Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Rot & Ruin
    Rot & Ruin
    Rot & Ruin
    Ebook468 pages6 hours

    Rot & Ruin

    By Jonathan Maberry

    4.5/5

    ()

    Switch to audiobook
    Read preview

    About this ebook

    In the zombie-infested, post-apocalyptic America where Benny Imura lives, every teenager must find a job by the time they turn fifteen or get their rations cut in half. Benny doesn't want to apprentice as a zombie hunter with his boring older brother Tom, but he has no choice. He expects a tedious job whacking zoms for cash, but what he gets is a vocation that will teach him what it means to be human.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
    Release dateSep 14, 2010
    ISBN9781442402348
    Author

    Jonathan Maberry

    Jonathan Maberry is a New York Times bestselling and five-time Bram Stoker Award–winning author, anthology editor, comic book writer, executive producer, and writing teacher. He is the creator of V Wars (Netflix) and Rot & Ruin (Alcon Entertainment). His books have been sold to more than two dozen countries. To learn more about Jonathan, visit him online at jonathanmaberry.

    Read more from Jonathan Maberry

    Related to Rot & Ruin

    Titles in the series (7)

    View More
    View More

    Related ebooks

    YA Horror For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Take a Writer Like Him: My Complicated Love Affair with Kingsley Amis

      Aug 24, 2018

      1. As much as I may rack my brain, there are 15 minutes or so in the dark that I can’t account for and that I’ll never get back—15 minutes during which, I have to think, that creep’s hands were touching my body. It’s a weird thing to think about all

      12 min read

    • Article

      The Power Of Love

      Jan 25, 2024

      The Power Of Love
      6 min read

    • Article

      The Power Of Love

      Jan 25, 2024

      The Power Of Love
      6 min read

    • Article

      Welcome To the mad House

      Feb 15, 2024

      Welcome To the mad House
      5 min read

    • Article

      Remembering Toni

      Aug 6, 2019

      Remembering Toni
      8 min read

    • Article

      Tiffany Haddish

      Jan 7, 2022

      Tiffany Haddish
      2 min read

    • Article

      California Screaming

      Mar 24, 2021

      California Screaming
      5 min read

    • Article

      A Survivor Responds

      Jun 21, 2021

      A Survivor Responds
      2 min read

    • Article

      Nuclear

      Oct 7, 2021

      Nuclear
      7 min read

    • Article

      If Beale Street Could Talk

      Jan 10, 2019

      If Beale Street Could Talk
      5 min read

    • Article

      Jon Richardson

      Apr 17, 2023

      Jon Richardson
      6 min read

    • Article

      Bump In The Night

      Oct 6, 2022

      Bump In The Night
      8 min read

    • Article

      Cat And Mouse

      Sep 28, 2023

      Cat And Mouse
      6 min read

    • Article

      Just Make Someone Feel Something: The Millions Interviews Bud Smith and Rae Buleri

      May 12, 2022

      "I come to fiction to suspend my disbelief. The book is a drug. I'm trying to take this drug. Get melted off this drug." The post Just Make Someone Feel Something: The Millions Interviews Bud Smith and Rae Buleri appeared first on The Millions.

      8 min read

    • Article

      ‘I Stopped Being A Person I Liked’: Lena Dunham On Time Out, Rehab And Marriage

      Sep 25, 2022

      It was a decade ago, at the sharpest peak of Lena Dunham’s fame, while her show, Girls, was being heralded as a masterpiece and Dunham herself as the voice of her generation, when producers asked what she’d like to make next. Anything, they said. Som

      9 min read

    • Article

      Now I know GRIEF LASTS FOREVER

      Jul 25, 2023

      My brother Tim was larger than life. I know it’s a cliché, but he really was. He was tall with dark hair, a large grin and loud. Really quite loud. Funny, caring, always up for whatever life threw at him. Except for what happened one January evening,

      3 min read

    • Article

      Tony Hillerman's Daughter Anne On Keeping Her Father's Mysteries Alive

      May 29, 2018

      With new focus on a female character, Anne Hillerman is successfully reviving her dad's immensely popular novels.

      3 min read

    • Article

      Who’d Win In A Fight?

      May 28, 2020

      Who’d Win In A Fight?
      5 min read

    • Article

      Bye Mum, I Love You

      Jun 15, 2023

      Bye Mum, I Love You
      7 min read

    • Article

      Heavy Heart

      Feb 5, 2022

      Heavy Heart
      6 min read

    • Article

      How Long Does GRIEF LAST?

      Sep 23, 2021

      How Long Does GRIEF LAST?
      3 min read

    • Article

      Death’s Plus-One

      Sep 8, 2017

      Death’s Plus-One
      4 min read

    • Article

      Bada Bing!

      Sep 16, 2021

      Bada Bing!
      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Rot & Ruin

    4.5/5

    89 ratings45 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 5/5
      amazing book loved hit the whole series is amazing recommend to anyone can hold your attention very well
    • 5/5
      I so appreciate this book. Although the world is dark, the characters have light of their own. It keeps the post apocalyptic subject from getting me down. Thanks for the tale. Can’t wait to read the next.
    • 5/5
      Zombie books are not usually something I gravitate towards. Before this, the only other book I read about Zombies was Warm Bodies, which I liked but didn't love. This book, however was quite a nice surprise!

      The world building was awesome and watching the relationship between our main character Benny and his brother Tom grow, was just heartwarming. This is so much more than a book about Zombies. There's a little mystery, a little teenage romance, and great action scenes.

      So glad I came across this unexpected gem and am looking forward to further adventures without cast of characters.
    • 5/5
      so far this has been a terrific series. You feel like you're there with them, fighting, scared, loving, missing. it's a rollercoaster ride to the end. Love it!
    • 4/5
      my first zombie novel and I really enjoyed it.
    • 3/5
      Rating: 3 of 5I read Rot and Ruin in one sitting. So obviously the story held my attention - mainly because Maberry kept hinting at deeper meanings and then I wanted the full story - but overall it didn't blow my mind or get me super excited to read the sequels.Thankfully, the aforementioned hinting did lead to full explanations. That meant there were several scenes of Tom explaining something to Benny or telling him about past events. All the telling usually happened in the middle of action or potential action, so it did not feel like info dump.Benny, the main character, wasn't all that likable and he often vacillated between morose/irrational and friendly/sensible. (Was that intentional? Because teenagers act that sometimes?) There were inconsistencies in worldbuilding and plot, but nothing that couldn't be overlooked by the casual reader. I dunno; I just never fully lost myself in the world or characters, which is why I won't move on to the sequel.This one's probably a good fit for readers who enjoy zombie stories with adequate characterization, moderate action, and high sentimentality.Note to self: Am I in a reading funk (October 2012)? Or am I picking the "wrong" books for me? The last few books I've read have been well-written but just okay. Hopefully I'll read one soon that'll knock my socks off.
    • 3/5
      OK, first let me state that the three stars are not a reflection on Mr. Maberry's writing. On the contrary -- if you read this book, you will find excellent writing, wonderful plotting, interesting world building and great characters. But you will also find zombies. In fact, you will be reading about life after the zombie apocalypse. And I just don't buy zombies ( I think they're silly). Many otherwise wonderful books have been ruined for me because they have zombies in them. And to me, zombies are gross and horrible, but also completely ridiculous and not at all convincing. Whereas I am OK with ring wraiths, as in Tolkien, gods, as in Megan Whalen Turner, and nature magic, as in Hilari Bell. But dead people who rise from the grave and try and eat your brains? Nope! That's just too silly.

