The first zombie movie I remember seeing was George A. Romero’s
Dawn of the Dead, probably when I was
in high school—and I was mesmerized by its iconic shopping mall gore and
mayhem. My mother raised me on the old
Universal horror movies like The Wolfman,
which were scary, but Dawn of the Dead
was jaw-droppingly shocking. I was
hooked on zombies.
Like millions of other television
viewers, I’m looking forward to the new season of The Walking Dead on AMC—although the show’s premise is achingly similar
to a television series my husband and collaborator Steven Barnes and I pitched
years ago called Devil’s Wake.
Our original concept was simple:
life in a small town after an infection creates creatures very much like the
walking dead. We wanted to tackle issues
like how to rebuild society once it breaks down, and how we create family after
losing our loved ones.
Our pitch didn’t fly. CBS was in the midst of developing a new show
called Jericho, which was too similar
to our concept, substituting a nuclear event for a zombie outbreak.
Oh, well. But Steve and I had published a short story
set in the world of Devil’s Wake, “Danger
Word,” in an anthology compiled by Brandon Massey called Dark Dreams—recently reprinted in Living Dead 2. We always intended to expand our concept into a
novel.
We got our chance with editor
Malaika Adero at Atria Books, but with one change—instead of focusing on the
adults, we wrote a YA/crossover novel with teenagers seeking safety on a
disaster-ridden road trip in a rickety school bus. Devil’s
Wake is the first in a series of novels, fulfilling our dream of bringing
our zombie world to life.
 |
| Atria Books--July 31st |
Our novel never mentions the word “zombie,”
but Booklist says we got it right: “Zombie
lovers won’t be able to put down Barnes’ [and Due’s] gripping yarn, which will
leave them hungry for the next installment.”
Why do we love zombies so
much? Maybe it’s our fear of our inevitable
mortality, or fear of chaos and war. In
the zombie culture, more than a few survivalists live as if they truly do
believe the Zombie Apocalypse is only days away.
The
Walking Dead won’t be back until the fall, but Devil’s Wake will be published July 31st. Until then, you can follow news from the zombiesphere with the “Devil’s Wake Survivors’ Daily” on Twitter—just
follow @ZombiesFreak.
Soon, I’ll post an excerpt from the
book here.
For now, we have shot this book
trailer to give you a taste and a tease.
Here’s wishing you dark dreams.
Bestselling novelist Steven Barnes has
been nominated for a Cable ACE award for his television writing on “The Outer
Limits” and “The Twilight Zone.” He has
also written more than a dozen novels, including the award-winning alternate
history Lion’s Blood. He latest collaboration Larry Niven and Jerry
Pournelle is the recently published e-book The
Secret of Black Ship Island. Visit his website at www.diamondhour.com.
Tananarive Due, an American Book
Award winner, has been nominated for the Bram Stoker Award and International
Horror Guild Award for My Soul to Keep
and The Good House. Her latest novel is My Soul to Take. Barnes and Due also co-author the
award-winning Tennyson Hardwick mystery series in partnership with actor Blair
Underwood. Her website is at www.tananarivedue.com.
