Reviews and Quotes for World War Z

2006-10-16T16:15:00.000+01:00

' Forget the cosy homage of Shaun of The Dead, World War Z is written like a documentary...Max Brooks takes in every angle he can. War Stories, massacres, survivors accounts, government policies, the grisly fate of entire countries, the cover-ups, and the betrayals-they're all written in a wonderfully considered manner. Staggeringly well-researched, World War Z isn't without a little black humour, which is just as well considering the grim nature of the book' Dreamwatch

'a cracking read and a work of great precision..Brooks has hit gruesome gold with this beauty...consistently creative and genuinely chilling, these tales of horror could easily have been lifted from books concerning war atrocities down the ages if the subject matter hadn't been so fantastical...one of the best softbacks I have read all year' The Darkside Magazine

Another review of World War Z:

2006-10-16T15:36:00.000+01:00

http://fractalmatter.com/main/?p=401

Zombies on YouTube

2006-10-10T10:32:00.000+01:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5pSNOhaWs0w
Click on the link to see some live undead zombies taking over Leicester Square.

and more...

2006-09-28T17:39:00.000+01:00

and more...

2006-09-28T13:09:00.000+01:00

More from Heidi

2006-09-26T13:45:00.000+01:00

Heidi's pix

2006-09-21T12:47:00.000+01:00

More from Matt

2006-09-21T12:43:00.000+01:00

Some more great photos. Thanks Matt

2006-09-20T14:49:00.000+01:00

And some more...

2006-09-19T11:26:00.000+01:00

More great pix from Z-Day

2006-09-19T11:19:00.000+01:00

Z-Day launch - 14th September

2006-09-18T13:24:00.000+01:00

Dear Zombies, I just wanted to say another HUGE thank you to you for being such terrific sports and launching Z-Day! I had a really fun day and I hope you all did too and I can't wait to send the photos to Max, I know he will be thrilled. Suzannah x

Revenant Magazine interview with Max Brooks

2006-09-18T13:13:00.000+01:00

Interview with World War Z author Max Brooks by John Reppion

Author Max Books is probably best known for his 2004 novel The Zombie Survival Guide - Complete Protection from the Living Dead but, all that is about to change as his new book World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War hits the shelves worldwide on the 12th of September 2006 from Duckworth Publishers. WWZ is already rumoured to have been picked up by a major Hollywood studio with the movie adaptation scheduled for release in 2008.

Revenant’s John Reppion managed to grab a few words with the understandably busy Max and find out how zombies have taken over his career.

JR: So, let’s start at the beginning; when did your interest in zombies begin? Was there a specific film or book that captured your imagination?

MAX: Anything and everything by George A. Romero. He created the genre and infused it with both action-adventure and razor sharp social commentary. When I was young I saw “Night of the Living Dead” and it filled me with the kind of nightmares that don’t dissipate for a long, long time.

JR: How did your writing The Zombie Survival Guide come about?

MAX: I was a struggling screenwriter, living in exile in a part of Los Angeles known as “The Valley”, writing script after script that I couldn’t stand but that my agent assured me were “what the market wanted”. In order to keep myself sane I realized I had to write something just for me, even if it wasn’t ever published, it had to remind me why I became a writer in the first place. This was around the time of the Y2K scare, when, in the States, volumes of survival guides were hitting the shelves. After reading a few about how to survive food shortages, race riots, and all out nuclear war, I said “hey, what about zombies?” So I started writing ZSG in my spare time. To this day, I’m blown away that someone actually published it.

JR: What did your friends and family think about the book?

MAX: My friends knew it was the perfect project for me. They knew how much I loved/feared/hated the idea of zombies and they couldn’t wait to read it. My family were just thrilled to see me passionate about writing again.

JR: The Recorded Attacks section at the end of The Guide is kind of a precursor to World War Z in a way. Had you already decided to write WWZ by the time you got to the end of The Guide?

MAX: Yes and no. I’d always wanted to do something along the lines of Studs Turkel’s “The Good War: An Oral History of World War Two”. I’ve always loved history and the recorded attacks were a chance for me to explore that side of the living dead. World War Z just seemed to be a natural outgrowth of those recorded attacks.

JR: WWZ is a very political book in many respects set, as it is, very much in the real world and the not too distant future. To me the zombies are just that: blood thirsty walking corpses. But, are you worried that some people might start saying “the zombies stand for this political party” or “this way of thinking”? Are the zombies in anyway analogous for you?

MAX: Zombies have always been for me nothing but mindless, flesh eating corpses. That’s what terrifies me about them, their viral nature, their singularity of purpose. For me, the exploration of political and social doesn’t come with the zombies, but how as humans react to them. In some ways, World War Z is just a simple, flat-out zombie book, but in others, it’s very much an “insert any disaster here” book.

