Horror Novels Book List: Zombies
First off I must admit that zombies are one of my favorite monsters and horror novels about zombies are my favorite reading material.
I've found that I tend to go overboard when somebody does something new with zombies.
A few years ago Gary A. Braunbeck did that to me with his chapbook We Now Pause for Station Identification. This year Michele Lee did it to me with her new chapbook Rot (see below).
What is it about the dead coming back -- inrotting corporal form no less -- that captures our imaginations so vividly?
Recently I've seen an upswell of interest in zombie stories. Could they be set to overthrow the vampires as the most popular monster in the horror genre? Only time will tell.
My name is Greg Fisher also known as "The Undead Rat". I manage With Intent to Commit Horror, a website dedicated to bring you horror fiction books and I present to you a terrifying collection of Zombie Horror Novels.
Rot by Michele Lee
My Favorite Zombie Horror Book for 2009
One of things I like best about the Horror genre is that there are plenty of "standard" zombie stories for when you're in that mood but every once in a while a writer will mix things up. This year Michele Lee did just that by re-envisioning zombies in a way no body has done before.Some people have the ability to will the dead back into their decaying bodies and bring them back to unlife. Silver Springs Specialty Care Community caters to the customer who isn't ready to let go of their dead loved ones but have realized they can't keep the animated corpse at home.
Dean is a recent hire for security. Sometimes when a zombie has decayed too much they go feral and attack and eat people. When that happens it's Dean's job to put them down. Amy and Patrick are friends, and zombies, and one at a time, they make their way into Dean's life doing filing and odd jobs and striking up a friendship.
Then Amy disappears. A frantic Dean and a rapidly decaying Patrick go on a dangerous hunt, tracking down the paper trail that will, hopefully lead them to the woman they both love.
You can get a copy of Rot at the Horror Mall, a specialty horror online bookstore -- a lot like Amazon and even more customer-friendly. You can use this link to check out the display page for this book at Horror Mall. (This is a non-affiliate link -- I don't make money when you click on it)
Rot: Zombie Horror Book Trailer #1
This is the trailer I like best
Rot: Zombie Horror Book Trailer #2
I like this one but not as much as the first
Zombie Horror Book List from Eden Studios
The All Flesh Must be Eaten Anthologies
To support the game, James Lowder edited three zombie anthologies with a kind of "best of..." collection due out soon.
The All Flesh Must be Eaten Anthology Series Order:
- The Book of All Flesh
- The Book of More Flesh
- The Book of Final Flesh
- The Best of All Flesh
The first three anthologies are out of print, although Amazon may be able to get a third party seller who has some. Alternately, I found a website offering PDF copies of the anthologies as well as the books for the All Flesh Must be Eaten role-playing game at about a third the cost of the print books. Check out Drive ThruRPG. com for a list of items up for sale.
(The link above is not an affiliate link -- I don't make money off of any purchase you make there.)
Anthologies: Zombie Horror Book List
All Flesh Must be Eaten Anthology Series
The Book Of All Flesh
James Lowder's first collection of zombie short horror stories loosely based on the zombie role-playing game All Flesh Must be Eaten
Table of Contents:
- Introduction by James Lowder
- Consumption by Steve Eller
- Dust Bowl by C. Dean Andersson
- Susan by Robin D. Laws
- Number of the Beast by Kenneth Lightner
- Dawn of the Living-Impaired by Christine Morgan
- Trinkets by Tobias S. Buckell
- Murdermouth by Scott Nicholson
- Calliope by Aaron T. Solomon
- Prometheus Unwound by Matt Forbeck
- Salvation by L. H. Maynard and M. P. N. Sims
- Take, Eat by John C. Hay
- Sifting Out the Hearts of Men by Warren Brown and Lana Brown
- The Other Side of Theory by Daniel Ksenych
- Inspecting the Workers by Jim C. Hines
- Last Resort by Michael Laimo
- Same Night, Different Farmhouse by Gregory G. Kurczynski
- Middles by Robert E. Vardeman
- One Last, Little Revenge by Ed Greenwood
- The Cold, Gray Fingers of My Love by Pete D. Manison
- On-Line Zombies and Dry-Land Skates by Scot Noel
- Hollywood Flesh by L. J. Washburn
- Scenes from a Foreign Horror Video, with Zombies and Tasteful
