This is a great zombie story, a bit different from the others I have read, as these zombies are demon spirits, accidentally released from the void, following orders from their leader, Ob. The Rising was my first Brian Keene novel and I can't wait to read more. I can tell that Keene is a fan of Stephen King as there is a line straight out of The Shining and a lot of mention of other worlds. Annoyingly poor editing aside, this was a fantastic read. The ending was extremely frustrating, as it didn'...

So to be perfectly honest, I’ve been going back and forth on whether on not I actually wanted to write this review. It basically came down to ‘not burning bridges’ in a very small universe, or being honest with my readers. (I know, all three of you.)When I weighted it out, I decided a bad review treated fairly and note based on gut reaction might be better for the internet as a whole then a blank space. Plus, that way, as new readers show up, (I’ll welcome you, reader number four,) they can feel...

Fast Moving: This story is all about the action. The story keeps moving with little time spent on exposition. If you like, your stories fast-paced this one should be in your consideration set. However, the story does move along at the expense of a lot of character development and is a bit light in the plot category.This book is trying a different spin on the zombie legend, but I ultimately grew bored. It seems more Sci-Fi than zombie. Lastly, I know what you are going to say… Sonja you are talki...

When I first read The Rising five years ago, I didn't much care for it. Here's why: early on in Brian Keene's zombie adventure, we discover that it's not just humans that can become reanimated. Animals are fair game for zombification, too, and the demonic Siquissim that possess Earth's corpses give all these zombies the ability to talk. This means that in addition to talking zombie humans, we also get talking zombie fish and talking zombie lions. My first encounter with these creatures seriously...

It’s zombie month and I am reading this one for Jare’s Spills & Chills Release Challenge over at bookcrossing.com. I seem to have quite the backlog of Keene books and they are neatly fitting the challenges. Awesome.Having enjoyed Keene’s Conqueror Worms post-apocalyptic novel about giant worms (seriously) I’m excited to see what he does with zombies.The book starts out similarly to The Conqueror Worms with a male protagonist telling the story of how his world collapsed but this time around i...

Epic! Brian Keene is a master of horror. Throw away your common conception of typic zombies. The Rising is in a league of its own.

I'm way late for the Brian Keene party. Especially for The Rising, a book that reignited the zombie craze, and caused countless imitators. This is is a must read book for anyone who calls themselves a horror fan, not just for the story and the writing, but for the incredibly huge impact this book had on society and the zombie mythos. As usual, I finished the book, had my thoughts, and then went and read a bunch of reviews here. I was actually surprised to see reviews all the way across the board...

Oh dear. Where to start...Whilst looking for zombie books worth reading, I saw this one mentioned and figured it looked like it might be a decent read.I was so wrong. Maybe the fellow in the forums that mentioned this book as being good was a 7 year old?Reading this was painful. It started out alright, and well written, but then degenerated into what can only be described as a paper version of the worst B movie ever made. Really I only need to give you a few examples of things that happen in thi...

When you're reading about the end of the world, what's better than zombies? They are relentless, they spread like wildfire, and they hunger for human flesh. Under the weight of hordes of the undead, civilization folds in on itself and the survivors are left to fend for themselves. That's why I like a good zombie apocalypse story. And that's why I was so excited to read Brian Keene's story.The problem with zombie apocalypse stories is that they tend to be formulaic. There is an outbreak. Civiliza...

The Rising: 10th Anniversary Edition This edition restores about thirty thousand words to the original release. I can not believe its been ten years already. Not your "usual" zombie book. A beautifully produced edition. This is copy 51 of 333 signed and numbered copies.This is book 1 of 3 of Brian Keene’s Maelstrom Series IV.

I'm sorry - zombie fish? I kind of lost it after that...

The shit has hit the fan and the dead walk the earth! Survivors wander around, staying one step ahead of the undead hordes and struggling to survive. Rogue military units are on patrol, rounding up survivors. Meanwhile, Jim Thurmond is on a trek from West Virginia to New Jersey to find his son...I'm a zombie fan from way back. My favorite movie as a teenager was the 1990 Night of the Living Dead remake. I have the Return of the Living Dead soundtrack on vinyl (I can smell your brains!) and Zombi...

Edit: When I first wrote this review, I was aghast at the terrible typos. I now know that this was not Keene's fault, and he is in fact a grammatically A-Okay writer. There is now a new author's preferred edition just published, I am sure that it has been polished up!So avoid this original paperback edition and be sure to get his latest.Every once in a while, I'll find myself caught up in a novel and, despite some flaws that would bug me, there's that certain something that sets the hook and pul...

Not your normal Zombie’s, thank fuck, these can think, even plan their main course from well done to medium rare (that's where you come in) and the return of the dead is eagerly awaited, they have purpose. Although it’s the normal method of dispatch in a head shot or decapitation, luckily that's pretty much one of the few things in common with your average literary zombie catastrophe. These Zombies are controlled by a demon like entity that has an intelligence and the wherewithal of the previous...

DNF @ 35%I had read this once before and remember enjoying it (maybe in my late teens or early twenties?), but I couldn't get into it this time around. It isn't a bad book by any means - in fact, I think it offers an incredibly unique twist on zombies, by throwing in a supernatural/demonic quality to the "virus". It's clearly evident how Brian Keene affected the zombie story genre tremendously with the innovative perspective he offered, and the switches in perspectives give a unique insight into...

Nothing stays dead for long. The dead are returning to life, intelligent, determined…and very hungry.This is a post-apocalyptic, zombie novel which was excellent; it's such a page turner and written very well with great characters.It's a different take on the zombie genre also, the zombies can talk, they can drive and can use weaponry.If you enjoy post-apocalyptic books with lots of action, I recommend this one.Definitely the best zombie book I've ever read!I've already bought the second book.

3.5 stars!It didn't take long to make my way through this zombie filled wasteland of a book. Humans, (whether they still be humans or be they zombies), are not the only monsters here. I loved the originality of this story. I can't get into the specifics of it without spoilers, but some of the things imagined and written about in The Rising have still not been done in other zombie books or movies. I really felt something for a few of these characters too. The author pretty much put everyone a...

I am a zombie fan and like to watch movies and read books about this sub-genre of the horror genre (along with vampires and werewolves).This book was first published in 2003, re-starting the zombie genre. The edition I read was the authors uncut preferred version.The story features several different characters as they clash with the zombies and their fellow humans. The main character is Jim Thurmond who is traveling across the zombie infested lands to find his son.Dr Baker is another character w...

There are too many things wrong with this book. Despite some original ideas and a few worthy tense moments, it is most of the time laughably bad, and embarrassingly badly written.The amount of typos and the atrocious grammar was shocking. Someone needs to tell Keene, the copyeditors and publishers that the past tense of "to spit" is "spat" and that you don’t tell a person to "lay" but to "lie" down. Your prose can also benefit by not using the word "again" (or any word, really) again and again t...

As the 21st Century dawned, zombies--if you’ll excuse the expression--were dead. Independently and through the use of three different media, that was about to change. Almost simultaneously Brian Keene published The Rising, an English film called 28 Days Later was released, and Robert Kirkman started planning a comic book called The Walking Dead. There’s a story that Kirkman had to tell his publishers that aliens were secretly behind the zombie plague to get the comic approved. If true, this news...