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I have been considering writing a Zombie book, and every few pages of World War Z I think to myself, man, what didn't I think of that. Not sure this would transfer over to a movie at all, but accomplishes what it wants to for sure. The ideas that Max Brooks comes up with are phenomenal. If you can enjoy a zombie movie, you will enjoy this book. It is almost the perfect book for fanatics.
If you have any interest in zombies, this book is for you. It will make you look over your shoulder if you read it at night.
The problem is that Brooks uses exactly the same voice for every character. There are too many good books to read to waste one's time on writing that can't grab your attention in the first 50 pages. The one Arab character profiled is an antisemitic buffoon, and while people like this do no doubt exist, the state of Israel is glorified to an absurd degree. Friends who've read it say it picks up pace later, but I just don't think a zombie apocalypse book can afford to be boring for even one minute.
Theoretically, they had to have been Palestinian, but in practice, they didn't check. Secondly, and this is something I'm sure was not going to change, while the author has substantial geopolitical and general knowledge (the one real strength of the work), he is not a good fiction writer. World War Z is supposed to be an "oral history" of the Zombie War, in the model of Studs Terkel's Working (and other works), which relied on first-person interviews. First, a disclaimer: I gave up on the book after 44 pages. Brooks is a rich, secular, American-born Jew. But what turned my stomach early on was his ridiculously pro-Israeli bent.
You see, ONLY Israel knew to protect itself from the zombie apocalypse. And here's the kicker: That great benevolent state opened its arms to all Arab refugees with a clean bill of health (i.e., who were not zombies) to protect them from what it knew was coming.
Do you think that may have something to do with his contempt for Orthodox Israeli Jews and his fantasy-world belief that Israel really just wants to get along with the Arab world.To be fair, my general impression is that a heck of a lot of thought and research went into World War Z. World War Z did improve, moderately, as I read on (I was ready to give up after about 15 pages), but the author's politics -- which stand in stark contrast to my own -- began to infect the writing to a degree that I knew I would not enjoy the rest of the book.Before going into that, let me first share my apolitical criticisms: To begin, the book is extremely boring.
The secular government of Israel did this against the fervent protest of Orthodox religious Jews, who then started a civil war within Israel. If the character is an Arab, there may be some obligatory "Death to the Jews." stereotyping, but the vocabulary and general manner of speech of literally every character is exactly the same -- that of Brooks.
This made for a very tedious read.Now on to the author's politics: I've seen others complain that Brook is overly "P.C." That may be. But because the Orthodox didn't serve in the military, they were easily crushed.
I just wish all that work could have materialized into something more entertaining and less infected with the author's politics (unless, of course, his politics were correct).
Exactly as it was described and an overall great book to read. It arrived right on time as well.
This is a must read zombie novel. It tells the story of humanity's fight to survive against the zombie hordes.Max Brooks is the author and he has a masterpiece here.
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