a Boy's Own adventure. show less

Rot & Ruin, the first book in Jonathan Maberry‘s exciting post-apocalyptic trilogy for young adults has been a thorn in my side since the day it came out. With thorn in my side, I mean, I really want these books … on my shelves … in physical form. I’ve already got a place picked out for them (Between the Arclight trilogy by Josin L. McQuein and the Vampire Academy series by Richelle Mead). But can I find the Benny Imura books in print anywhere in Pretoria, South Africa? Hell no! Now, yes, I know I can order them online, but the online stores either don’t have the box-set and/or they don’t come in these beautiful American covers. I can also import them, I know, but do you know what shipping and handling costs then? show more *sigh*

Anywho, I’ll stop complaining, but seriously this was such a great book. It’s fast-paced, fun, well-written, exciting, and gruesome in the not-so-gruesome-that-kids-can’t-read-it-but-gruesome-enough-to-make-it-memorable kind of way. I loved Tom Imura – it’s the Japanese samurai thing, I’m super-sure – and Benny is such a reluctant hero that I couldn’t help but fall in love with him too. The zombies are proper zombies, the plot is intriguing … Yes, I finished this book in one sitting, and yes, I want to read the next books too, but in all honesty, this is the type of series you want in print. So, this is not only the review for Rot & Ruin, but a desperate cry to Simon and Schuster to PLEASE find a distributor in South Africa for these books.

I’m not kidding, the market is filled to the brim with female protagonist young adult books. It’s difficult to find a male protagonist book for boys around these parts, and this series will definitely sell.

Back to the review then …

So, Rot & Ruin totally gave me the feels on more than one occasion. I can’t go into why that is, because then I would totally be giving away the plot, but let it be known that I had total: “Oh no! The feels!” moments. There’s a bit of a mystery to be solved in there too with the Lost Girl *hint-hint wink-wink*. Oh and then Charlie Pink-Eye is an interesting character that I’d rather not want to meet in real life … not a spoiler, just a fact.

I loved this book. I want it on my bookshelf. Badly. You need it on your bookshelf too. Badly. I’m not kidding. Like, do it.

Mr. Maberry, have a heart and threaten that big publisher with one of your zombies, please? For me? Pretty please? And if not for me … think about the children! What about the children, Mr. Maberry? How will they know how to survive a zombie apocalypse in South Africa without reading Benny Imura’s story?!

(review originally posted on www.tentaclebooks.com) show less

Read from March 13 to 18, 2012

Read for Fun!
Challenges: Zombies, Read for Fun
Overall Rating: 4.25
Story Rating: 4.25
Character Rating: 4.50

First Thought when Finished: I am slightly in love with a fictional character named Tom Imura!

What I Loved: Rot & Ruin was set long after the First Night and gives us a glimpse at society trying to rebuild itself. I loved that Jonathan wasn't afraid to show us that some people chose to hide, some people chose to fight, some people were nasty creatures, and other people chose to make their own kind of stand. I imagine that the world he created is a lot like what would happen if something catastrophic changed our world. Rot & Ruin really makes you think about what your coping mechanism would be in a show more crisis. I also really loved that even though this is YA (there are some very smack the teenager up the head moments), you never feel as if that is the whole story. There are adult figures, family, teenagers learning lessons (and not knowing it all), and mostly truth shared through experience and teaching. This is the kind of YA that I enjoy reading.

What I Liked: The characters in Rot & Ruin run the spectrum in personalities. Jonathan Maberry pretty much put one of each into the mix and let you find someone you could identify with. I think that above all it was the people (good and bad) that makes this story tick! Plus, I really liked Tom Imura's POV towards Zombies and how he is teaching Benny to think as well as act!

Final Thought When Finished: I am glad I have the 2nd one on hand to start! show less

I know, zombies, right? So passe, so early century, so urban fiction--so yawn for so many people. The genre is erroneously underrated; the best zombie and apocalypse fiction is about wrestling with humanity, ethics and survival, with some hair-raising action to leaven the philosophy. At worst, they're Cracker Jacks, caramel popcorn fun with a prize at the end. I love me some apocalypse fiction, and when Trudi recommended this series, I knew I had to give it a go.

It opens in a small town of 28 thousand, with fifteen year-old Benny and his best friend Lou Chong forced to look for jobs, the bane of countless teenagers during countless summers. Only, if they don't find a job, food rations will be decreased by half, and we all know how teens show more like to eat. Benny lives with his half-brother Tom in a gated community, only this particularly community is gated to keep the zombies out. Benny has been carrying a grudge against Tom since the day of the Fall, fourteen years ago. He has a memory of Tom carrying him, racing away from the arms of his mom and leaving her to their father, who was already a zombie. Since then, Tom has spent years raising and protecting him, now working as a zombie-quieter. Benny truly doesn't understand his brother's expertise and philosophy, instead admiring the town bounty-hunter thugs who brag about number of kills and scavenged riches. To absolutely no one's surprise, Benny fails as all the jobs he tries and resigns himself to apprenticing with Tom. Tom takes him outside the fence, and Benny finds many of his beliefs and emotions challenged. They return to town, more stuff happens, and Benny has to do some fast growing up as they race against time to save ---

The expositional process of going through different jobs is a novel and clever one, introducing the reader to various roles and norms within the community. The locksmiths repair locks so people can be locked in at night (in case they die of natural causes), and erosion artists act like police sketch artists for those missing family and friends. There isn't too much that is unique in the town setting or in society's reaction to the Fall, except for a religious faction that blames the zombies on technology. Religion plays another role outside the fence when Benny meets the zombie sympathizers. Mentality and technology have an 1800s Western feel, with bounty hunters and traders being the few willing to set foot outside of town.