Nudity by Mark McLaughlin
- La Carrera de la Muerte by Joe Murphy
- Electric Jesus and the Living Dead by Jeremy Zoss
- Live People Don't Understand by Scott Edelman
The Book of More Flesh
James Lowder's second collection of zombie short horror stories loosely based on the zombie role-playing game All Flesh Must be Eaten
Table of Contents:
- Introduction by James Lowder
- Goobers by Scott Edelman
- The Husks by Paul Finch
- The Hounds of Love by Scott Nicholson
- Fading Quayle, Dancing Quayle by Charles Coleman Finlay
- Trouble by Mark McLaughlin
- Naked Shall I Return by Tom Piccirilli
- Falling Into Naught by Douglas W. Clark
- Sitting With the Dead by Shane Stewart
- The Black Rose by Don D'Ammassa
- Charlie's Hole by Jesse Bullington
- The Dead Kid by Darrell Schweitzer
- Brainburgers and Bile Shakes: A Love Story by Jim C. Hines
- ZOMB, Inc. by J. Allen Thomas
- Life Sentence by David Dvorkin
- Martin's Inferno by Tyler Sigman
- Memory Remains by Steve Eller
- The Little Death of Mr. Phillips by J. Robert King
- The Hyphenated Spirit by Scot Noel
- Inheriting Red by Alexander Marsh Freed
- Goddamn Redneck Surfer Zombies by Michael J. Jasper
- Night Shift by Rebecca Brock
- Bright Angels by K. Z. Perry
- The Ethical Treatment of Meat by Claude Lalumiere
The Book of Final Flesh (All Flesh Must Be Eaten)
James Lowder's third collection of zombie short horror stories loosely based on the zombie role-playing game All Flesh Must be Eaten
Table of Contents:
- Introduction by James Lowder
- Charnel Blues by Joe Murphy
- You'll Never Walk Alone by Scott Nicholson
- Opiate of the Masses by Lee Thomas
- Not Quite Ghosts by Kealan Patrick Burke
- Relapse by John Sullivan
- Zombies are Forever by Mark McLaughlin
- What Comes After by Kristine Dikeman
- The Blonde by Sarah A. Hoyt
- Homelands by Lucien Soulban
- Not on the Books by Roland J. Green
- Dawn Patrol by Joseph M. Nassise
- Aces Undead by Pete D. Manison
- Layabouts by Scott Reilly
- Provider by Tim Waggoner
- If a Job's Worth Doing by Andy Vetromile
- The Secret in the Cellar by Ed Greenwood
- Familiar Eyes by Barry Hollander
- Christina's World by Steve Melisi
- What Dead People are Supposed to Do by Paul E. Martens
- So Many Things Left Out by Paul G. Tremblay
- Shouting Down the Moon by Myke Cole
- Seven Brains, Ten Minutes by Christine Morgan
- The Cannibal Zombies of West Los Angeles by Jonathan Petersen
- The Last Supper by Scott Edelman
The Best of All Flesh: Zombie Anthology
Content not available at this time.
Zombie Horror Novels from Brian Keene
The Rising Series Order:
- The Rising
- City of the Dead
- The Rising: Selected Stories
- Unhappy Endings (Selected Stories Only)
There is also a single zombie novel which does not take place on the world of the zombies in The Rising.
- Dead Sea
The Rising Zombie Horror Novels
The Rising
The 2003 Bram Stoker Award winner for Superior Achievement in a First Novel.
Deep in the safety of a bomb shelter, slowly losing his mind, Jim Thurmond receives a call for help from his son Danny who lives with his mother several states away. The problem is, the whole world is covered with fast moving, intelligent zombies and Jim may not have much time to save his son.
City Of The Dead
The last survivors of a city overrun with zombies are ensconced in a tower fortified to withstand a siege of mindless zombies. Unfortunately, the zombies are rather resourceful and, led by Ob, they intend to take out the skyscraper and eat all the humans one way or another.
The Rising: Selected Scenes From The End Of The World
32 short stories set in the world of The Rising and City of the Dead.
Table of Contents:
- Don's Last Mosh
- Family Reunion
- As Above (Sisters, Part One)
- So Below (Sisters, Part Two)
- Last Chance for La Chance
- Watching the World End
- The Fall of Rome
- Walkabout (Part One)
- Hellhounds on My Trail
- Spoilers
- The Man Comes Aound
- The Summoning
- Pocket Apocalypse
- The Viking Plays Patty Cake
- If You Can See the Mountain . . .
- You Only Live Twice
- And Hell Followed With Him
- The High Point
- Where the Down Boys Go
- Walkabout (Part Two)
- 1 Corinthians 15:51
- All Fall Down
- Through the Glass Darkly
- A Man's Home is His Casket
- Zombie Worm
- The Night the Dead Died
- The Morning After
- The March of the Elilum
- Best Seat in the House
- American Pie
- Two Suns in the Sunset
- Other Worlds Than These
Unhappy Endings
Reprints several short stories and novellas, including a few hard-to-get and high priced items.
