World War Z

I have a confession to make. I never considered myself much of a zombie fan. I thought zombies were quite literally the stupidest monster in the whole of the monster horror genre. I loathed them for their utter mindlessness. After all, I’m a self proclaimed elitist; I need my monsters to be smarter than me in order to truly touch me.

Or do I?

Maybe not, because I absolutely loved World War Z. Loved it from the get go, and fell more in love with it with every passing page. In fact, I’d go so far as to compare it to one of my favorite novels of all time, Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. I don’t have to go out on too much of a limb; the back cover blurb from USA Today said this book was “Apocalypse Now, pandemic-style, and everybody knows the movie Apocalypse Now was based on Heart of Darkness, right? Right?

Just as Conrad’s novel depicts a journey that culminates in significant truths about the darker side of human nature being revealed, World War Z is also a gripping, moving and very detailed illustration of what man is capable of when pitted against utter horror. Much as Captain Kurtz says near the conclusion of Heart of Darkness, oh, “the horror, the horror” of world infested with flesh eating zombies, but even more so “the horror” of what man resorts to when confronted with his own certain demise.

The section of this rollicking, riveting documentary style novel that worked best for me was Jesika Hendricks’s account, beginning on page 121. At first, the Hendricks seem to only be on an extended camping trip, but by the end of the story, we see they – along with other desperate survivors clinging to what remains of life – resort to cannibalism. By doing this, they essentially become no better than the zombies in that they too are flesh-eaters consuming their neighbors for sustenance. Wow, Mr. Brooks. Now that is deep.

There were a few sections that didn’t work for me; mainly, these were the ones that depicted actual warfare. The submarine scene didn’t particularly impress me, and most of the “battle” scenes fell flat for me, which is surprising considering I normally love epic battle scenes.

Don’t get me wrong. This novel was epic, battle scenes and all, and to an extent that was part of its charm. It went outside the box; it was global, even universal, in its scope. Were there some believability issues? Sure, but then again, I don’t believe in zombies in the first place, so once I suspended my disbelief enough initially to begin reading and getting engrossed in this book, I was fairly accepting of the unbelievable.

To address the question of “were the zombies scary monsters”, well, no, by and large I didn’t find them all that frightening. The tension in this work wasn’t achieved by hearing how the zombies consumed their victims but rather from hearing the accounts of how the survivors managed to stay alive. For me, the survivor’s tales of their flights from the cities and towns – zombies in hot pursuit – were what interested me most.

In conclusion, I thoroughly enjoyed this book and am looking forward to the point in my life when I have the opportunity to revisit it. Perhaps the highest praise of all is this: Tomorrow, I’ll be passing this on to my son.