Dust
Joan Frances Turner
Ace, Sep 7 2010, $24.95
ISBN: 9780441019281

After not buckling her seatbelt, she died at fifteen in a car accident and was interred in a zone void of humans. She wakes up inside her coffin and though she has only one good arm as her right was almost severed off in the accident, she pushes her way out of the coffin and digs through the dirt. The teen immediately knows what she is: a revenant (zombie) and joins a pack of her kind. They live in a human-free zone where they hunt animals for food.

Jessie is an undead who does not suffer from zombie amnesia as she remembers her previous mortal life though nine years have passed since she passed. She has feelings for those she considers family (past and present) though humans lock them away with putting electrical security fences their homes as if they were illegal immigrants and the police have standing orders to kill at first sight. However an inexplicable plague arises like none before as this pandemic disease can kill human and revenant. If a miracle cure is not found soon, both species will go way of the dinosaur turning into fossils and Dust.

This is a first rate urban fantasy that “humanizes” zombies who are not mindless shark like predators, but a different sentient life form with feelings for others. Jessie is a strong willed resolute soul who thrives on coping with whatever splitter fastball life throws at her head. Readers will root for her while enjoying Joan Frances Turner’s sensual revamping of zombie fever.

Harriet Klausner

The Chamber of Ten
Christopher Golden and Tim Lebbon
Ballantine, Jul 27 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780553386561

As Venice is sinking under the sea, residents have already shut down the bottom floors of their homes. American archaeologist Geena Hodge and her assistant lover Nico Lombardi have gotten Italian government permission to save as much of the heritage from the encroaching Adriatic in what is the Bibliotheca project that has BBC filming praying not another Capone vault.

Digging in Piazza San Marco, Geena, assisted by Nico and some students, finds Petrarch’s library. Beyond the famous lost library, they uncover the fabled Chamber of Ten. However, nothing goes smoothly as the walls collapse allowing flood waters to inundate the chamber. Soon afterward Nico acts insane as he has become possessed by a Renaissance Era mage battling three evil immortals with the city at stake.

This is more an exciting thriller than a horror tale. The story line starts off as fast-paced as any tale this year and as vivid (with its dank damp picture of the city), but never quite keeps the accelerator at that incredible opening rate of speed. Still Readers will enjoy the Chamber of Ten as the archeologist and her team is caught up in the middle of a centuries old Magical war in which Venice is at stake.

Harriet Klausner

Lady Lazarus
Michele Lang
Tor, Aug 31 2010, $14.99
ISBN 9780765323170

In 1939 Budapest, Magda Lazarus is the eldest daughter of an eldest daughter whose lineage traces back to the ancient witch Ein Dor. Magda is the servant of Bathory the vampire. Fleeing Stalin’s wrath, a Russian Jew Zihad Juhuri pleads with Magda to help him obtain the Book of the Angel Raziel that only one who has returned from the dead like a Drinker can obtain. He fears the Nazis will obtain the greatest weapon, this biblical tome, ever known. At the same her sister Gisele the seer warns of a pandemic destruction of the Jews by the Nazi abomination.

Magda searches for the tome. On her quest she encounters a horde of diverse supernatural Nazi essences who want to prevent her from becoming the Lazarus witch who can reach the angel Raziel. As she gets closer to completing her mission that she hopes prevents the mass devastation her sibling predicts is coming, she meets and magically duels the King of Lies.

This is a fascinating WW II fantasy thriller that builds its mythos from mostly the Jewish lore sprinkled with some Hungarian and other Eastern Europe myths. The story line is fast-paced as time is running out on Magda while Nazis werewolves, demons, and worse assault her preferable to kill her permanently because she is a threat to their domination. Although the language can turn stilted in an archaic way, which in fairness brings realism with it, readers will enjoy the exhilarating tale of Magda trying to become the Lazarus in order to protect her family, her people and Europe in that order.

Harriet Klausner

Infinite Days
Rebecca Maizel
St. Martin’s Griffin, Aug 3 2010, $9.99
ISBN: 9780312649913

Five centuries, nine decades and two years ago Lenah Beaudonte became a vampire. In recent decades, she has come to loath her undead life. She wants to die a human so she would no longer dine on mortals.