Abridged Table of Contents:
- The Resurrection And The Life (featuring Ob from The Rising and City of the Dead)
- The Ties That Bind (from the world of The Rising)
- The Waiting Is The Hardest Part (featuring Danny from The Rising)
- The Siqqusim Who Stole Christmas (featuring Ob from The Rising and Tony/Vince from Clickers II: The Next Wave)
- Midnight At The Body Farm (from the world of Dead Sea)
Zombie Horror Novels from Kim Paffenroth
The Dying to Live Series
- Dying to Live: A Novel of Life Among the Undead
- Dying to Live: Life Sentence
The Dying to Live Zombie Horror Novels
Dying to Live: A Novel of Life Among the Undead
Jonah Caine is a survivor in a world overrun by zombies when he discovers a small community that seeks to establish order and beauty in the zombie ravaged world. Unfortunately, another band of survivors encounters Jonah's new community, proving to be a greater threat than the undead.
Dying to Live: Life Sentence
Zoey has lived in the community all her life and watched as it pushed the physical boundaries grow, pushing back the zombie threat. However, as the community clashes with another human community, the zombies have slowly begun to reclaim their memories . . . including awareness of what they've done.
Here's my favorite link:
Zombie Horror Book List
Stand alone zombie books
A note about zombies: In selecting books for the list, I'm using the term loosely. Not every zombie story here has dead bodies rising up and eating brains or body parts. Some, like Stephen King's Cell has a cell phone signal turn everyone who hears it into an insane killing machine . . . which further changes as time passes. No corpses rising from the dead, no hungry zombies -- murderous, yes, but not an endless appetite on two legs.
So when I use the term zombie novel for some of these books, it a generalization of the tone and feel of the book and not a specific monster.
Zombie Horror Book List
Part One
Cell: A Novel
One day, all at once, every cell phone in the world rings. Unsuspecting, people answer their phone and are hit with a strange noise that wipes their personalities leave only aggression and destruction behind.
The Condemned
The city is dying while the world burns with another war. The City People, mindless zombie-like people rule the streets at night. Jett and his new partner -- a wounded war vet -- conducts city raids which are getting increasingly bloody -- until he realizes that the City People are holding back secrets . . . secrets that might just set Jett free: or kill him.
Dead City
After a sound thrashing by five hurricanes, Most of the lower half of Texas is reeling from the destruction when a virus breaks out -- one that revives the dead with an insatiable hunger.Eddie Hudson, of the San Antonio police department, is one of the first officers to encounter the zombies and survive. Can he find a way to save his family and destroy the walking murderers?
Deathbringer
The Deathbringer is a dark, shadowy figure who has come to the town of Dandridge just as the dead pull themselves out of the ground and attack the living. What chance do the living stand against an army of undead when everyone of their numbers who falls gets up and joins the ravenous army?
Hater
Danny McCoyne is a civil servant in a British city when slowly civilization begins to crumble as people, normal one second, becomes a rage-filled murderer attacking seemingly everyone in sight the next. Danny just wants to protect his family but what can he do when the person you're next to is find one minute and attacks you the next? And what happens if this affects someone in your family?
(This one barely falls in the zombie category but it is a great read, especially for the sense of paranoia it creates)
Zombie Horror Book List
Part Two
History Is Dead: A Zombie Anthology
Take a look at zombies throughout history in this collection of historical zombie short horror stories.
Table of Contents:
- This Reluctant Prometheus by David Dunwood
- The Gingerbread Man by Paula R. Stiles
- The Barrow Maid by Christine Morgan
- Harimoto by Scott A. Johnson
- The Moribund Room by Carol Lanham
- Theatre is Dead by Raoul Wainscoting
- The Anatomy Lesson by Jenny Ashford
- A Touch of the Divine by Patrick Rutigliano
- A Cure for All Ills by Linda L. Donahue
- Society and Sickness by Leila Eadie
- Summer of 1816 by James Roy Daley
- The Hell Soldiers by Juleigh Howard-Hobson
- Junebug by Rebecca Brock
- Starvation Army by Joe McKinney
- Pegleg and Paddy Save the World by Jonathan Maberry
- The Third Option by Derek Gunn
- The Loaned Ranger by John Peel
- Awake in the Abyss by Rick Moore
- The Travellin' Show by Douglas Hutcheson
- Edison's Dead Men by Ed Turner
The Missing
Since the fire that destroyed neighboring Bedford and killed the surrounding forest, Corpus Christi, Maine, has been a town on the decline. Lois Larkin takes her fourth grade students on a field trip to Beford. There they are exposed to a virus that transforms people into hungry, violent predators -- not mindless zombies -- but something far more cunning and alien.