      But I digress. What I'm trying to say is, don't pay any attention to my three stars, if you like zombies. For you, this book may well be a 5 star read! Because there are many wonderful things in it, plus zombies. The characters and their interactions are really vivid and engaging, and the plot is compelling and in places really moving, as well.

      In sum -- I think this is a really good book. Well worth reading, despite the zombies -- just not my favorite, because of the zombies.
    • 3/5
      As much as I love zombie movies, I cant seem to ever get into zombie novels.
    • 4/5
      I am really, really not a zombie person.* When I saw this one had won the Cybil for YA SF/F, I kind of groaned and went "REALLY?" And then I read it and enjoyed it, which just goes to show you. It's fast-paced and smart and funny and sad. I loved Tom and Benny's banter and the real relationship they had. It's another book where the defining relationship is familial, not romantic (though there is a bit of that as well). It wraps up nicely, though there's room for a sequel. The last 100 pages or so was a little weaker, in my opinion, especially with the sudden expositions all over the place, but all in all I was very pleasantly surprised.

      * The first draft of this sentence was "Zombies leave me cold" [Feb. 2011]
    • 4/5
      At the outset, Benny is a bit of an obnoxious kid. He has some serious teen boy syndrome going on, what with the rebellion against his parental figure, whining, messing with a girl's feelings and idolization of whoever has the biggest muscles. Although this did help create sympathy for Tom and Nix, I still had trouble, even to the end of the novel, liking Benny, or Tom for that matter. Benny definitely got better, but he still has a lot of growing up to do. He wasn't completely awful and I didn't want him to die or anything, but he is not going down as a favorite either. Tom, while a really good guy, who I would probably have a bit of a crush on, just came off as way too much of a goody goody, even when you get to see him in action mode.

      You know who I loved though? Nix and, to a lesser degree, Lilah. Although Rot & Ruin is written by a man and the main character is male and the main audience is likely teenage boys, most of the women in this novel still kick serious ass. Props to Jonathan Maberry for not writing about teenage girls who only talk about boys and trip all over themselves and constantly need to be saved. Honestly, I think Nix saves Benny's hide more often than he saves hers.

      The dystopian aspects were pretty cool, although somewhat similar to the way Carrie Ryan's world reacted to the zombie menace, minus the crazy gates all over the place. Maberry didn't do anything too original with his worldbuilding, but its solid and the book is well-written. For zombie dystopias, I rank this way above Carrie Ryan's books, but still far below Mira Grant's Newsflesh series.

