Customer Reviews
An excellent and original take on a tired idea - By: A. Whitehead, 01 Oct 2008 
It's finallly happened. The zombie apocalypse has come & devastated civilisation...but in the end, civilisation ralllied & won. Using tactics pioneered in South Africa & bankrolled by Cuba, the largest nation to remain infection-free, the world's armies successfully defeated the undead menace, but only at a staggering cost in lives & resources. Ten years after victory was declared, a journalist travels the world, listening to the stories of the survivors, from those who were there when the outbreak began to those who listened in the corridors of power as key decisions were taken to the stories of everyday men & women thrust into circumstances beyond their control. From Hawaii to China, even to the isolated crew of the International Space Station, this is the story of that war.
World War Z is that most beloved of Hollywood ideas, 'high concept'. One of those ideas that makes other writers go away smacking themselves in the head thinking, "Why didn't I think of that?" Zombies are very much 'in' these days, but after several years of zombie movies & computer games the appeal was waning, until Brooks' interesting take on the concept revitalised interest. Most zombie fiction is somewhat nihilistic, ending with the world overrun by the undead hordes or humanity reduced to tiny enclaves battling the mindless hordes, so the fact that World War Z features a victory is interesting enough. The stories of what sacrifices were necessary to achieve that victory makes up the book, which is essentiallly a 'mosaic' novel rather than a standard work of fiction. The book shifts between the different interviewees, some of whom appear only once but most of them reappear periodicallly throughout the book, as we find out how they survived the decade of the war & what happened to them along the way.
It's an excellent device & Brooks employs it skillfully. Some of the stories border on the silly - the blind Japanese gardener taking on the zombie hordes with a sword in a park full of traps stretches credulity - but elsewhere Brooks nails the feeling of total horror, with the computer nerd trying to flee his infested Japanese apartment block or the soldiers fighting to clear the catacombs under Paris. Elsewhere Brooks takes the capabilities of the zombie menace to their logical conclusion, with heavily-armoured divers fighting off zombie forces underwater, or the US army making full use of dogs (who are driven wild by the presence of zombies) in fighting the hordes & the fates of both the animals & their handlers during & after the war.
This is a widescreen story, with a truly global perspective, told economicallly & well. There are some good laughs (the new US zombie-dispatching firearm is nicknamed a 'Meg', as it resembles a Megatron toy from Transformers; during one battle a nun & REM lead singer Michael Stipe help fight off the zombie hordes), but Brooks takes his subject mostly seriously & sounds some cautionary notes along the way. To some extent the story isn't reallly about the zombies, but about people & what they are capable of when their backs are against the walll.
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War (*****) is a gripping, page-turning, memorable read which throws some fresh impetus on an old idea, & makes it work brilliantly. The book is available in the UK from Duckworth & in the USA from Three Rivers Press. A movie version is in development, with a script being written by Babylon 5 creator J. Michael Straczynski.
Max Brooks has written the best book of the Zombie genre - hands down - By: Gisli Jokull Gislason, 31 Aug 2008 Read this straight away - Don't read the survival guide first (if at alll).
Max Brooks has written the best book of the Zombie genre - hands down.
It is told in a collection of personal stories that as a whole give a good view of the Zombie war or World War Z. Nearly alll the stories are tense & the others hold different horrors. Max has developed alll characters well & given them strong supporting backgrounds - he also explores the human factor of the survivors & brings many interesting psychological effects of this World Armageddon.
It is a stong point that the story is told from many countries & here Max has done his research, bringing out national characters, the Israelies enter into a voluntary quaranteen & close their borders, South Africa brings out a survival plan based on the horrors of Apartheid, the zombie outbreak is helped by black market body part sales & human trafficking, the infected running from developing countries escape into the underbelly of the Western Cities where the unwanted & unnamed live. So it is not only about our war against zombies, it is also about our contemporary world with the Zombies as an instigator of our collapse.
On another level it explores the Global effect of Romero's Zombie movies, what happens everywhere else?
I reallly enjoyed reading this book, it was tense, gripping & even made me think a little. On the whole probably the best horror novel I have read. I wish I hadn't bothered with the survival guide however, I felt I had to read it first but World War Z stands alone & nothing in the survival guide is needed to read WWZ. After reading both I'd recommend skipping the survival guide entirely.
But read this one, they are already making the movie & the book is brilliant.
Tedious and Disappointing - By: Karel Bata, 15 Aug 2008 
I wouldn't bother leaving such a negative review, but I do feel a bit cheated into buying this book by alll the other ultra-positive posts here. They must be friends & relatives, zombie fan-boys, or (like the author clearly is) survivalist fantasists.
I was so looking forward to reading this, but was very disappointed. The structure (made up of 60 or so interviews) at first seems innovative, but it means there are no central characters & hence no real plot or jeopardy. Worse, they alll sound the same. It gets reallly tedious. And cliched.
According to Mr. Brooks alll politicians & businessmen are corrupt liars, the army is incompetent (except of course for the brave foot soldiers), the media only say what the big corporations let them, & most deserving of contempt are alll those folk who work in offices & never bothered to learn any proper survival skills.
Credibility is virtuallly absent - on almost ever page I thought "No, that wouldn't happen" such as in the daft Battle of Yonkers where a bullet apparently enters & exits a zombie's skull ('skimming the inside') without causing catastrophic damage. No, that wouldn't happen...
On the other hand, if you're into zombie stuff, Max Brook's other book The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead makes for quite an entertaining read. As for zombie fiction, check out Steven King's Cell which is set to be filmed in 2009 by (wait for it!) Rob Zombie.
I couldn't put it down - By: Lks Canty, 12 Aug 2008 An amazing story set alll over the world during the zombie uprising, Brilliantly written, Superb development of the zombie war from outbreak to control & eradication. I reallly enjoyed the style in which it was written with each chapter like a short interview with a survivour. This is the first zombie novel I have bought & in my humble opinion it would make an excellent film.
This simply will not disappoint !
I'VE READ IT TWICE SO FAR - By: Hathor 38, 03 Aug 2008 What a great book, I turned away from reading horror books because I felt the genre was becoming too samey. A friend of mine recomended this & I couldn't put this great book down, a great book for your collection.
