Dead Aware – A Zombie Journey: Eleanor Merry
Reviewed By Steve Stred
- Paperback: 154 pages
- Publisher: LAC (11 Aug. 2019)
“He could smell something that called to him, stimulating his hunger.”
What’s that, you say? Steve read and reviewed a Zombie book! But I thought he hated all things Zombie now?
While everything in that last sentence is dead true, I’ve resurrected a Zombie read (see what I did there?) to continue my personal goal to help get some exposure for some authors that might slip through the cracks.
This is Merry’s debut novel and it’s a fun read. I put aside all of my current annoyance and dislike of Zombie stuff to get this read and reviewed before release day. I know just how hard it can be for new authors to get seen and even harder when it’s a female horror author.
Dead Aware tackles the Zombie trope from the Zombie’s perspective. We follow Clara and Max as they work towards starting their life together. Then something begins to make news across the world, something the scientists have dubbed FIRE. This happens at the same time Max has to head across the country for work, leaving Clara at home in Surrey, BC while Max ends up in Toronto, ON.
From here it becomes a journey for the two of them to somehow find a way to reconnect. Both wonder if the other is dead, and if so, have they been reanimated?
Merry sprinkles in a number of common plotlines we see in all things Zombie, but none of it was off-putting for me; humans wanting to survive, scientists researching the returned to living and the military attempting to put their stamp on it.
At the core of the book is the love story between Max and Clara and their desire to spend eternity together. I found both characters to be really well done and their interactions with the others were enjoyable.
I personally also enjoyed the lower mainland BC setting. Having lived in that area for over a decade, I spent some time trying to deduce just where their house was located from Merry’s description. All I know for sure is that I hope it wasn’t in Whalley or Fleetwood.
This was a really solid debut and from what I gather there will be more in this world in the future, but for now, I think if you’re looking for a quality character-driven story with some death but nothing overly gory, you can’t go wrong here.
Dead Aware
This is the name humanity gave for the virus that covered the globe within days; a highly contagious disease that first seemed to be a run of the mill flu but soon turned into something much more sinister.
When Max and Clara Jacobs married 20 years ago, they promised to love each other until death did them part. But what happens after that? The devoted couple are at opposite ends of the country when the FIRE virus sweeps across Canada, making zombies of a third of the victims. Waking after death, Max and Clara must learn to accept their new forms and navigate a chaos-ridden world filled with people who are out to get them.
Dead Aware is a post-apocalyptic novel written mostly from an undead point of view. Motivated by love, this is a story of death, adventure, acceptance…and zombies.
You can buy Dead Aware from Amazon UK & Amazon US
Steve Stred
Steve Stred writes dark, bleak horror fiction.
Steve is the author of the novels Invisible & The Stranger, the novellas The Girl Who Hid in the Trees, Wagon Buddy, Yuri and Jane: the 816 Chronicles and two collections of short stories; Frostbitten: 12 Hymns of Misery and Left Hand Path: 13 More Tales of Black Magick, and the dark poetry collection Dim the Sun.
On September 1st, 2019 his second collection of dark poetry and drabbles called The Night Crawls In will arrive. This release was specifically created to help fund the 1st Annual LOHF Writers Grant.
Steve is also a voracious reader, reviewing everything he reads and submitting the majority of his reviews to be featured on Kendall Reviews.
Steve Stred is based in Edmonton, AB, Canada and lives with his wife, his son and their dog OJ.
You can follow Steve on Twitter @stevestred
You can visit Steve’s Official website here
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