Why do we love flesh-eating zombies?

The following is an excerpt from my recently released book titled “Just Bite Me: A Guide to Zombies, Vampires, Werewolves, and Other Walking Nightmares.” The book is now available at Amazon and Barnes and Noble.  

The sun is blinding and shares its warm rays with anyone who can appreciate its warmth. It’s a time for family vacations, grilling out, swimming, and romance. Couples are visiting local parks, holding hands, and sharing embraces. The dog walkers and elderly also enjoy frequenting local parks. But only a few miles away, turbulence is stirring in the local boneyard.

Silent chants float through the air.

A chilling breeze silently whispers, Brains! Brains! Brains! The chant becomes one with the old boneyard and caresses the remains of its residents. The remains are rotten and long forgot. Madness soon rises from underneath crusty ground. Dirt covered phalanges protrude through unholy mounds of earth. Prodding fingers still wear wedding rings, necklaces, and other reminders of a former life. Other fingers clutch handfuls of dirt clumps encased with shreds of grass.

Skeletal arms puncture the soft dirt and raise their arms in protest. These dead creatures once held jobs, wrote poetry, and held loved ones in what they used to call arms. Now, the dead fingers writhe and clutch dirt and shards of their rotting coffins. The living don’t hear the cracking phalanges and metacarpal bones. These creatures now seek sustenance.

Zombie skulls resemble burned out Jack-O-lanterns. The skulls no longer contain eyeballs or flesh. The worms have taken residence. In harmony, the dead have returned to lay waste on the living. With tattered flesh dangling from bones like wind chimes, the dead silently infiltrate the surrounding subdivisions. 

Ragged burial clothing wrap long-dead skeletons like a bandage. These horrors do not speak or dance. They only exist to collect their pound of flesh. They will soon feast on blood, brains, and pale fleshy skin. The zombies are on the march.

Before 1968, zombies weren’t flesh-eating monsters. Director George Romero introduced flesh-eating zombies in a movie titled Night of the Living Dead. After Hell closed its doors, evil had nowhere to go. Their only recourse was to kill the living and inherit the planet.

Please click here to read the entire article.