World War Z

I was given Max Brooks' book World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by one of my kids at Christmas and the book languished on my bookshelf for months before I picked it up. But when I picked it up - I couldn't put it down. The book is a series of interviews of survivors of the Zombie War and if that sounds like a silly concept for a book I guess I wouldn't have disagreed with you. That is until I started reading the book.

The book is geared to read like a Studs Terkel book (it was modeled after The Good War: An Oral History of World War II but I kept thinking of Hard Times: An Oral History of the Great Depression which I think was the original best selling oral history by Studs Terkel).

The book was entertaining and disturbing to the point that I'd find myself daydreaming about defending my family against zombie hordes and the best ways to do so. While waiting at stoplights in my mind I seriously debated the merits of aluminum bats over wood bats and finally finding a use for my 1-iron. Crushing zombie brains needs forethought you know.

While reading the book I couldn't help but think that it was tailor made for a HBO series. Each chapter in the book deals with a different interview with a focus on different stages of the Zombie War. Perfect for HBO! I was disappointed to learn that the book supposedly be made into a movie. That doesn't mean I wouldn't go see the movie. Brad Pitt's Plan B Entertainment secured the screen rights to the novel and now that the ill-conceived adaptation of Moneyball has been shelved - maybe World War Z can move to the front burner for production.