      While I never got super engrossed into Rot & Ruin, perhaps because I just wasn't quite in the right mood, it was definitely a solid read and I am looking forward to the second book, Dust & Decay.
    • 5/5
      Best. Zombie. Book. Ever! This is definitely your average zombie story. Nope. There is too much character and depth to the story. Yes, there is blood and killing of walkers, but there is also a story and characters to love. A MUST read!
    • 4/5
      This is a great read for zombie or "last days" fans. The characters have depth that makes you really care about how their story will unfold.
    • 5/5
      I love Tom and Benny Imura. Even if you are not a fan of zombies, this book is a great story of going out in the world, growing up, and realizing that things aren't always as they seem.
    • 5/5
      Several people that I really trust told me that I would love this book, and they were completely right. I've had this book on my to read list for a while. I was a little apprehensive because I have not been very impressed with any of the zombie YA books I've read. This includes the extremely hyped up "This Is Not a Test." Rot and Ruin, on the other hand, was intelligent, thoughtful, moving, and fast paced.Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Maberry focuses on Benny Imura, who was orphaned after First Night, when the first zombie outbreak took place 14 years ago. He was rescued by his brother, Tom, who is a skilled Bounty Hunter. Benny doesn't think much of his brother and thinks him a coward. In the beginning of the book, Benny tries to find a job that fits him. In the end, he realizes that he is destined to follow in his brother's footsteps, and that his brother is more than he seems to be.It is hard to compress this wonderful book into a synopsis without giving away its wonderful secrets. Let's just say that this book develops layer after layer, each one more intricate and thoughtful than the last. Maberry does a masterful job of world building. Zombies are more than just zombies-- the remaining humans have created a culture around them. All of their jobs, etc, have to do with living their lives free of zombies. Then there is the Rot and Ruin where the zombies roam free where Bounty Hunters are paid to put zombies down. Even that is treated with a reverence and thoughtfulness that I thought remarkable. The characters are many layered as well, as three dimensional as you get. Benny starts off as an annoying, bratty adolescent who then is confronted with darkness much scarier than the zombies and has to grow up too fast. Then there is Nix, who is a wonderful female counterpart. Tom, Benny's brother, may have been my favorite character and I may just have a little bit of a crush on him. And then another character is introduced that is incredibly intriguing, whom I think we will learn more about in future books.I could go on and on about how wonderful this book is. Because it was so good, I'm worried that the next two books may not live up to the first. But you can be sure I'm picking them up. Overall, one of the best books I've read all year.
    • 5/5
      Jonathan Maberry creates undaunted heroes for a new era that you will champion for out loud in the first book of this edgy, dark new YA series. The story and characters stay with you long after you close the cover. It’s a book not about zombies but about love, survival, and redemption.Maberry shines light across a ravaged land 15 years after a zombie epidemic, a world that teenage Benny Imura grows up in. It’s a painful journey following Benny as his limited, and often naïve, world view is crushed with devastating events that change the course of his life. Events that also resonate in the greater world he discovers around him.Through fast paced and horrific heart-grabbing scenes Maberry reveals that zombies are to be pitied and true evil lies within those who remain alive. Its heart breaking to witness Benny as his wide-eyed innocence is replaced with a hunger to survive and help his loved ones at any cost, but we are also touched by the love he finds in the brother, Tom. A brother Benny never really knew, but comes to see as a different kind of hero to reclaim their world. As Benny relentlessly claws his way across the great rot and ruin to stay alive, his childhood is lost blow by blow but the man he is to be stands in his place – an unlikely hero alongside his brother.
    • 4/5
      This young adult novel actually got me thinking. Benny's older brother does an important job of hunting the zombies, if one must call it that, but it is important in any instance of warfare to remember the humanity on either side. What irked me about this otherwise well-written and well-paced novel is that there was little information about the provnance of the zombie event itself.
    • 4/5
      Rot and Ruin is set in a zombie apocalyptic future where the main character, 15-year-old Benny Imura, has lived most of his life. When at the age of 15, people in the small surviving community he lives in must choose their career in order to continued receiving food. After resisting his brother's suggestions of becoming a Bounty Hunter like himself, Benny finally gives in and begins training. He sees the world from a different perspective, his eyes now open to what really went on outside of their safe bubble. When Benny's friend Nix is kidnapped by a band of closed-minded Bounty Hunters to be taken to a fight for survival game, he sets out to save her with his older brother Tom by his side, facing an epic journey along the way. All in all, I think this book was one of the best I've read in a long time. It opens up your eyes to things you'd never think about before. A must read!
    • 4/5
      I was a bit unsure what to expect from this book. Novels with male protagonists aren't my normal taste, but the cover and blurb really drew me in. What I found was the male version of Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth. Not that they are similar as far as plot or characters go, but the underlying message seemed to be alike, that we can't shut out the rest of the world. Benny at first seems very immature and sheltered, considering the zombie infested world he lives in, hanging out with his friends and looking for a job that pays great but requires little effort. Once he's forced into working with his brother, his character begins to grow and that for me carried the story. There were parts of the plot, such as the zombie games, that seemed a bit stereotypical post-apocalyptic movie, but it's how Benny comes to his realizations about himself, his brother, and his world that really kept me reading.Benny is a true three dimensional character. We see all sides of him, and the way Maberry mixes the darkness of a horror story with the sometimes humorous thoughts of a teenage boy is refreshing. I didn't feel like Benny' was being forced down a path by circumstances. He actively chooses his path to the end of the book. Maberry managed to keep a certain lightness to much of the story, and it's partly because Benny isn't aware of the horror in the Rot & Ruin where the zombies continue to dwell. The violence isn't over done and Benny's brother Tom manages to humanize the zombies in a way that actually makes the ending so sad to read.This is the first of the Benny Imura series, with Dust & Decay the second book and he has a few other Zombie books out as well. I'm already looking forward to reading more by Mr. Maberry!
    • 4/5
      Yes, this was a zombie book, but it seemed different than most zombie books. Instead of starting the book right when the zombie apocalypse began or soon after, it starts about 14 years after it happened. It's a very different point of view when you see the world through someone's eyes who doesn't even remember what the world was like "before". The characters were great and the relationship building between the two brothers was awesome. I liked all the little details Maberry put in like the job options for a 15 year old and how everyone locks themselves into their rooms at night to keep the zombies out and to keep themselves in if they happen to die in the night. You can tell he really REALLY thought everything through. I liked the twist near the end... it helped make up for the fact that a lot of other things that happened were easy to see coming. Looking forward to picking up the sequel at some point.
    • 4/5
      Listened to the audiobook; narrator did a great job. Fifteen years after a zombie apocalypse, few have survived and are trying to fix the sad state of the world. Zombies still thrive in the "rot and ruin" or the area outside of the safe confines of the survivors' camp. Benny learns to be a zombie bounty hunter from his older brother. After an attack on their camp, Benny's best friend is kidnapped and taken to Gameland where kids are pitted against zombies for entertainment. Benny sets out on an adventure with his brother to rescue his friend and on the way comes to understand more and more about what happened fifteen years ago. Not a typical zombie story, gives an interesting spin on the nature of zombies. Set long after the zombie apocalypse when people are starting to rebuild.
    • 5/5
      As he turns fifteen, Benny Imura can’t find a job, unfortunately if he wants to receive rations he has no choice, he must work. As his career options narrow, he realizes that he’s going to have to do the one thing he didn’t want to do, join the family business. Living in a world infested with billions of zombies, Benny trains for his career as a zombie killer. His older brother Tom appears to be teaching Benny more than just the whacking of zombies, he seems to be trying to show Benny that the real monsters of this world are still living.I loved Rot & Ruin by Jonathan Maberry. A action packed coming of age story that sees the main character, Benny Imura, transform from a know-it-all, selfish teenager into a responsible, caring person who sees beyond his immediate needs to the well being of others. A few home truths, a lot of zombie action, and dealing with a group of outlaw bounty hunters makes this kid grow up fast.Yes, all the usual zombie gore and violence, but this book also provides some insightful bonding between two brothers, as each struggles to see the other’s point of view. The females aren’t forgotten either as Maberry gives us two independent, strong, resourceful girls that helped to make the book such a fun read. I’m looking forward to Jonathan Mayberry’s next instalment in this zombie apocalypse series to see how these great characters develop.
    • 5/5
      Read from March 13 to 18, 2012Read for Fun!Challenges: Zombies, Read for FunOverall Rating: 4.25Story Rating: 4.25Character Rating: 4.50First Thought when Finished: I am slightly in love with a fictional character named Tom Imura!What I Loved: Rot & Ruin was set long after the First Night and gives us a glimpse at society trying to rebuild itself. I loved that Jonathan wasn't afraid to show us that some people chose to hide, some people chose to fight, some people were nasty creatures, and other people chose to make their own kind of stand. I imagine that the world he created is a lot like what would happen if something catastrophic changed our world. Rot & Ruin really makes you think about what your coping mechanism would be in a crisis. I also really loved that even though this is YA (there are some very smack the teenager up the head moments), you never feel as if that is the whole story. There are adult figures, family, teenagers learning lessons (and not knowing it all), and mostly truth shared through experience and teaching. This is the kind of YA that I enjoy reading.What I Liked: The characters in Rot & Ruin run the spectrum in personalities. Jonathan Maberry pretty much put one of each into the mix and let you find someone you could identify with. I think that above all it was the people (good and bad) that makes this story tick! Plus, I really liked Tom Imura's POV towards Zombies and how he is teaching Benny to think as well as act!Final Thought When Finished: I am glad I have the 2nd one on hand to start!
