Dragon Quill

World War Z.

This book was recommended several times as an accurate/scientific take on the subject. I ignored such things because I’d read the opening of the Zombie Survival Guide and hated it. The author spends his time setting up his version of zombies rather than traditional ones and coming off as a smug ass as he does it. He isn’t going with the most common zombie tropes but he still spends time mocking those idiots who dare think they function differently than his own pet version, and despite the fact he obviously thinks it’s the most realistic, the only thing worse than his science is the repetitive way he writes it. And he brings up the issue of zombie sex in a way that’s very transparently trying to look like he doesn’t want to but has to because it’s such a common line of thought, and I really didn’t need that look into how his brain works.

But I kept hearing about it, including claims it was better than the first book. The fact the book takes place as a retrospective is rather unique and I thought lent some credence to the idea it might be realistic, given that one of the various plot holes zombie books tend to have is how unbeatable a bunch of braindead shamblers are.

So I read it. It didn’t live up to its hype, but there were some good ideas in it. There were also some bad ideas and a great deal of terrible execution. So, your standard zombie novel, really, but done more cleverly than usual.
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Section 1 is Warnings.

Our first oral history takes place in GREATER CHONGQINGN THE UNITED FEDERATION OF CHINA. The opening mentioned “victory in China” day, and the typical trope is to have the infection be worst in the places it started, so you can figure it must have started in China and this is about our patient zero.

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I think this is my favorite chapter.

In contrast with last chapter, the behavior of people here seems very human. It’s about people responding to the disease like people always do, by fleeing the area, and responding to sick family members like people always do, by trying to take them along anyway.

And it’s pretty internally consistent, even if it’s hard to believe this led to a full-on zombie apocalypse.

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Temporary lack of the computer with my game on it means yet another Blueless day. Let’s continue with WWZ.

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I arrive blindfolded, so as not to reveal my “hosts’” location. Outsiders call them the Yanomami, “The Fierce People,” and it is unknown whether this supposedly warlike nature or the fact that their new village hangs suspended from the tallest trees was what allowed them to weather the crisis as well, if not better, than even the most industrialized nation.

The fact their village is in the air WHY IS THIS EVEN A QUESTION.

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I was told to expect a “tall ship,” although the “sails” of IS Imfingo refer to the four vertical wind turbines rising from her sleek, trimaran hull. When coupled with banks of PEM, or proton exchange membrane, fuel cells, a technology that converts seawater into electricity, it is easy to see why the prefix “IS” stands for “Infinity Ship.”

I’m pretty sure none of this is ever relevant. I think it’s there to show that it’s the future and all, but it’s a weird, weird use of resources to be building these things.

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Our interview this chapter is with an Israeli spy although of course he can’t say that outright. From the sounds of it he’s really a guy in the intelligence agency rather than the person who actually goes out and does spy stuff. For obvious reasons, it’s the latter where secrecy is a big deal.

(Though come to think of it, considering the death toll even that shouldn’t matter by now. The reason to keep former spies a secret has more to do with protecting their contacts.)

But on to what the guy actually has to say.

Most people don’t believe something can happen until it already has. That’s not stupidity or weakness that’s just human nature.

Christ.

It’s not just that this is bullshit, it’s that the author’s own story shows it’s bullshit.

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[With his rugged looks and polished charm, Saladin Kader could be a movie star. He is friendly but never obsequious, self-assured but never arrogant. He is a professor of urban planning at Khalil Gibran University, and, naturally, the love of all his female students. We sit under the statue of the university’s namesake. Like everything else in one of the Middle East’s most affluent cities, its polished bronze glitters in the sun.]

I think this is to make up for the fact the rest of the chapter is every Jew-hating Arab stereotype that can be packed in.

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Right then. We now enter the book’s second section: Blame. (more…)

[It is spring, “hunting season.” As the weather warms, and the bodies of frozen zombies begin to reanimate, elements of the UN N-For (Northern Force) have arrived for their annual “Sweep and Clear.” Every year the undead’s numbers dwindle. At current trends, this area is expected to be completely “Secure” within a decade.

We haven’t yet been introduced to much of zombie behavior yet, so this seems reasonable, and the idea frozen zombies would be trapped by ice should be savored as emminantly reasonable on its own and also a rare exception to the nonsense we’ll mostly be getting.

Our interviewee today is Travis D’Ambrosia, Supreme Allied Commander, Europe there to be in charge of zombie mopup, and unlike last chapter’s friendly principal personality, is more of a broken man:

There is a softness to the general’s voice, a sadness. Throughout our interview, he struggles to maintain eye contact.

I won’t deny mistakes were made. I won’t deny we could have been better prepared. I’ll be the first one to admit that we let the American people down. I just want the American people to know why.

That’s right, “Surpreme Allied Commander, Europe” is an American. And yet the average American reads this book and is wowed by the multiculturalism. (more…)

This chapter, the most remote of the remote antarctic stations, which is why today’s interviewee lives there.

We meet in “The Dome,” the reinforced, geodesic greenhouse that draws power from the station’s geothermal plant. These and many other improvements were implemented by Mister Scott when he leased the station from the Russian government. He has not left it since the Great Panic.

He’s hiding out, you see. Like a great deal of this book, this at first seems clever and intriguing, then will end up feeling dumb and badly reasoned. (more…)

[Grover Carlson works as a fuel collector for the town’s experimental bioconversion plant. The fuel he collects is dung. I follow the former White House chief of staff as he pushes his wheelbarrow across the pie-laden pastures.]

This may be a petty choice, but let’s admit it, it’s pretty satisfying. (more…)

[This neighborhood is, according to the brochure, the “New Community” for the “New America.” Based on the Israeli “Masada” model, it is clear just from first glance that this neighborhood was built with one goal in mind. The houses all rest on stilts, so high as to afford each a perfect view over the twenty-foot-high, reinforced concrete wall. Each house is accessed by a retractable staircase and can connect to its neighbor by a similarly retractable walkway. The solar cell roofs, the shielded wells, the gardens, lookout towers, and thick, sliding, steel-reinforced gate have all served to make Troy an instant success with its inhabitants, so much so that its developer has already received seven more orders across the continental United States. Troy’s developer, chief architect, and first mayor is Mary Jo Miller.]

Introduction: male interviewer.
Warnings, GREATER CHONGQINGN THE UNITED FEDERATION OF CHINA: male doctor
LHASA, THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC OF TIBET: male smuggler
METEORA, GREECE: male soldier
THE AMAZON RAIN FOREST, BRAZIL: male doctor
BRIDGETOWN HARBOR, BARBADOS, WEST INDIES FEDERATION: male teen
TEL AVIV, ISRAEL: male intelligence agent
BETHLEHEM, PALESTINE: male teen
LANGLEY, VIRGINIA, USA: male CIA
VAALAJARVI, FINLAND: male American military adviser
VOSTOK STATION: ANTARCTICA: male snakeoil salesman
AMARILLO, TEXAS, USA: male White House chief of staff.

That is, thirteen sections in, we have the first female main character. (more…)

On to a new section. Now we enter The Great Panic, which is naturally referring only to the events in America because AMERICA FUCK YEAH and I guess other countries dealt with it in their own way whatever that might be.
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