Zombie, Illinois: A Novel - Softcover

Scott Kenemore is the author of The Zen of Zombie; Z.E.O.; The Art of Zombie Warfare; The Code of the Zombie Pirate; Zombies vs. Nazis; and Zombie, Ohio, his debut novel. He lives in Chicago, Illinois.

One thing’s for sure, you won’t be thinking: ho-hum, another book where the mayor of Chicago gets eaten by a zombie Al Capone. That’s one of the highlights of this follow-up to Zombie, Ohio (2011), in which a college professor survives an attempt on his life, only to discover he hasn’t really survived at all. But this isn’t really a sequel: it takes place at roughly the same time as the earlier book but in a different location and with different characters: the drummer in an all-girl rock band, a church pastor, and a newspaper reporter (in one of many of the book’s in-jokes, the paper he works for is called Brain’s). The reporter has the hots for the drummer, the drummer hates the pastor (whose daughter also plays in the band), and all three of them soon run into some shady politicians who are determined to use the zombie apocalypse to gain control of the city (one of the politicians being the drummer’s father, whom the drummer also hates). Did we mention the zombies? They’re crawling out of the cemeteries, they’re lurching out of Lake Michigan, they’re attacking and chomping and tearing the living apart. Fans of zombified mayhem will not be disappointed. If Zombie, Ohio was at its heart a noir with zombies (man tries to solve his own murder), this is a political thriller with zombies (good guys try to stop evil politicians from taking over the city)—different in tone from Ohio, but in its own way just as good. It’ll be interesting to see what story the author tells next. --David Pitt