    • 4/5
      I enjoyed reading this novel through and through. Sure, Benny Imura is rather hard to deal with in the first part of this book. His attitude is something close to a lazy brat who doesn’t enjoy any of the jobs he gets. Even when he becomes Tom’s apprentice, his attitude still doesn’t let up. Yet that’s the best part of Benny’s character, because it develops in a big way throughout this book. He goes from immature, to mature as the novel progresses. I enjoy reading Benny’s friendships with Chong and Nix. Especially with Chong. They both make a perfect friendship and that’s where some of the humor comes from. Character development in this book is wonderful and well done with all of the main characters. Of all the characters, Benny’s attitude wasn’t so great but it improved as the book went along. I found it hard to like Nix. She just wasn’t that great in my opinion. (Lilah on the other hand, ended up becoming one of my favorite characters, second to Tom).The plot of this book was also good. The action was great and everything you could want in a zombie plot. Yet besides zombies, there’s also the threat of not so nice humans out there and this is what I liked the most about the book. It’s not all just pure killing zombies, but also what humanity does in horrible situations and what some very horrible people are quite capable of doing. This was well done, as like Benny, we’re assuming this is all going to be about zombie killing. Tom shows Benny and the reader what’s it really like, getting rid of these ‘zoms’. Zombie fans rejoice, this is one of the better books out there regarding the subject. It’s catered to a younger audience but readers of all ages should enjoy this one as much as I did. Most definitely recommended!
    • 4/5
      Very quick and satisfying read, good YA zombie apocalypse story with strong characters and fast pacing.
    • 4/5
      As a post-apocalyptic scenario lover, Rot and Ruin was right up my alley! Mayberry manages to write a character driven zombie book that eloquently weaves action and gore in to a thought provoking coming of age novel. Two thumbs up!
    • 5/5
      Benny reluctantly agrees to apprentice with his brother who kills Zoms for a living. Benny soon leans that the world is much more complex that he imagined. The origins of the zombie outbreak are interwoven in to this story of trying to rescue Nix and find Lilah, the Wild Girl. Tom is an amazing brother and Benny is a character to cheer for as he figures out who he is and what he believes. An intense book with twists and turns and loads of action! Sharing the idea of being fenced in to protect from zombies with the Forest of Hands and Teeth, this book is quite different - got a wild west flair and some of the humans are a lot more deadly than the zombies.
    • 5/5
      When 15-year-old Benny needs to find a job or lose his food rations, he ends up apprenticing for his older brother Tom as a zombie killer. He finds that out in the zombie-infested world of the "rot and ruin"--there there are living men who are much more evil than zombies. I loved this teen novel where the zombies are not the actually the bad guys. The book is excellently written, very suspenseful with just a touch of romance--but be warned, this is not for the faint of heart; there are many scenes that will make you cringe. What I like most about the book though is the message of looking beyond the surface--things are not always as black or white or as good or evil as they appear.
    • 5/5
      OMZ, Jonathan Maberry, you have truly outdone yourself – and while I wasn’t in love with Patient Zero last year, I am tempted to camp out on your doorstep and beg you for more tales of the Imura brothers, the Lost Girl, and ye olde world of Rot & Ruin. I cannot believe I did not pick it up until now! This book is a MUST-READ. It reminds me of THE FIRST DAYS with a little touch of ZOMBIELAND and dash of The Forest Of Hands And Teeth. It was almost like Jonathan Maberry threw all the best things zombie and cooked up such a rich and brainy story to sink our teeth into. Delicious! f(0_o)fTHE GOOD BITS{A dynamic love-hate relationship between brothers who lost their parents on the First Night.} Rot & Ruin chronicles the post-zombocalyptic world through Benny Imura’s eyes as he reaches the age of “adulthood” (15). He blames his older brother for leaving their parents to die, and he has a blind hatred for zombies. When Benny is forced to shadow Tom to learn what happens in the Ruin, he has to face the possibility that all that he has been taught and heard may not be true – or humane.{Tom Imura.} I wish there had been a little more about him because his story would definitely be phenomenal. He is a zombie samurai who has a lot of honor and heart. As an older sibling myself, I could relate to Tom and all his burdens/responsibilities. Not to mention living with a brother who makes no effort to hide his disdain for your very existence.{Parts 3 and 4.} Holy fried brainz on a stick! LOVE LOVE LOVE. Action-packed, horror-filled, tear-jerked, surprise-ended, zombie-loaded :D Well worth the journey!THE BAD BITS{Misleading Zombie Trading Cards.} I don’t know if the paperback version will have the awesome Zombie Trading Cards illustrations on the inside front and back cover, but I was looking forward to an encounter with “The Bride Of Coldwater Spring.” She sounded delightful – and by delightful, I mean downright frightful! However, because of the cards, I had prepared myself for a completely different zombie story. Like Benny, I had imagined the glory days of zombie bounty hunters – taking down zombies like nobody’s business! On the flipside, I am more than satisfied with the actual Rot & Ruin story!{The deaths of certain characters} ...whom I shall not name here, but dearly wished that they had not gone the zombie way. However, I think that this also drove home what Jonathon Maberry wanted to get across. Yes, we all love our zombies getting blown to smithereens, but have we gone a little kill-kill-kill-crazy? Let’s stop and remember that zombies had family who might still be human.{The book ended.} Granted, I thought the ending was the most beautifully-crafted piece of work, but I was seriously distraught that the story ended there. So many questions, so many ties left undone, and so much more revolutionary changes to make! Thank goodness that DUST & DECAY has already come out because I don’t think I can wait much longer to find out what happens next!THE OVERALLAbsolutely a stunning piece of storytelling that shines a whole new light on zombies! I loved the way that Jonathan Maberry envisioned them and how that idea served as a way to bring brothers together after a tragedy that seems hard to forget and forgive. This would make an excellent movie with all the right sort of tension, excitement, romance, and humor! For a title like Rot & Ruin , this book has built such a strong, flavorful world where the sky is the limit.
    • 5/5
      THIS. WAS. SO. GOOD.I love zombie stories - mostly because I like reading about what happens after the world ends for most of the world, and the few people still alive must figure out what to do next. Zombies are just a really creepy and gory way to tell that story, and so has my devotion.Benny has grown up hating his older brother, and cannot imagine how such a cowardly man can have such a good reputation as a bounty hunter. In Benny's world, turning fifteen means one is ready to get a job, and so he tries to find one that doesn't suck in his fenced in town - but as his eyesight sucks and he hates all the other jobs...he's forced to ask his brother to take him on as an apprentice. What Benny learns about his brother and about the world beyond the safe fences - the Rot & Ruin - changes Benny forever.This book is intense, scary, sad and ugly, as is the world in which Benny and his brother live. Tom, Benny's brother, earns his living by finding the dead (now zombie) family members of townspeople and giving them "closure." To do this, Tom finds that zombie and permanently kills it, but in doing so, exposes himself to the many zombies still roaming the Rot & Ruin and to the many unpleasant men who have embraced this harsh new world. Benny, who's hated the zombies who killed his parents (and all other zombies, for that matter), discovers the ugly truth that sometimes other men are more scary than the monsters he's feared and hated his whole life.Highly Recommended!
    • 5/5
      The First Night occurred 14 years ago, the day when the dead rose. Benny Imura was only a baby that night and only has fuzzy memories of being handed to his older half brother, Tom, and Tom running away, leaving his mother to die. This image is burned into his mind and he sees his brother as a coward. Now, society isn’t as it used to be. Instead of large sprawling cities, civilization is reduced to small, sparse settlements. Benny is 15, which, in the society left in the wake of the dead, means that he has to get a job or lose half of his food rations. He goes job hunting with a friend, but doesn’t have any luck due to being overly picky and generally lazy. His only option left is becoming an apprentice to Tom in his bounty hunting business. Benny figures this job will entail going out into the Rot and Ruin to slice and dice zombies, but the experiences beyond the boundaries of civilization will serve to not only change his view of his brother, but of life and undeath.Jonathan Maberry is an accomplished zombie novelist (as in he writes awesome zombie novels and isn’t really a zombie). His writing style and skilled story telling translate well into a young adult book. Benny is a completely believable character who has the misfortune to grow up in a zombie-ridden world. Now, the society he lives in expects him to grow up and become self sufficient, which he resisted at every turn. I found him very annoying at this point. He is completely ashamed of his big brother and refuses to try to get to know him. The first half of the book consists of him whining, complaining, and running away from responsibility until he has no other option. After his brother takes him into the Rot and Ruin (which is the uninhabited ruin of the past that surrounds their small settlement), everything changes. Benny sees things he can never forget. He questions the other bounty hunters’ ethics when he sees them torture zombies and doesn’t see them as the epitome of cool anymore. Tom reminds him that zombies were once people and just because their corpses are walking around doesn’t make it ok to mutilate their bodies for amusement. He only kills them when it’s truly needed or he gets a request from a loved one. Only Maberry can make it absolutely heartbreaking to kill a zombie. Benny really grows as a person and makes decisions about his own morals and ethics as we all do when we grow up.The world in the novel is both smaller and larger than it seems in real life. It’s smaller because technology and electricity are irrationally shunned and blamed for the zombie apocalypse. Their pockets of society stay small and can’t easily connect with other cities let alone other states or continents. It’s bigger because now that society is more compact, the wide open spaces are almost like the US before it was ever settled: full of possibility yet dangerous and wild. I have never seen a world quite like this one and the next book, Dust and Decay, should expand the view of it.Rot and Ruin is an exceptional zombie book. Jonathan Maberry manages to capture the familiar coming of age experience to and transports it into a strange, post-apocalyptic, zombie ridden world. I would recommend it to any zombie fan.

