Unabridged, Unabashed and Undead is a giant collection of Eric S. Brown's zombie stories. Brown is certainly the king of zombie stories in the world of zines and anthologies and chances are that you may well have seen a few of these stories when they were first published. Brown's writing conveys very human characters, whether in fear, anger or despair. These stories feature the military, of course, but also frightened ordinary folk, kids, workers, lovers, spacemen, G-men, supermen, mutants and robots. And the ever-present threat of those who won't stay dead. Brown writes about all sorts of zombies: the fast, the shamblers, animal zombies, evolving undead, aliens and the plant-based living dead, to name a few.

There's something about zombies; they're so relentless. Not quite unstoppable — there's always that never-failing shot to the head — but they keep on coming none the less, perhaps because the highly infectious nature of zombie-ism means there's usually so many of them. As such, it's not surprising that real living humans don't fare so well in these stories. And that's putting it mildly. The majority of these stories are end-of-the-world affairs, with a last few humans holding out against the hoards of living dead... until they find a way in, or the humans have to find a way out. Brown doesn't fancy our chances in this world of the dead, where former lovers are still interested in nibbling on your flesh — but now in huge bloody chunks, and let's face it: he's probably right.

But then, in many of these stories, humankind has brought it all on itself. The source of the zombies is frequently a virus, biowarfare gone wrong, escaped its boundaries. Occasionally an alien race will bring this ongoing death to us, but usually it's all our own fault. So I guess we deserve the myriad gore-laden deaths and suicides that Brown has written with such graphic attention to detail. There's certainly a lack faith in the goodness of human nature when up against unfavourable odds that comes through loud and clear.

All in all, it's a gloomy picture painted by Brown's atmospheric writing. But so what if it's the end of the world? Never fear, we'll go out fighting, and take as many zombies as we can with us! Grab your final few bullets, and remember, aim for the head...

Unabridged, Unabashed and Undead is available from Amazon.com.