I just read a zombie book, and then I read a Last Man On Earth type of book, and I also read one about the Klan. This one came available in my library holds, so I checked it out and then I realized on page 1 that this was ALSO an apocalypse book and I was like, ugh, I don’t really want another apocalypse book right now, I kind of want a change of tone like maybe a romance? But I read it anyway.
This is not like any other zombie book you have ever read.
You know when you read really good poetry and you don’t understand how these few words can make you feel such deep feelings? You read it again and you see and understand the individual words, and that’s fine, but something about how they are put together breaks windows and alters paradigms and maybe kind of changes your life?
On page 1, our protagonist is examining her arm that has just fallen off. She is detached and pain-less, noting only the practical adjustments that she now has to make in order to accommodate her lopsided body. She is, obviously, undead. She lives (“lives”) with other undead in some sort of undead commune, where people have forgotten their names but do remember things about being alive; they self-organize and give speeches and participate in rituals of a sort. We gradually learn that although we are post-zombie apocalypse, the actually living are still around too. Our protagonist goes on a journey to things she remembers about her life–more specifically, to places and people she remembers loving. The journey itself is typical zombie fare and you know, it’s fine! The hunger, the dissociation from one’s body, the shambling, the encounters with the living who protect their camps with a variety of clever weapons. The world seems fully realized even though we only get very brief glimpses of it – but this is not a book that spends a lot of time explaining. If you are looking for a plot-centric survival book, this ain’t it, this is a vibes book.
Anyway, it’s clear from very early on that this book is not about zombies. (I know, I know, most zombie stories are not actually about zombies, they are about societal breakdown, habits of consumption, fear of the Other, loss, the materiality (or not) of the soul…) This book is about grief.
Our protagonist makes her way through a variety of strange and sometimes hilarious or gory situations. She has no sense of time, and practically no physicality. She is propelled by an unbearable longing for the person and the place where she knew love. All else is literally falling apart – her body is breaking down and cannot be fixed. The world has changed and cannot be righted. She cannot remember her name. But she remembers her love.
I am tearing up even writing this review, and I read this several days ago. This is one of the most powerful meditations on grief and love that I have read in a long time. I read this pretty quickly because I am on a mission to finish my CBR but I will return to it again in the future to read more slowly. There were paragraphs and vignettes that didn’t really make sense to me — but I still got it. The feeling or isolation and yearning and loss is palpable. It’s weirdness and its abject horror hits right in those odd, human cracks of the heart, where poetry lives.
I saw a Reddit comment that said, “This book is the only thing helping me with my grief. I feel like a zombie navigating life, and this book made me feel seen. Would highly recommend.” This makes a lot of sense to me. Sometimes you don’t need a self-help book about healthy management of emotions; you need a one-armed zombie with a dead crow in her ribcage.
10/10 absolutely read this one.
Post script: This reminded me a bit of Grief is a Thing With Feathers by Max Porter, except that this one is much weirder. If you liked that one, and are cool with a little zombie gore, I think you’ll like this one.