JR: You’ve done you’re best to “clean up” the existing Hollywood zombie mythology with both books; dismissing things such as running, tool use and ghouls carrying memories of their past lives as “misguided myths”. Obviously, it was important to get the “facts” of zombie-ism ironed out in order to make the encounters within the books convincing and consistent. But, is there an element of having a bit of a dig at certain filmmakers and writers for taking the zombie genre away from its core ideas?

MAX: Not really. I definitely have my opinions about what zombie movies I like and don’t like (and in some cases, despise), but I have to shut all that out when I’m creating my own story. I want as little outside influence, positive or negative, as possible when I’m writing. I just want to live as deeply in my own world as I can.

JR: WWZ is structured in such a way that each chapter is basically a self contained short story; a first hand account of one individual’s experience of the war, often with an unexpected twist or revelation. Did you write the chapters in the order in which they appear or did you start out with a couple and then the structure the rest of the book around them?

MAX: I wrote the interviews according to who was shouting the loudest. I had all these characters in my head and all of them wanted their stories to be told. The ones who inspired the most immediate passion got their stories written first. That made for a wonderful first-draft experience but really kicked my backside when it came to second draft editing. I had to do a lot of chopping and refining to bang all these interviews into a coherent story.

JR: So, how did the whole movie deal thing with Paramount come about?

MAX: Good question. I wish I had as good an answer. As I understand it, both Brad Pitt’s and Leonardo DiCaprio’s companies had heard of this book months before it was finished and were asking for an advance reader copy as soon as it was ready. Before I knew it, there was a full blown bidding war. Both production companies were calling me to pitch their side and all I could say was “You know what you’re bidding on, right?” I just couldn’t believe these mainstream Hollywood Titans were interested in zombies!

JR: I read online that you’ll be adapting the book for the big screen yourself, are you looking forward to that or is it a bit daunting? How closely will you be sticking to the original text?

MAX: I actually won’t be the one adapting the book. In order for World War Z to work as a film, it will have to be BIG, and in order to get that kind of budget from the studio, there has to be a well established “A-list” screenwriter on board. Strangely enough, I’m totally okay with this. I got all the emotional, artistic satisfaction I needed from the book. This time around, I’m just looking forward to being an audience member.

JR: Are there any plans to do a comic book/graphic novel adaptation of WWZ in the pipeline? If so, would you plan on adapting the story for the medium yourself?

MAX: Funny you should say that. It’s too soon for WWZ but I’m in talks with several comic book companies about adapting the recorded attacks in the back of “The Zombie Survival Guide”, now THAT is a project I’d be excited to work on personally.

JR: Do you have any plans to work on future zombie novels or screenplays or are you interested in moving beyond that genre now you have revitalised it?

MAX: I honestly don’t know. I still love zombies, well… not ‘love’ them, but the genre still fascinates me to no end. I’ll have to wait until I get an idea that I just can’t let go of, the way I did with WWZ. After every project I always get a deluge of new ideas, all of which seem excellent at the moment. It’s just a question of being patient and seeing which refuses to fade.

JR: What does the future hold for Max Brooks?

MAX: Right now, just being a salesman. All publishing is self publishing and after working so hard on World War Z, I feel I have to devote as much blood, toil, tears and sweat to getting out on the road and letting people know it exists. It would be nice have just a little bit of time off in the near future, nothing overly indulgent, just a day or two to kick back on the couch, open a couple of Snapples and watch every episode of “Blackadder”, or even “Night of the Living Dead”. Is that too much to ask?

JR: Max, thank you very much for your time.

http://www.revenantmagazine.com/MaxBrooks.htm

2006-09-13T18:18:00.000+01:00

September 14th will see the first edition of London's latest free giveaway newspaper: The Deadly Terrorgraph-packed full of news review and handy hints on surviving a zombie holocaust. Its innovative 'undead' distribution from a swarm of zombies lurching and groaning around London will see more than 10,000 copies hit the streets.

A Duckworth spokesman angrily dismissed suggestions that this was no more than a cheap publicity stunt for Max Brooks' World War Z published today.

Be on your guard for expected zombie sightings in the following places from midday onwards:

Smithfield's Meat Market
St Paul's / Paternoster Square
Oxford Circus
Forbidden Planet
Trafalgar Sq
Leicester Sq Sq
Piccadilly Circus

Welcome to World War Z UK

2006-08-07T17:07:00.000+01:00

September 14th sees the UK publication of Max Brooks's eagerly awaited follow-up to The Zombie Survival Guide, World War Z. We will be posting exlcusive news and reports on the book here from now until publication.

Welcome to the war.

World War Z UK

More zombie videos on YouTube

Reviews and Quotes for World War Z

Another review of World War Z:

Your chance to win tickets for The Barbican's Zombie Film Fest:

Zombies on YouTube

and more...

and more...

More from Heidi

Heidi's pix

More from Matt

Some more great photos. Thanks Matt

And some more...

More great pix from Z-Day

Z-Day launch - 14th September

Revenant Magazine interview with Max Brooks

Welcome to World War Z UK