In this wry take on the post-apocalyptic horror novel, a pandemic has devastated the planet. The plague has sorted humanity into two types: the uninfected and the infected, the living and the living dead. Now the plague is receding, and Americans are busy rebuildandshy;ing civilisation under orders from the provisional governandshy;ment based in Buffalo.
Their top mission: the resettlement of Manhattan. Armed forces have successfully reclaimed the island south of Canal Street - aka Zone One - but pockets of plague-ridden squatters remain. While the army has eliminated the most dangerous of the infected, teams of civilian volunteers are tasked with clearing out a more innocuous variety - the 'malfunctioning' stragglers, who exist in a catatonic state, transfixed by their former lives.
Mark Spitz is a member of one of the civilian teams workandshy;ing in lower Manhattan. Alternating between flashbacks of Spitz's desperate fight for survival during the worst of the outbreak and his present narrative, the novel unfolds over three surreal days, as it depicts the mundane mission of straggler removal, the rigours of Post-Apocalyptic Stress Disorder, and the impossible job of coming to grips with the fallen world. And then things start to go wrong.
Both spine chilling and playfully cerebral, Zone One brilandshyliantly subverts the genre's conventions and deconstructs the zombie myth for the twenty-first century.
About the Author
Colson Whitehead is the author of the novels Zone One; Sag Harbor; The Intuitionist, a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway award; John Henry Days, which won the Young Lions Fiction Award, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; and Apex Hides the Hurt, winner of the PEN Oakland Award. He has also written a book of essays about his home town, The Colossus of New York, and a non-fiction account of the 2011 World Series of Poker called The Noble Hustle. A recipient of a Whiting Writers' Award, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a MacArthur Fellowship, he lives in New York City.
His latest, The Underground Railroad, is an Oprah's Book Club pick.
Industry Reviews
A dark futuristic satire laced with fiendish humour * The Times *
Exhilarating, heartbreaking -- Stuart Kelly * Scotland on Sunday *
Profoundly thoughtful... Zone One is a dark mirror, to be sure, but there is no doubt it is our own age that is being scrutinised here * New Statesman *
A zombie story with brains... Whitehead can spin gore into macabre poetry * Washington Post *
As satirical and gut-wrenchingly emotional as it is horrific, Zone One is the zombie tale at its literary best * SciFi Now *
A cool, thoughtful and, for all its ludic violence, strangely tender novel * New York Times Book Review *
Punchy cocktail of horror, comedy and social critique * Metro *
Often simultaneously arch and sombre, Whitehead's narrative flares with a sociological intelligence -- Benjamin Evans * Daily Telegraph *