    Book preview

    Rot & Ruin - Jonathan Maberry

    PART ONE

    FAMILY BUSINESS

    I don’t know what’s waiting for us when we die—something better, something worse. I only know I’m not ready to find out yet.

    —CHARLES DE LINT, THE ONION GIRL

    1

    BENNY IMURA COULDN’T HOLD A JOB, SO HE TOOK TO KILLING.

    It was the family business. He barely liked his family—and by family he meant his older brother, Tom—and he definitely didn’t like the idea of business. Or work. The only part of the deal that sounded like it might be fun was the actual killing.

    He’d never done it before. Sure, he’d gone through a hundred simulations in gym class and in the Scouts, but they never let kids do any real killing. Not before they hit fifteen.

    Why not? he asked his Scoutmaster, a fat guy named Feeney who used to be a TV weatherman back in the day. Benny was eleven at the time and obsessed with zombie hunting. How come you don’t let us whack some real zoms?

    Because killing’s the sort of thing you should learn from your folks, said Feeney.

    I don’t have any folks, Benny countered. My mom and dad died on First Night.

    "Ouch. Sorry, Benny—I forgot. Point is, you got family of some kind, right?"

    "I guess. I got ‘I’m Mr. Freaking Perfect Tom Imura’ for a brother, and I don’t want to learn anything from him."

    Feeney had stared at him. Wow. I didn’t know you were related to him. He’s your brother, huh? Well, there’s your answer, kid. Nobody better to teach you the art of killing than a professional killer like Tom Imura. Feeney paused and licked his lips nervously. I guess being his brother and all, you’ve seen him take down a lot of zoms.

    No, Benny said with huge annoyance. He never lets me watch.

    Really? That’s odd. Well, ask him when you turn thirteen.

    Benny had asked on his thirteenth birthday, and Tom had said no. Again. It wasn’t a discussion. Just No.

    That was more than two years ago, and now Benny was six weeks past his fifteenth birthday. He had four more weeks grace to find a paying job before town ordinance cut his rations by half. Benny hated being in that position, and if one more person gave him the fifteen and free speech, he was going to scream. He hated that as much as when people saw someone doing hard work and they said crap like, Holy smokes, he’s going at that like he’s fifteen and out of food.

    Like it was something to be happy about. Something to be proud of. Working your butt off for the rest of your life. Benny didn’t see where the fun was in that. Okay, maybe it was marginally okay because it meant only half days of school from then on, but it still sucked.

    His buddy Lou Chong said it was a sign of the growing cultural oppression that was driving postapocalyptic humanity toward acceptance of a new slave state. Benny had no freaking idea what Chong meant or if there was even meaning in anything he said. But he nodded agreement because the look on Chong’s face always made it seem like he knew exactly what was what.

    At home, before he even finished eating his dessert, Tom had said, If I want to talk about you joining the family business, are you going to chew my head off? Again?

    Benny stared venomous death at Tom and said, very clearly and distinctly, I. Don’t. Want. To. Work. In. The. Family. Business.

    I’ll take that as a ‘no,’ then.

    Don’t you think it’s a little late now to try and get me all excited about it? I asked you a zillion times to—

    You asked me to take you out on kills.

    Right! And every time I did you—

    Tom cut him off. There’s a lot more to what I do, Benny.

    Yeah, there probably is, and maybe I would have thought the rest was something I could deal with, but you never let me see the cool stuff.

    There’s nothing ‘cool’ about killing, Tom said sharply.

    There is when you’re talking about killing zoms! Benny fired back.

    That stalled the conversation. Tom stalked out of the room and banged around the kitchen for a while, and Benny threw himself down on the couch.

    Tom and Benny never talked about zombies. They had every reason to, but they never did. Benny couldn’t understand it. He hated zoms. Everyone hated them, though with Benny it was a white-hot consuming hatred that went back to his very first memory. Because it was his first memory—a nightmare image that was there every night when he closed his eyes. It was an image that was seared into him, even though it was something he had seen as a tiny child.

    Dad and Mom.

    Mom screaming, running toward Tom, shoving a squirming Benny—all of eighteen months—into Tom’s arms. Screaming and screaming. Telling him to run.

    While the thing that had been Dad pushed its way through the bedroom door that Mom had tried to block with a chair and lamps and anything else she could find.

    Benny remembered Mom screaming words, but the memory was so old and he had been so young that he didn’t remember what any of them were. Maybe there were no words. Maybe it was just her screaming.

    Benny remembered the wet heat on his face as Tom’s tears fell on him as they climbed out of the bedroom window. They had lived in a ranch-style house. One story. The window emptied out into a yard that was pulsing with red and blue police lights. There were more shouts and screams. The neighbors. The cops. Maybe the army. Thinking back, Benny figured it was probably the army. And the constant popping of gunfire, near and far away.

    But of all of it, Benny remembered a single last image. As Tom clutched him to his chest, Benny looked over his brother’s shoulder at the bedroom window. Mom leaned out of the window, screaming at them as Dad’s pale hands reached out of the shadows of the room and dragged her back out of sight.

    That was Benny’s oldest memory. If there had been older memories, then that image had burned them away. Because he had been so young the whole thing was little more than a collage of pictures and noises, but over the years Benny had burned his brain to reclaim each fragment, to assign meaning and sense to every scrap of what he could recall. Benny remembered the hammering sound vibrating against his chest that was Tom’s panicked heartbeat, and the long wail that was his own inarticulate cry for his mom and his dad.

    He hated Tom for running away. He hated that Tom hadn’t stayed and helped Mom. He hated what their dad had become on that First Night all those years ago. Just as he hated what Dad had turned Mom into.

    In his mind they were no longer Mom and Dad. They were the things that had killed them. Zoms. And he hated them with an intensity that made the sun feel cold and small.

    Dude, what is it with you and zoms? Chong once asked him. You act like the zoms have a personal grudge against you.

