Book Review- Zombies of the World by Ross Payton

Title: Zombies of the World

 Author:  Ross Payton

Series:  N/A

Published:  15 June 2011

Length: 114 pages

Warnings: zombies.

Source: Author

Other info: Ross Payton has also written Curriculum of Conspiracy and Road Trip

(part of) Summary : Zombies menace humanity, yet we barely understand them.

There are books that show you how to kill the undead but this is the first study to explain the importance of zombies to us. Zombies of the World reveals the undead to be a valuable part of our ecosystem and the key to new discoveries in medicine and technology.No other book covers these topics. Zombies of the World brilliantly documents that evolution has led to a wide variety of species.

Few outside the scientific community even realize that creatures like the Egyptian Mummy (Mortifera mumia aegyptus) are actually zombies. Some species are even harmless to humans. The Dancing Zombie (Mortifera immortalis choreographicus) only seeks to thrill humans with elaborate dance routines. Destroying the undead isn t always the answer. Even if we could annihilate all zombies, we would lose knowledge potentially vital to our own survival.

After decades of research, we have no idea why zombies never tire or stop. They possess an endless source of energy to shamble or (in some cases) sprint after us. Unlocking this mystery could benefit all humanity. Only Zombies of the World tackles this issue and many other paradoxes.

Review: I always find it interesting when someone decides to make a non-fiction style book relating to a fictional subject. It’s always interesting to see what elements of the specific myths they’ll pick up on, and how they’ll present it.

This is set out like a  proper non fiction book, with a introduction, and a thorough guide to zombies of the world to the author’s view. It gives a full insight into what makes a zombie reanimate, how it interacts with humanity, where they came from and so on. It then gives twenty zombie profiles, one for each of the main species of zombie, and gives a thorough view of all of them, providing information as to where they crop up and how endangered they are.  Then it gives you advice as to how to survive a zombie encounter, with lots of tips that could be useful. Then there’s a history of the undead and how they interact with humans throughout various points in time, such as being seen as demons in the olden days. Finally there is a chapter on how science is tackling zombies, in terms of things like energy supplies, and immortality. A lot happens.

I really do think that if zombies were real, then a book on them would turn out somewhat like this. The language was always really informative and descriptive, like a real non-fiction book would need to be.

I love  the range of zombies covered  in this. Some of them seem to be ones that we tend to encounter in the zombie novels of today, and some others are ones from various other mythologies, and some I think are completely new ones made up for this book. The guide section was consistent offering the same information for all of them, unless the information is “unknown”, which while being realistic, was kind of annoying. I wanted to know about these zombies!

The illustrations were brightly coloured and consistent, not just greys and greens and reds, what you would expect a zombie book to be like, but quite a lot of colours to make it interesting. The photos included are also relevant.

Overall: Strength 3 tea to a book that would be worth consulting as a good source of information if zombies were real 

Links: Amazon | Goodreads | Author website |