It’s not the end of the world-it’s just zombies.

B.J. Burrow is the author of a zombie novel called The Changed, which is published by Apex Book Company. B.J. also contributed stories to Apexology: Horror and The Zombie Feed Volume 1.

Flames Rising reviewer and zombie fan, Eric Pollarine, sat down with B. J. to talk undead, writing and a few other topics…

Here are the young men, with weights on their shoulders or what it’s like to be a typist.

I was half way through with it, my first real attempt at writing a novel, I was so close.

I had typed, roughly, 40,000 words. Real words mind you, not these contrived little things that you see on the screen in front of you currently, but real actual words that were going to tell a real actual story. And then I had to stop, give up and start all over again. Because they weren’t the words I needed to say, or write, or put on the paper. They were the words that I was trying to say, or write or put on the paper. And it just wasn’t F-ing happening.

I woke up today without any power which is a large part of the reason as to why this review is a day behind. Not that you needed to know that little fact, or really even, not that my day to day is all that relevant to the review itself. We are living in the 24/7 digital world here, so it shouldn’t matter when I do the reviews, right?

No, wrong. This was the perfect setting to nearly blow all my battery power and candles on writing a review. Especially a review of Survival Horror/ Zombie Apocalypse superstar writer David Moody’s latest book in the autumn series by Thomas Dunne St Martin’s Griffin press. In fact it was probably the most perfect setting to write the review in. Picture it.

This and that and everything …

I hate the New Year.

Ok, I get it, you’re probably thinking “get on with it old man, you hate a lot of things,” but if you’ll indulge me here for a brief moment, then you’ll see that I have something to really say about the New Year.

I really (emphasis is clearly my own) hate the New Year because it forces me to think about the fact that another twelve months of my life has flown by, in what seems to be an ever increasing and perilous amount of speed. It forces me to acknowledge that I am one more year closer to death, one more year removed from the awesomeness/horribleness (not really a word, I’ve slammed two industrial sized Red Bull’s, three pots of coffee and possibly enough over the counter truck stop speed to kill a small battalion of polar bears, so go easy on me) that was my twenties and the foulness that is the onset of my thirties.

Before I go off on how wonderful I thought the season finale of AMC’s The Walking Dead was, how the series has changed television, how it may or may not be one of the most relevant social commentaries of the 21st century in media right now, I want to thank all of you who have read and shared these reviews. You make typing these little posts something to look forward to.

Now that, that is out of the way, let’s begin.

So, here we are, we’ve come to the end, that was it, for now. I hope you paid attention. because if you didn’t then this is going to be a little confusing. I want to talk about the “reality” that is portrayed in the series, especially in the the season finale. It’s a sticky subject, reality that is, as everyone produces to a certain extent their own version of it. Not in the way that they can interact with the physical world on a scientific level, you couldn’t interpret the laws of physics in your own way. Say with a suspension in the belief of Gravity, and live to tell about it. No matter how many happy thoughts you think, you’re going to plummet off the top of a building if you jump, you simply can not get around that reality.

After the other reviews, I don’t really have much to say concerning this episode of AMC’s, The Walking Dead. In fact, I don’t know how much more I can say, which brings me at a place that I never thought I could really be. A place where zombies, walkers, shamblers, runners, etc, etc have sufficiently taken their toll on my psyche.

I know, I know-you’re thinking, “Surely Eric, you jest.”

I can assure you that I don’t, and to prove my point, well, OK, not so much to prove my point but more to keep these posts going, I will explain why. Also I may have signed a contract while drugged, you never know about such things, as they are (contracts and random druggings) arcane in nature.

“Survival horror” is everywhere, if you don’t believe me then just go to the horror section and take a look around. I guarantee you’ll see at least, if the bookstore happens to be Borders, 25-30 titles from small and large publishing companies alike that have something to do with survival horror.

Guaranteed.

And the majority of these titles will invariably have the words, dead; plague, zone, strain, Armageddon and/or zombie on the front cover or even interjected into the title of the book in some way, shape or form. Now for someone who really loves this sort of stuff, as I do, a fact which I make plainly and painfully clear every chance that is given to me, then this is something of a golden age for the “survival horror” fan.

