IZ: Introduction

Introduction

IZ is my take on the classic zombie tales – well, it is in a way.  They act a bit like the classic zombie, but they can’t really be considered your classic zombie.  You’ll find out why as you’re reading IZ.

I was really tired of certain facets of zombie stories:

Zombies are always created by some completely unbelievable process.  Viral infection, strange radiation experiments, parasites, and all sorts of things you have to work with the whole “suspension of disbelief” thing to make the reader feel zombies could happen.  Not a one of them really gives a good workable reason why zombies exist – all science must be thrown out the window.

Zombie movies tend to start at the point where all of civilization has collapsed.  There’s no ramp up, and in some movies it’s even an overnight process where one day the world is fine except that satellite that re-entered the atmosphere, and the next 99% of the population is gone.

Zombies have evolved over time into faster moving zombies, or even slightly smarter zombies. But generally speaking, there’s nothing really fundamental that has changed over the years (unless you count the Rage Virus from 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later.)

Zombies are always killed by destroying the brain.  Anything else just results in a crippled zombie that can get you later.

I thought about the nature of zombies for a while before reading World War Z.  I kept thinking there’s some serious room for remodeling zombies one of these days, and reading World War Z was interesting because Max Brooke refined the existing classic zombie genre down to it’s core fundamentals, and put it into an almost believable setting.  It did fix one of my complaints – the population hadn’t collapsed completely when World War Z starts.  Most of my other complains – including the ones I haven’t bothered listing here – still applied.

I started exploring a little bit of existing technologies and where they might lead down the line.  Then I had that moment of clarity – I see exactly how I could make zombies a workable, scientifically based problem if I changed one important variable:  I set it in the near future.

I’m not going to spoil the hows and whys of the existence of zombies in the IZ universe, you’ll have to discover what went wrong as you’re reading the story.  Why spoil all the fun up front?  In essence though this might be thought of as a Science Fiction Zombie book.  A lot of time is spent making the science of IZ work as an extrapolation of where our technology is now.  Most of the technology used by the characters is pretty easily identifiable.  IZ is only 10 years into the future – technology moves fast these days.  Take a look at your smart phone and compare it to what was on the market 10 years ago to get an idea how the incremental progress of technology add up quickly.

There’s so much I’d love to say about this story – but I’m not going to.  Too many of the things I’d like to say would spoil the fun!  But, I’ll say this:  I changed one rule about zombies – no, not the part where I set it in the future, that’s just a way to bring about the change I wanted.  I won’t tell you what the rule is, you’ll figure that one out pretty quickly in the story!  The effects of changing one rule changes almost everything you’ve known about zombie tales – it cascades down through all the parts of the story.

I said almost everything.  There’s still one core thing that exists in common with most every zombie story:  humanity trying to survive against impossible odds.

I sincerely hope you enjoy reading IZ as much as I enjoy writing it!  In fact… I hope you enjoy reading it so much you decide to help support it’s continued serialization, along with the other two books that are being serialized:  “Autobiography of a Super-Villain” and “Muse”.  Hit the “Support This Now” button on any book page for more information on what you can do and what you get for it.  For example – access to more of the story than what’s currently posted (the first book of the “Muse” series is already completed, and books 2 & 3 are under development), signed & numbered copies of the books, and more!

Enjoy!