I lacked patience for early Benny; he's such a teenager, but of course, that's so he can grow exponentially by the book's finish. Characterization was done well; developed so that we had a feel for their complexities and motivations. Teenage dialogue, slacking and angst was believable. Zombies were standard for the genre. Writing was competent, with enough variety in structure and word choice to remain interesting, even if it didn't lead me to marvel over its beauty. There's a twisty ending, one part that we could see coming, another twist we couldn't, and it lends an emotional gravity to the book.

Three and a half stars on the GR scale of enjoyment, rounding up because 1) I feel like it, and 2) I recognize my enjoyment in the first part was slightly compromised by the idiot naive teen angle that left me wanting to slap Benny. But that's me and teenagers, and probably a mark of how well Maberry creates characters. show less

Let's hear it for another intelligent, emotional, original, well-done, post-zombie apocalypse novel!

Benny Imura can't find a job, but at fifteen, he needs one badly in order to continue to get along in society. He would rather do anything but join his older brother Tom in the 'family business' of killing zombies. But options are slim, and the vast wildness of the zombie infested land called the Rot and Ruin needs clearing of its undead denizens. And so a very reluctant Benny, saddled with an all-consuming hatred of the creatures that killed his parents on the apocalyptic First Night, agrees to become Tom's apprentice.

Thus begins not only Benny's coming-of-age story, but an amazing tale that is part gruesome zombie novel, part show more action-packed Western, and altogether a book with more punch behind it than just a bunch of fight scenes and dismemberment (although there's plenty of that too). Kidnappings, murders, conspiracies, chases, twisted plans, and mythical legends all play a part.

I loved the originality of this book, with a main character who starts out as naive, short-tempered and mostly unlikeable only to trace a realistic path of discovery through a world both very different and yet with many resemblances to our own. I loved the way the author played the idea and "rules" of the zombies very straight, imbuing them with fear and suspense, but at the same urged the reader to see both the humanity and sympathy of such wretched creatures. I loved the idea of having zombie bounty hunters as much as I loved the idea of people who brought morality and empathy to the idea of closure and the "death" of the living dead. I loved the characters: Benny himself of course; his wise, badass, katana-wielding brother Tom; beautiful, bookish, increasingly awesome action girl Nix Riley; and the Lost Girl, an urban legend of a mute, feral girl who hunts the woods for corrupt male bounty hunters and zombies to murder with her bayonet spear. With a cast like this, how can this book not be great?

Lastly, the emotion in this novel had a lot more depth than I expected to find. Relationships are interestingly, amusingly, movingly crafted, and they change in realistic and gripping ways. Benny's dynamic with Tom, his shifting feelings about his brother's "job", about zombies, about good and evil, about life in the isolated village, about his own place in the world...all are well-done.

And of course I'm excited by the direction the book is taking and the plotlines it promises to bring up in the sequel; I want to see where these characters and this world go! show less

Rot and Ruin is set in a post-apocalyptic zombie infested California where a group of survivors have formed a community about fourteen years after First Night, the night the zombies rose from the dead. Benny Imura, on his fifteenth birthday has to look for a job in order to earn his rations. After sifting through several jobs that he didn’t like or wasn’t cut out for, he joins his half-brother Tom in the family business—killing zombies. Tom is strong both physically and mentally, honorable, and a great person to have on your side during a zombie apocalypse, but despite this, his brother doesn’t like him because he feels Tom abandoned his parents on First Night.

The second half of the novel is much better than the first half, show more where not a whole lot happens. Where it heats up is when the legend of the Lost Girl is mentioned. Benny feels a strange connection to her, someone Tom has been searching for years for. This is the impetus to set them against the story’s villains, also zombie hunters, who want to kill the Lost Girl because of her knowledge of the Gamelands, where kids are pitted without weapons in fights against zombies. An attack on their community leads Benny and Tom in a collision course with the villains.

The writing in this novel is top notch. The pace of the first half is slow but gets much better in the second half. I liked the world-building. Although this isn’t a fresh take on zombie fiction, it is exceptionally well done. My biggest problem with the novel is that Benny, unlike Tom, is not a very likable character. He is whiny and generally annoying. Granted, he gets better as the story unfolds, but as far as protagonists go, I wasn’t particularly impressed with him. Otherwise, this was an enjoyable piece of zombie fiction.

Carl Alves - author of Blood Street show less

This novel was an interesting twist of the zombie story. It wasn’t the typical hack and slash story I was expecting. Instead, Maberry really highlights the man vs. monster dilemma as he humanizes the zombies. I never thought it was possible to feel sympathetic toward a creature that hungers only for brains, but this novel proves it is. The one thing I appreciated best is Maberry’s ability to keep me guessing all the way through; there were so many twists and turns! And there were so many cliffhangers that had me telling my boyfriend, “I’ll play the game with you in a second, but I have to read just one more chapter…”.

I thought Tom was a little too good to be true, and Benny was a tad bit annoying. But Nix and the Lost Girl show more were amazing; then again, I always break for the butt-kicking heroines. And Charlie Pink-eye and the Motor City Hammer were two characters that I loved to hate. I wanted to tie those two guys up and feed em’ to the zoms!

I thought some of the dialogue was a little hokey, but not so much that it was a distraction. But, every once in a while, it had me thinking, “Did he really just say that?”.

Overall Rot & Ruin was an enjoyable read filled with adventure, butt-kicking, blood and rotting flesh, a budding romance, and dreams of a better future. show less