I cannot think of a better way to release a book that tackles the curious question of living zombies than a zombie flash mob. I spent the afternoon sipping a wonderful Watermelon iced tea and then wandering into range of a hungry mob of zombies who mauled one woman and then did the thriller dance.
Yeah, that happened.
The mob was part of a novel release party at Arizona State University for author Tom Leveen and his new book Sick. Leveen is a noted YA author whose previous works are slowly racking up awards. Zombies–horror in general–is not a new topic for him. He is an avid follower of the King (Stephen, not Elvis). Following the mob scene, Leveen spoke along with other scholars about the role of zombies in popular culture.
Zombies have been around for an incredibly long time. Over the last few decades the idea of zombies has morphed from the Vodoo-insipired stories of Haiti to the infection-driven plague set forth to eat all of humanity.
There is a certain simplicity in the zombie mythos. In the world of zombies there is little to distinguish us besides Alive or not, and the living are forced to band together in order to stay living. Zombies and post-apocalyptic stories flower from the same tree. Both tell the tale of folks who want to separate from the shackles of modern society and live in the land of simple goals. It doesn’t get simpler than, “Stay alive!”
Doomed to live in a zombie world, I would have very few rules and but two goals: Stay alive, and find some more of that watermelon tea.
Some Thoughts:
- Fell behind quite a bit in the class, which is resulting in a inability to do things on the time frame I really want to do them. What I am instead left with is a lot of confused kids who, while happy, are probably losing faith in their ability to trust when things will be due. At any rate, it isn’t really fair to give them more work until the past work is graded.