Now after 592 years she awakens a disoriented and frightened human after a long period of a deep sleep. Her soul mate Rhode, who existed so much longer than she, displayed his guilt for changing her and his love for her by sacrificing himself in an ancient ritual so she can revert. Lenah struggles to acclimate to being human. Thanks to Rhode she attends the exclusive Wickham Boarding School as a sixteen year old student and marvels how far mankind has come with technology. However, her crypt is opened by her vampire coven who finds her gone. They obsess, especially her emotionally hurt last lover Vicken, over finding their missing queen at any cost to her.

This is an exciting vampire thriller with a strong cast that makes what happened to Lenah seem real. Besides the intrepid heroine, the three main males in her life (Rhode, Vicken and Justin who tries to keep her safe) make for a strong urban fantasy as the emotions of this quartet and other coven members feel genuine. Sub-genre fans will enjoy Rebecca Maizel’s entertaining character-driven dark with a glimmering of light tale of the Undead.

Harriet Klausner

Siren
John Everson
Leisure, Aug 1 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780843963540

When Josh drowned, his death also figuratively killed his parents Evan and Sarah. Suffering from aquaphobia, Evan watched in horror as his son drowned. Now he watches in horror as his beloved wife drowns her sorrow with alcohol.

Over a year since the tragedy, Evan meets naked Ligeia on the beach he tramps every night before bringing his intoxicated wife home from the bar. She provides Evan with an escape from his nightmarish failure as a father and now a husband. She sexually entices him with her perfect body and her silky voice drowns out Josh’s plea to him for help. Mostly she makes him forget, but not entirely as he tries to ignore her siren’s call by returning to his wife.

Siren plays out on two levels; as a horror thriller and as a psychological family drama. There is also a second subplot that provides the audience with a late nineteenth century look at Ligeia’s past, which is a two edged sword depending on the reader’s taste; on the one hand it anchors the siren story line, but also detracts from the reader’s imagination of whether she is true or a desperate figment of grieving Evan’s psyche. Still this is a powerful thriller as John Everson uses the loss of an offspring as the springboard to the gripping Siren.

Harriet Klausner

The Ocean Dark
Jack Rogan
Ballantine, Jul 27 2010, $7.99
ISBN: 9780553385182

In a rarely noticed remote island in the Caribbean, the Mariposa cargo ship heads to its meeting with the Antoinette to pick up an illegal shipment of guns. However, the criminal crew mostly from Costa Rica is attacked by deadly apparently amphibious creatures.

When the Antoinette finally reaches the rendezvous point, they find an island littered with broken ships. The crew of almost entirely felons with one undercover FBI agent on board is under siege. A nearby FBI vessel serendipitously follows the Antoinette, but hesitates whether to intervene. While in the States DOD scientists have an idea what is terrorizing the Antoinette, but protocol slows down their assistance. All hell has broken loose in a tiny dot in the Caribbean.

This is an exciting horror thriller as the beasts mount up quite a number of kills even before readers meet the amphibious species up front and in person. The story line is fast-paced with mostly unsympathetic characters like the last survivor on the Mariposa Braulio putting a human face to the terror. Action-packed from the first bloody scream to the last, fans will enjoy this exhilarating sea thriller mindful of the Beast from the Black Lagoon especially over the first third of the novel.

Harriet Klausner

Married with Zombies
Jesse Petersen
Orbit, Sep 1 2010, $7.99
ISBN 9780316102865

Seattle based David and Sarah hope to salvage their faltering marriage as they love one another. When they go to their appointment with their marriage counselor, they find Dr. Erica Kelly dining on another couple. Shocked, they flee in spite of charges for a missed visit.

They manage to reach their home safely, but remain stunned with what they witnessed. After discussing what next, David and Sarah decide to visit his sister in nearby Longview to insure she is okay. Everywhere they go they are chased by a zombie horde. Having seen the Romero and Ron Zombie films and other sub-genre movies of the walking dead, they know how to fight the enemy. As they remain struggling first with seemingly irreconcilable differences, they team up as married slayers battling the dead while having each other’s back but also thinking of placing the knife elsewhere.