    What, I’m supposed to have fuzzy bunny feelings for them? Benny had snapped back.

    No, Chong had conceded, but a little perspective would be nice. I mean . . . everybody hates zoms.

    You don’t.

    Chong had shrugged his bony shoulders and his dark eyes had darted away. Everybody hates zoms.

    The way Benny saw it, when your first memory was of zombies killing your parents, then you had a license to hate them as much as you wanted. He tried to explain that to Chong, but his friend wouldn’t be drawn back into the conversation.

    A few years ago, when Benny found out that Tom was a zombie hunter, he hadn’t been proud of his brother. As far as he was concerned, if Tom really had what it took to be a zombie hunter, he’d have had the guts to help Mom. Instead, Tom had run away and left Mom to die. To become one of them.

    Tom came back into the living room, looked at the remains of the dessert on the table, then looked at Benny on the couch.

    The offer still stands, he said. If you want to do what I do, then I’ll take you on as an apprentice. I’ll sign the papers so you can still get full rations.

    Benny gave him a long, withering stare.

    I’d rather be eaten by zoms than have you as my boss, Benny said.

    Tom sighed, turned, and trudged upstairs. After that they didn’t talk to each other for days.

    2

    THE FOLLOWING WEEKEND BENNY AND CHONG HAD PICKED UP THE Saturday edition of the Town Pump, because it had the biggest help wanted section. All of the easy jobs, like working in stores, had been long-since snapped up. They didn’t want to work on the farms, because that meant getting up every morning at the crack of no way, José. Besides, it meant dropping out of school completely. They didn’t love school, but it wasn’t too bad, and school had softball, free lunches, and girls. The ideal fix was a part-time job that paid pretty good and got the ration board off their backs, so over the next several weeks, they applied for anything that sounded easy.

    Benny and Chong clipped out a bunch of want ads and tackled them one at a time, having first categorized them by most possible money, coolness, and I don’t know what it is, but it sounds okay. They passed on anything that sounded bad right from the get-go.

    The first on their list was for a locksmith apprentice.

    That sounded okay, but it turned out to be humping a couple of heavy toolboxes from house to house at the crack of frigging dawn while an old German guy who could barely speak English repaired fence locks and installed dial combinations on both sides of bedroom doors, as well as installing bars and wire grilles.

    It was kind of funny watching the old guy explain to his customers how to use the combination locks. Benny and Chong began making bets on how many times per conversation a customer would say what, could you repeat that, or beg pardon.

    The work was important, though. Everyone had to lock themselves in their rooms at night and then use a combination to get out. Or a key; some people still locked with keys. That way, if they died in their sleep and reanimated as a zom, they wouldn’t be able to get out of the room and attack the rest of the family. There had been whole settlements wiped out because someone’s grandfather popped off in the middle of the night and then started chowing down on the kids and grandkids.

    I don’t get this, Benny confided to Chong when they were alone for a minute. "Zoms can’t work a combination lock any more than they can turn a doorknob. They can’t work keys, either. Why do people even buy this stuff?"

    Chong shrugged. My dad says that locks are traditional. People understand that locked doors keep bad things out, so people want locks for their doors.

    That’s stupid. Closed doors will keep zoms out. Zoms are brain-dead. Hamsters are smarter.

    Chong spread his hands in a hey, that’s people for you gesture.

    The German guy installed double-sided locks, so that the door could be opened from the other side in a real, nonzombie emergency; or if the town security guys had to come in and do a cleanup on a new zom.

    Somehow, Benny and Chong had gotten it into their heads that locksmiths got to see this stuff, but the old guy said that he hadn’t ever seen a single living dead that was in any way connected to his job. Boring.

    To make it worse, the German guy paid them a little more than pocket lint and said that it would take three years to learn the actual trade. That meant that Benny wouldn’t even pick up a screwdriver for six months and wouldn’t do anything but carry stuff for a year. Screw that.

    I thought you didn’t want to actually work, said Chong as they walked away from the German with no intention of returning in the morning.

    I don’t. But I don’t want to be bored out of my freaking mind either.

    •   •   •

    Next on their list was for a fence tester.

    That was a little more interesting, because there were actual zoms on the other side of the fence that kept the town of Mountainside separate from the great Rot and Ruin. Most of the zoms were far away, standing in the field or wandering clumsily toward any movement. There were rows of poles with brightly colored streamers set far out in the field, and with every breeze the fluttering of the streamers attracted the zoms, constantly drawing them away from the fence. When the wind calmed, the creatures began lumbering in the direction of any movement on the town side of the fence. Benny wanted to get close to a zom. He’d never been closer than a hundred yards from an active zom before. The older kids said that if you looked into a zom’s eyes, your reflection would show you how you’d look as one of the living dead. That sounded very cool, but there was a guy with a shotgun dogging Benny all through the shift, and that made him totally paranoid. He spent more time looking over his shoulder than trying to find meaning in dead men’s eyes.

    The shotgun guy got to ride a horse. Benny and Chong had to walk the fence line and stop every six or ten feet, grip the chain links, and shake it to make sure there were no breaks or rusted weak spots. That was okay for the first mile, but afterward the noise attracted the zoms, and by the middle of the third mile, Benny had to grab, shake, and release pretty fast to keep his fingers from getting bit. He wanted a close-up look, but he didn’t want to lose a finger over it. If he got bit, the shotgun guy would blast him on the spot. Depending on its size, a zom bite could turn someone from healthy to living dead in anything from a few hours to a few minutes, and in orientation, they told everyone that there was a zero-tolerance policy on infections.

    "If the gun bulls even think you got nipped, they’ll blow you all to hell and gone, said the trainer, so be careful!"

    By late morning Benny got his first chance to test the theory about seeing his zombified reflection in the eyes of one of the living dead. The zom was a squat man in the rags of what had once been a mail carrier’s uniform. Benny stood as close to the safe side of the fence as he dared, and the zom lumbered toward him, mouth working as if chewing, face as pale as dirty snow. Benny thought the zom must have been Hispanic. Or was still Hispanic. He wasn’t sure how that worked with the living dead. Most of the zoms still retained enough of their original skin color for Benny to tell one race from another, but as the sun continued to bake them year after year, the whole mass of them seemed to be heading toward a uniform grayness as if the Living Dead was a new ethnic category.

    Benny looked right into the creature’s eyes, but all he saw were dust and emptiness. No reflections of any kind. No hunger or hate or malice either. There was nothing. A doll’s eyes had more life.

    He felt something twist inside of him. The dead mail carrier was not as scary as he had expected. He was just there. Benny tried to get a read on him, to connect with whatever it was that drove the monster, but it was like looking into empty holes. Nothing looked back.

    Then the zom lunged at him and tried to bite its way through the chain links. The movement was so sudden that it felt much faster than it actually was. There was no tension, no twitch of facial muscles, none of the signs Benny had been taught to look for in opponents in basketball or wrestling. The zom moved without hesitation or warning.

    Benny yelped and backpedaled away from the fence. Then he stepped in a steaming pile of horse crap and fell hard on his butt.