Flames Rising reviewer and Survival Horror fanatic Eric Pollarine had the chance to talk to author David Moody for Zombie Week.

We had previously posted the first chapter of David’s novel Hater here on Flames Rising. In this interview David tells Eric about his work on the Autumn and Hater series.

So, I know that when I last wrote about the series, it was after the second episode, of AMC’s The Walking Dead, which was “Guts” and that it’s taken me a while to get these reviews moving. I apologize but there was a holiday in there some where. or at least I’ll use that as my excuse as to why I didn’t post these before. If you don’t like it then leave me comments.

Let’s get into it shall we?

Tell it to the what?

Episode three, or “Tell it to the Frogs,” was something of a proving ground for the series. What, you scoff, you don’t believe, then I will tell you.

So, by a show of hands- who would have thought that there would ever come a time, in the history of television, when the total evisceration and down right general defilement of a shambling corpse would make for great, if not EPIC, television?

I know what you’re thinking and no, obviously not me, because if it were me then the first sentence of this little diatribe would be a little misleading. Was it you? I couldn’t see your hands if it was, so I’ll take that as a no as well. But that’s exactly the way it was last Sunday when I watched the second episode of AMC’s The Walking Dead. It was a painful and intimate event, one that even I, one of the biggest fans of the so called “Survival Horror,” genre couldn’t watch without thinking, “Holy crap on a crap cracker, that was intense.”

So I have waited to get this off the ground for a few good reasons, the first being that I am and will probably always be a very, very lazy individual. The second being that I wanted to give my initial awestruck impressions of AMC’s The Walking Dead a rest and see if I could realistically look at the show with a critical and more journalistic eye. Or at least if not a journalistic and critical eye, one that wasn’t covered in fan boy man happiness. Yes I said it fan-boy man happiness. don’t judge, it isn’t a very charming quality in a person.

Sunday October 31st 2010 will most likely go down as one of the most important dates in the history of zombie anything, outside of the original release of Night of The Living Dead. If you don’t believe me then you’re probably not as big a fan of the genre or you really have no idea of what I am talking about when I say “zombie” because you would have had to have been born circa 1949 to not understand the significance that the show represents for the horror community and the world of speculative fiction and/or maybe even the entire Media industry in and of itself. Looking back on it -the entire day, was at least for me, predicated around the premiere of AMC’s The Walking Dead. I know that , if you are reading this article, then it was probably the same way for you.

So, just when you thought there wasn’t any room left in hell for yet another “definitive” book on the greatest zombie movie of all time, Citadel Press puts out their 200 plus page achievement called Night of the Living Dead: Behind the Scenes of the Most Terrifying Zombie Movie Ever.

Yes, that’s the whole title.

Anyway – written by Joe Kane billed on the cover as “the Phantom of the Movies,” which I believe hearkens back to his (Kane’s) movie reviewing days with the New York Daily News, the book stands now as possibly the definitive book on the original movie. I found it at a big box book retailer about two days ago and after quickly leafing through it was compelled to purchase it.

FlamesRising.com contributor Eric Pollarine blogs about horror music and horror artists in this colorful post about his top ten Halloween songs, albums and soundtracks.

It’s time for Halloween again, that most special of holidays for nerds, RPG folks, fan boys, Goth kids, and freak shows such as us, where we are able to come out come out from wherever we normally hide and celebrate openly, without fear of persecution, our collective weirdness. From the food court in the mall to the back room of the comic shop, from our mother’s basement to the diner down the street, no-not that one, the other one down the street.

Former high school history teacher Layne Prescot and his girlfriend Tara are returning home from teaching English in China for Laynes’ father’s funeral. While they wait to board the next flight back to his sleepy and economically depressed hometown of Lilly’s End, Florida they meet a mysterious “professional courier” named Mr. Scott, and from there the adventure, terror and conspiracies are just beginning. Because on arrival back home they find that the mysterious man has left Layne his briefcase, and at exactly 11:23 the townspeople start going mad and committing unspeakable acts of violence towards both the people they love and themselves. While the two and their friends try to find a way out they quickly realize that the town has come under strict quarantine, been cut off from the outside world and that death isn’t picky.