Based on the principle the “couple who slays together stays together”; Married with Zombies is a fun lighthearted horror thriller that never takes itself even remotely seriously. Fast-paced, but eventually repetitive with a ton of zombie tangos and dysfunctional marital discord, this remains an amusing lampooning of zombie fever.

Harriet Klausner

The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer And The Undead
Mark Twain and Don Borchert
Tor, Aug 3 2010, $13.99
ISBN: 9780765327291

The plague turned people into zombies who could only be stopped by beheading them or shooting them in the head. People like young Tom Sawyer and his Aunt Polly adapted to the Zum as southerners called the zombies with some safety adjustments to normal living like sharpening the top of wooden fences. Tom ever the imp causing Polly and the townsfolk despair was punished for a misdeed by being forced to perform zombie antiterrorist fence sharpening, but conned the other lads into doing his work.

Tom, Huck and their friend play pirate on a nearby island. They stay for days and rumors spread amongst the townsfolk they were dead until they miraculously return home. Another time Tom and Huck get lost in a cave with Becky Thatcher and the Zum serial killer Injun’ Joe.

This is amusing historical fantasy uses the prime cast and story line from the Mark Twain classic, but adds Zum fever to the tale. The cast is solid, but the plot is clearly owned by the mischievous title character and his prime adversary the Undead Injun’ Joe serial killing Zum. Readers who enjoyed zombie invasion of the classics like the respective tales by Seth Grahame-Smith and Steve Hockensmith starring Jane Austen or W. Bill Czolgosz’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Zombie Jim will want to read Tom’s undead farce with Injun’ Joe.

Harriet Klausner

The Reapers Are the Angels
Alden Bell
Holt, $15.00
ISBN 978-0-8050-9243-1

Fifteen years old Temple has learned one thing in her life; either one kills the zombies and other predators or they die. She can never remember a time before the Meatskins when the globe was relatively safe, but recalls the old man and her younger sibling before she was forced to begin her trek to nowhere.

At an alleged safe house, human Abraham Todd assaults her. Following her credo, she kills him but flees before his family or allies can come after her. Outraged by the teen’s murder of his brother, Moses vows to find, torture and kill Temple. On her trek, Temple finds a dim witted mute Maury who starts tagging along with her. She cannot shake him and soon feels responsible for his safety; as he brings back memories she would prefer to forget. Meanwhile Moses stalks her and the meatskin zombies chase her and her companion.

The world of Alden Bell is a dark place, a terrible place to live but Temple refuses to die so circumstances of survival has made her one of the fittest and toughest. Temple makes the grim convergence of horror with science fiction work as she seeks redemption instead of the remorse that fills her soul. Her journey is deadly battling predators of all kind; some who would rape and then kill her; other who would eat her to death. The Reapers Are the Angeles is an exciting fast-paced thriller that grips readers from start to finish.

Harriet Klausner

Pariah
Bob Fingerman
Tor, Aug 3 2010, $14.99
ISBN: 9780765326270

Around the world in eighty seconds is what the zombie pandemic seemed like to those not bitten. It occurred so fast, zombie became the dominant species on the planet. Humans were food and forced to hide behind barriers. New York City, for instance, contains eight million of these reanimated dead and little pockets of hiding mortals.

In an apartment building in Manhattan, a few souls remain concealed, but are running out of water and food. From windows they can see the supermarket, but zombies hang out on the streets seeking fresh flesh. The besieged group see hope when a female teenage human walks freely while the zombies avoid her. Mona brings food and drinks as she moves in with the adults at 1620 York Avenue, but the danger remains constant.

This is an exciting fast-paced zombie horror tale that grips the audience early and never let’s up as it will remind readers of I Am Legend by Richard Matheson (and to a lesser degree the Will Smith movie). The vivid opening in which zombies walk the streets while humans are locked behind barriers is riveting with an implied social spin as to who owns the neighborhoods. Additionally with civilization collapsed, the humans trapped inside an apartment with no electricity prove horror comes in many shapes and forms as Bob Fingerman provides a taut thriller.

Harriet Klausner