    All of the guards burst out laughing.

    Benny and Chong quit at lunch.

    •   •   •

    The next morning Benny and Chong went to the far side of town and applied as fence technicians.

    The fence ran for hundreds of miles and encircled the town and its harvested fields, so this meant a lot of walking while carrying yet another grumpy old guy’s toolbox. In the first three hours they got chased by a zom who had squeezed through a break in the fence.

    Why don’t they just shoot all the zoms who come up to the fence? Benny asked their supervisor.

    ’Cause folks would get upset, said the man, a scruffy-looking guy with bushy eyebrows and a tic at the corner of his mouth. Some of them zoms are relatives of folks in town, and those folks have rights regarding their kin. Been all sorts of trouble about it, so we keep the fence in good shape, and every once in a while one of the townsfolk will suck up enough intestinal fortitude to grant permission for the fence guards to do what’s necessary.

    That’s stupid, said Benny.

    That’s people, said the supervisor.

    That afternoon Benny and Chong walked what they were sure were a million miles, had been peed on by a horse, stalked by a horde of zoms—Benny couldn’t see anything at all in their dusty eyes—and yelled at by nearly everyone.

    At the end of the day, as they shambled home on aching feet, Chong said, That was about as much fun as getting beaten up. He thought about it for a moment. No . . . getting beaten up is more fun.

    Benny didn’t have the energy to argue.

    •   •   •

    There was only one opening for the next job—carpet coat salesman—which was okay because Chong wanted to stay home and rest his feet. Chong hated walking. So Benny showed up, neatly dressed in his best jeans and a clean T-shirt, and with his hair as combed as it would ever get without glue.

    There wasn’t much danger in selling carpet coats, but Benny wasn’t slick enough to get the patter down. Benny was surprised they’d be hard to sell, because everybody had a carpet coat or two. Best thing in the world to have on if some zoms were around and feeling bitey. What he discovered, though, was that everyone who could thread a needle was selling them, so the competition was fierce, and sales were few and far between. The door-to-door guys worked on straight commission, too.

    The lead salesman, a greasy joker named Chick, would have Benny wear a long-sleeved carpet coat—low knap for summer, shag for winter—and then use a device on him that was supposed to simulate the full-strength bite of an adult male zom. This metal biter couldn’t break the skin through the coat—and here Chick rolled into his spiel about human bite strength, throwing around terms like PSI, avulsion, and postdecay dental-ligament strength—but it pinched really hard, and the coat was so hot, the sweat ran down under Benny’s clothes. When he went home that night, he weighed himself to see how many pounds he’d sweated off. Just one, but Benny didn’t have a lot of pounds to spare.

    •   •   •

    This one looks good, said Chong over breakfast the next morning.

    Benny read out loud from the paper. ‘Pit Thrower.’ What’s that?

    I don’t know, Chong said with a mouth full of toast. I think it has something to do with barbecuing.

    It didn’t. Pit throwers worked in teams, dragging dead zoms off the backs of carts and tossing them into the constant blaze at the bottom of Brinkers Quarry. Most of the zoms on the carts were in pieces. The woman who ran orientation kept talking about parts, and went on and on about the risk of secondary infection; then she pasted on the fakest smile Benny had ever seen and tried to sell the applicants on the physical fitness benefits that came from constant lifting, turning, and throwing. She even pulled up her sleeve and flexed her biceps. She had pale skin with freckles as dark as liver spots, and the sudden pop of her biceps looked like a swollen tumor.

    Chong faked vomiting into his lunch bag.

    The other jobs offered by the quarry included ash soaker—because we don’t want zom smoke drifting over the town, now, do we? asked the freckly muscle freak. And pit raker, which was exactly what it sounded like.

    Benny and Chong didn’t make it through orientation. They snuck out during the slide show of smiling pit throwers handling gray limbs and heads.

    •   •   •

    One job that was neither disgusting nor physically demanding was crank generator repairman. Ever since the lights went out in the weeks following First Night, the only source of electrical power was hand-cranked portable generators. There were maybe fifty in all of Mountainside, and Chong said that they were left over from the mining days of the early twentieth century. Town ordinance forbade the building of any other kind of generator. Electronics and complex machines were no longer allowed in town, because of a strong religious movement that associated that kind of power with the Godless behavior that had brought about the end. Benny heard about it all the time, and even some of his friends’ parents talked that way.

    It made no sense to Benny. It wasn’t electric lights and computers and automobiles that had made the dead rise. Or, if it was, then Benny had never heard anyone make a logical or sane connection between the two. When he asked Tom about it, his brother looked pained and frustrated. People need something to blame, Tom said. "If they can’t find something rational to blame, then they’ll very happily blame something irrational. Back when people didn’t know about viruses and bacteria, they blamed plagues on witches and vampires. But don’t ask me how exactly the people in town came to equate electricity and other forms of energy with the living dead."

    That doesn’t make even a little bit of sense.

    "I know. But what I think is the real reason is that if we start using electricity again, and building back up again, then things will kind of go back the way they were. And that this whole cycle will start over again. I guess to their way of thinking—if they even consciously thought about it—it would be like a person with a badly broken heart deciding to risk falling in love again. All they can remember is how bad the heartbreak and grief felt, and they can’t imagine going through that again."

    That’s stupid, though, Benny insisted. It’s cowardly.

    Welcome to the real world, kiddo.

    The town’s only professional electrician, Vic Santorini, had long since taken to drinking his way through the rest of his life.

    When Benny and Chong showed up for the interview at the house of the guy who owned the repair shop, he sat them down in the shade of an airy porch and gave them glasses of iced tea and mint cookies. Benny was thinking that he would take this job no matter what it was.

    Do you know why we only use hand-cranked generators in town, boys? the man asked. His name was Mr. Merkle.

    Sure, said Chong. The army dropped nukes on the zoms, and the EMPs blew out all of the electronics.

    Plus Mr. Santorini’s always sauced, said Benny. He was about to add something biting about the bizarre religious intolerance to electricity when Mr. Merkle’s face creased into a weird smile. Benny shut his mouth.

    Mr. Merkle smiled at them for a long time. A full minute. Then the man shook his head. No, that’s not quite right, boys, Merkle said. It’s because hand-cranked machines are simple, and those other machines are ostentatious. He pronounced each syllable as if it was a separate word.

    Benny and Chong glanced at each other.

    You see, boys, said Mr. Merkle, God loves simplicity. It’s the devil who loves ostentation. It’s the devil who loves arrogance and grandiosity.

    Uh-oh, Benny thought.

    Mr. Santorini spent the first part of his life installing electrical appliances into people’s homes, said Mr. Merkle. That was the devil’s work, and now he’s sought the oblivion of demon rum to try and hide from the fact that he’s facing a long time in hell for helping to incur the wrath of the Almighty. If it wasn’t for Godless men like him, the Almighty would not have opened the gates of hell and sent the legions of the damned to overthrow the vain kingdoms of mankind.