So, here we are readers, another late night at the old computer, another review, but this time it is a slightly different affair. Upon completion of George Mann’s “The Affinity Bridge” published by Tor, I happened upon a realization, OK, well not really a realization, more of a revelation, and not one in the biblical sense mind you, more of a traditional something that I hadn’t seen before until I opened my eyes sort of thing. Confused? Well, it seems as if you aren’t the only ones, because I am as well. So here we go with the admission stage of feeling guilty.

I love books, which should be fairly obvious, as I take a great deal of time explaining to you on here, as to why I like or what I like about books. Normally I stick to Zombies/Survival Horror, not because that is solely what I read, as my house is quite literally overstuffed with books; but because I know that genre. I don’t live it; you won’t see me preparing for an all out zombie apocalypse on television or anything. I don’t live and breathe by Max Brook’s “The Zombie Survival Guide” though to be completely honest, after I read it; I did have the sudden urge to purchase my fair share of survival gear. But for the most part, on all conventional levels, I know that specific trope/genre/sub-genre extraordinarily well. It is often predictable; in its very nature is a formula, which is nearly standard issue for all true zombie/survival horror stories. It doesn’t mean that it is not enjoyable, that there aren’t a lot of really great character driven stories out there- because I think, if you have read any of the reviews I’ve done here and elsewhere, you know, that I believe that I have helped pick out some of the better pieces in the annuls of the living dead. But, every once in a while, just every so often- I choose to read something that is completely unassociated with the “living” dead or zombies or having to defend yourself against homicidal post apocalyptic cannibalistic mutated savages.

Anthologies are a sordid sort of crapshoot. Admittedly, I am not normally a fan of crapshoots, or really gambling of any sort. It doesn’t come as some sort of moral high ground or religious stance against lady luck; it just isn’t my cup of tea. So when I got the chance here to do a review of Elder Signs Press’s, “The Best of All Flesh” which was edited by James Lowder, whose earlier works are some of THE seminal Ravenloft and Forgotten Realms works. Needless to say I was both excited-as all things zombie leave me feeling somewhat elated, and yet very, very skeptical. I have read the Permuted Press outings, and I have also read some of the newer compilations which have been released in the last five years, as all things “Zombie” seemed to be just the right thing for the failing publishing industry.

So when we last everyone’s favorite and most famous gunner, Avery Cates, in the Digital Plague, he was on his knees and smiling. Hoping that this was the end, and that the universe would just put the bullet in his head and let him rest. I mean he had already survived an uprising from cybernetic monks, being patient number zero for a world killing nano robotic plague, and of course the seemingly endless stream of System Security Force cops trying to take down public enemy number one. You know what? I would be smiling too.

Ah yes, here we go. So when I was at Wizard World Chicago, see previous blog article on said adventure, prior to going into the actual convention I met up with Matt, our very fair minded and –not to be a kiss up, but really, in to in fact be a kiss up-wonderful editor handed me a box, which he so apply and verbally labeled as a “Christmas Present.” I asked as we stood in the lobby of the hotel, whether or not “Johannes Cabal the Detective,” was in the box or not? To which, of course there was the obvious reply, yes. But the man wears sunglasses to obfuscate his eyes, which I believe hide his own supernatural abilities. Point being, I am scared of him, so I didn’t press the subject.

What is there that hasn’t been said about author Kim Paffenroth? I mean come on, the guy practically invented the thinking man’s zombie story with his “Dying to Live” series, used the original Romero movies as the main focus for a book entitled “Gospel of The Living Dead,” is a Professor of Religious Studies and his latest work has taken him into the depths of the 14th century poet and author of “The Divine Comedy,” Dante Alighieri’s soul.

How is that for a resume?

But really all you need to know about Kim Paffenroth, is that he is a prolific writer and larger than life figure in the Zombie/Survival Horror genre. A man that, in today’s scene of lumbering unholy living dead, needs absolutely no introduction from the likes of a opinion pusher like me, so let’s get into the bone and sinew of this interview, with author Kim Paffenroth.