The 7 Best Selling Zombie Books
I enjoyed Bookgasm's post about 7 Current Zombie Books with Brains so much that I decided to write a post about the 7 best selling zombie books that we carry at our store. These aren't necessarily the most current zombie books we have in stock, but our customers love them.
The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks - Even though it came out in 2003, The Zombie Survival Guide is still a best seller. Do my customers know about an impending zombie apocalypse or something? Probably not. The popularity of this book probably has more to do with the clever idea and the good writing. But if you're ordinary person who is worried about what to do during a zombie outbreak, then you'll find this book useful And Max Brooks is Mel Brooks's son.- World War Z by Max Brooks - This isn't really a novel. It's actually a collection of short stories set in a single setting where the zombies rose and were eventually more-or-less defeated in the titular war on zombies. It's an excellent follow-up to Brooks's first zombie book, and the writing is outstanding. The audio version of World War Z is also well worth listening to, with readings from notables like Alan Alda and Rob Reiner, among others.
- Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth-Grahame Smith - 85% of the text in this book is the same as the text in Austen's original novel Pride and Prejudice. But oh what a difference the other 15% makes. We read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies as a horror book club selection one month, and it was well-liked by all our members. (And yes, we do have members who love Jane Austen.) Beware of the many attempts to cash in on the popularity of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies; they're not all of the same high quality. Although Seth-Graham Smith's new book, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, is likely a worthy successor.
- The Walking Dead - The paperback collections of Robert Kirkman's excellent comic book series The Walking Dead fly off the shelves as soon as they come in. Each edition collects six issues of the comic book, which is a zombie movie as an ongoing series with no ending. We expect sales of this one to continue to grow, especially now that AMC is creating The Walking Dead as an ongoing television series. (And Frank Darabont's in charge of this one, so it should be great.)
- ZEO: How to Get A(Head) in Business by Scott Kenemore - This isn't the first book about zombies that Scott Kenemore has written. The Zen of Zombie is also a popular seller at the store. But ZEO seems to be more popular. Is it possible that people are really so desperate for good advice on how to run a business that the only real wisdom they can find is in a spoof book? I think so. The career advice in this one actually made more than a little bit of sense to me. What that says about me, I'm not sure.
Marvel Zombies by Robert Kirkman - The collected editions of these comics still sell out constantly. In case you're not familiar with the series, it takes a look at what would happen in the Marvel Universe if a zombie apocalypse happened there. So we get treated to zombie versions of the Hulk, Spider-Man, Wolverine, and all of the other Marvel superheroes. I think this would make a great movie (definitely better than either of the dull Fantastic Four movies I sat through, anyway).- The Best of All Flesh by James Lowder - Before zombie anthologies became common, James Lowder was editing collections of short fiction as a companion to Eden Studios' roleplaying game All Flesh Must Be Eaten. These anthologies are all out of print now, but this collection picks out Lowder's favorites from the three volumes. RPG companies are not always known for the high quality of their fiction publications, but The Best of All Flesh stands head and shoulders over most other zombie short fiction anthologies.
Visit us Eerie Books, 205 N. Ballard, Wylie, TX between 2pm and 6pm in order to buy any of these tiles. We'd love to meet you.
For more information about zombies and zombie books, check out some of these resources:
That's all for today. Will blog more tomorrow.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 23rd, 2010 at 12:00 pm and is filed under Horror Fiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Have you read Breathers? It is one of the best zombie books I’ve read recently. This is a great list. thanks
Aw, I miss those zombie short-story collections from Skipp and Spector from the ancient days of the late ’80s/early ’90s.
I read the first two on your list and enjoyed them quite a bit. Sadly most of the zombie books I buy from the local bookstore are really bad and seem to have been thrown together just to get a title and image on the shelf, which is starting to turn me away from them all together. I will give the rest of your list a try. Maybe it will help relight the fire that the first two built.