    Out of the corner of his eye, Benny could see Chong’s fingers turning bone white as he gripped the arms of his chair.

    I can see a little doubt in your eyes, boys, and that’s fair enough, said Merkle, his mouth twisted into a smile that was so tight, it looked painful. "But there are a lot of people who have embraced the righteous path. There are more of us who believe than don’t. He sniffed. Even if all of them don’t yet have the courage of their faith to say so."

    He leaned forward, and Benny could almost feel the heat from the man’s intense stare.

    "The school, the hospital—even the town hall—run on electricity from hand-cranked generators, and as long as right-minded people draw breath under God’s own heaven, there won’t be any ostentatious machinery in our town."

    There was a whole pitcher of iced tea on the table, as well as quite a pile of cookies, and Benny realized that Mr. Merkle probably had a lot to say on the subject and wanted his audience comfortable for the whole ride. Benny endured it for as long as he could and then asked if he could use the bathroom. Mr. Merkle, who had now shifted from simple electricity to the soul-crushing blasphemy that was hydroelectric power, was only mildly thrown off his game, and told Benny where to go inside the house. Benny went inside and all the way through and out the back door. He waved to Chong as he vaulted the wooden fence.

    Two hours later Chong caught up with him outside of Lafferty’s, the local general store. He gave Benny a long and evil look.

    You’re such a good friend, Benny, I’ll really miss you when you’re dead.

    Dude, I gave you an out. When I didn’t come back, didn’t he go looking for me?

    "No. He saw you go over the fence, but he kept smiling that smile of his and said, ‘Your little friend is going to burn in hell, do you know that? But you wouldn’t spit in God’s eye like that, would you?’"

    "And you stayed?"

    What could I do? I was afraid he’d point at me and say ‘Him!,’ and then lightning bolts would hit me or something.

    Scratch that job off the list?

    You think?

    •   •   •

    Spotter was the next job, and that proved to be a good choice, but only for one of them. Benny’s eyesight was too poor to spot zoms at the right distance. Chong was like an eagle, and they offered him a job as soon as he finished reading the smallest numbers off a chart. Benny couldn’t even tell they were numbers.

    Chong took the job, and Benny walked away alone, throwing dispirited looks back at his friend sitting next to his trainer in a high tower.

    Later, Chong told Benny that he loved the job. He sat there all day, staring out over the valleys, into the Rot and Ruin that stretched from California, all the way to the Atlantic. Chong said that he could see twenty miles on a clear day, especially if there were no winds coming his way from the quarry. Just him up there, alone with his thoughts. Benny missed his friend, but privately he thought that the job sounded more boring than words could express.

    •   •   •

    Benny liked the sound of bottler, because he figured it for a factory job of filling soda bottles. Benny loved soda, but it was sometimes hard to come by. Some pop was old stuff brought in by traders, but that was too expensive. A bottle of Dr Pepper cost ten ration dollars. The local stuff came in all sorts of recycled bottles—from jelly jars to bottles that had actually once been filled with Coke or Mountain Dew. Benny could see himself manning the hand-cranked generator that ran the conveyor belt or tapping corks into the bottlenecks with a rubber mallet. He was positive they would let him drink all the soda he wanted. But as he walked up the road, he met an older teenager—his pal Morgie Mitchell’s cousin Bert—who worked at the plant. When Benny fell into step with Bert, he almost gagged. Bert smelled awful, like something found dead behind the baseboards. Worse. He smelled like a zom.

    Bert caught his look and shrugged. Well . . . what do you expect me to smell like? I bottle this stuff eight hours a day.

    What stuff?

    Cadaverine. What, you think I work making soda pop? I wish! Nah, I work a press to get the oils from the rotting meat.

    Benny’s heart sank. Cadaverine was a nasty-smelling molecule produced by protein hydrolysis during putrefaction of animal tissue. Benny remembered that from science class, but he didn’t know that it was made from actual rotting flesh. Hunters and trackers dabbed it on their clothes to keep the zoms from coming after them, because the dead were not attracted to rotting flesh.

    Benny asked Bert what kind of flesh was used to produce the product, but Bert hemmed and hawed and finally changed the subject. Just as Bert was reaching for the door to the plant, Benny spun around and walked back to town.

    •   •   •

    There was one job Benny already knew about: erosion artist. He’d seen erosion portraits tacked on every wall of the town’s fence outposts and on the walls of the buildings that lined the Red Zone, the stretch of open land that separated the town from the fence.

    This job had some promise, because Benny was a pretty fair artist. People wanted to know what their relatives might look like if they were zoms, so erosion artists took family photos and zombified them. Benny had seen dozens of these portraits in Tom’s office. A couple of times he wondered if he should take the picture of his parents to an artist and have them redrawn. He’d never actually done it, though. Thinking about his parents as zoms made him sick and angry.

    But Sacchetto, the supervising artist, told him to try a picture of a relative first. He said it provided better insight into what the clients would be feeling. So, as part of his audition, Benny took the picture of his folks out of his wallet and tried it.

    Sacchetto frowned and shook his head. You’re making them look too mean and scary.

    He tried it again with several photos of strangers the artist had on file.

    Still mean and scary, said Sacchetto with pursed lips and a disapproving shake of his head.

    "They are mean and scary," Benny insisted.

    Not to customers they’re not, said Sacchetto.

    Benny almost argued with him about it, saying that if he could accept that his own folks were flesh-eating zombies—and that there was nothing warm and fuzzy about it—then why can’t everyone else get it through their heads?

    How old were you when your parents passed? Sacchetto asked.

    Eighteen months.

    So, you never really knew them.

    Benny hesitated, and that old image flashed in his head once more. Mom screaming. The pale and inhuman face that should have been Dad’s smiling face. And then the darkness as Tom carried him away.

    No, he said bitterly. "But I know what they look like. I know about them. I know that they’re zoms. Or maybe they’re dead now, but, I mean—zoms are zoms. Right?"

    Are they? the artist asked.

    Yes! Benny snapped, answering his own question. And they should all rot.

    The artist folded his arms across his chest and leaned against a paint-spattered wall, head cocked as he assessed Benny. Tell me something, kid, he said. Everyone lost family and friends to the zoms. Everyone’s pretty torn up about it. You didn’t even really know the people you lost—you were too young—but you got this red-hot hate going on. I’ve only known you half an hour, and I can see it coming out of your pores. What’s that all about? We’re safe here in town. Have a life and let go of the stuff you can’t change.

    Maybe I’m too smart to just forgive and forget.

    No, said Sacchetto, that ain’t it.

    After the audition, he hadn’t been offered the job.

    3

    "IT WAS A 1967 PONTIAC LEMANS RAGTOP. BLOODRED AND SO souped-up that she’d outrun any damn thing on the road. And I do mean damned thing."

    That’s how Charlie Matthias always described his car. Then he’d give a big braying horselaugh, because no matter how many times he said it, he thought it was the funniest joke ever. People tended to laugh with him rather than at the actual joke, because Charlie had a seventy-inch chest and twenty-four-inch biceps, and his sweat was a soup of testosterone, anabolic steroids,

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1