Patient Zero: A Joe Ledger Novel
Joe Ledger killed a terrorist during a raid to capture a dangerous bio-weapon. Now he finds himself having to kill the terrorist again which is very bad news because the bio-weapon, if released -- would turn the populace into zombies.
Visit The Patient Zero website to download the free short story -- the prequel called "Countdown".
Stranger
Outsider Greg Valdiva is valued by the isolated community of Sullivan because he alone can tell when a human is infected with the strange disease that turns them into dangerous zombie-like predators called "hornets" and dispatch them before they cause harm to the community. But the questions remain, how did he get this power? And how long until the town of Sullivan turns on him?
Zombie Horror Book List
Part Three
World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War
It was the war that almost ended the human race -- the zombie war. Sent to gather a wide range of statistical data about the war and the aftermath, Max also collected many eye-witness accounts to the zombie war and set them in this oral history -- lest anyone should forget the time when humanity almost toppled.
Xombies: Apocalypse Blues
Agent X struck women first, turning them into vicious xombies intent on spreading the disease. Lulu Pangloss is an uninfected seventeen-year-old girl. When she is rescued by the father she had never met, she becomes part of a small team dedicated to preserving the human race.
Zombie Survival Kit
Everything you need to survive zombie armageddon
The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead
This is the guide you need to survive any zombie attack, be it full scale zombie invasion or just a local gang of restless corpses -- its in here. Zombies do not play by the rules or ordinary human engagement. If you want to live, you need to know the enemy and know their weaknesses.
The Zombie Survival Guide: Recorded Attacks
In this graphic novel, Max Brooks shows how other civilizations and cultures in history dealt with zombie infestations.
The Zombie Survival Guide Deck: Complete Protection from the Living Dead
Don't have time to read a book? The zombies waiting outside your door already? Or maybe you need a little bush up because you've panicked and forgotten everything you learned while trying to outrun those shambling corpses? This is the item for you. Short, concise instruction that you need on small cards that you can carry with you in the event of a zombie invasion.
Zombie Survival Notes Mini Journal
It's not enough to study how to survive an undead onslaught -- you really need to plan out your survival strategies based on your environment and the items you have at hand and this is the journal to plan it in.
Zombie Survival Mini Note Pads
These make ideal to-do lists, ticker notes to remember some particular thought later or to write help letters to put in bottles.
Zombie Survival Kit
Part Two
ZOMBIE ATTACK SURVIVAL KIT
All the things you need to clean up after a zombie attack including cordon tape, hazard signs and stickers, poster, toe tags, a bite kit and a CD with further training.
GOVERNMENT POSTER THE ZOMBIE SURVIVAL ZOMBIES 24650-G
It's art . . . and it's zombie attack survival guide all in one.
ZOMBIE ATTACK SURVIVAL KIT horror flesh funny BW SHIRT
When the end of the world comes round your corner, you need a shirt that will let the cringing masses -- at least those masses that haven't been bitten yet -- that you are the point man (or woman) on the crisis and everybody should give you their attention.
Shirt reads: I am a zombie attack kit.
I HEART ZOMBIES funny horror survival undead BR SHIRT
In a zombie attack, both sides really need to be clearly delineated. This shirt is idea for that devil-may-care zombie lover who just can't wait to take her (or his) bite out of life. Wear it with caution.
Shirt reads I "heart" zombies, where "heart" is an actual human heart. The letters and heart are in red with blood dripping from them.
Gary A Braunbeck's Zombie Horror Book
We Now Pause For Station Identification
He read it shortly before publication at a convention. It was taped and posted online. I've included it here so you can enjoy the story too.
We Now Pause For Station Identification
Part 1
Warning: Adult language is used in the story and therefore in the reading of the story. Don't watch if the use of such language offends you.
We Now Pause For Station Identification
Part 2
Same warning about adult language applies.
We Now Pause For Station Identification
Part 3
Same warning about adult language applies.
Zombie Horror Book Comments
You know the drill -- leave a comment and I'll check it out. If it looks like spam, I'll deep-six it. But if it's an honest comment on this lens or on your favorite Halloween stories, I'll accept it and you'll be immortalized on this lens forever.
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Reply
- bdkz bdkz Oct 27, 2009 @ 11:45 am
- Congratulations! You've been SquidBoo Blasted. Happy Halloween!
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