If you’re on the third floor of Company X’s F-ton location and wandering down the aisles, the dark haired chick with the scuffed rectangular glasses in the white oxford with a certain stuffed green monster at her desk and glaring at her dual monitors with a hot pink iPhone 3GS jammed into ears is me. Okay, maybe I’m not exactly glaring at the dual monitors (see scuffed glasses reference, Blacklight is an expensive spouse) but there are iPhone headphones jammed in my ears from the second the clock hits 7am until snack time. And what am I listening to so intently as I process away? HPPodcraft, Stuff You Should Know, Pop Culture Happy Hour, Skeptoid and Monster Talk. And thanks to my podcast habit, I have a huge list of Stuff I Want If I Ever Had Money. Hey…that iPhone? It’s a refurbished/reconditioned 3GS with the cheapest plan known to man, ATT and Company X. And remember those scuffed glasses?

So thank heavens for the Connecticut Public Library system. Because this afternoon while taking some Me Time at the Noah Webster/West Hartford Public Library, I saw IT, the book that had been calling my name, nay, screaming my name at the Blue Back Square Barnes & Noble. Curse Barnes & Noble and curse the good people at Monster Talk and curse Steven C. Schlozman because there was The Zombie Autopsies just sitting there on the shelf in Science Fiction, all “you know you want me. Who needs to pick up boring old lactose free milk and get quarters for laundry?”. Let me tell you it took all my strength to walk away from the book shelf and march out the door and over to the library. Because come on! George Romero wants to do The Zombie Autopsies. GEORGE FREAKING ROMERO!

So I was in the new fiction section of the library. And what did my tiny little hazel eyes see? And what did my little undead paws snatch off the shelf like there were slavering hordes right behind trying to reach the same book? The Zombie Autopsies of course! (You know…the book I’m writing the blog post about?)

Do I even need to say the second the milk was shoved into the fridge and comfy clothes were on, The Zombie Autopsies joined me on Mr Couch for a hot date? And the second I put the finished book down I was reaching for Mr iPhone to tweet how awesome sauce The Zombie Autopsies was?

Here’s the basic plot, it’s 2013, a zombie virus known as Ataxic Neurodegenerative Satiety Deficiency Syndrome (ANSD) has unleashed havoc on the world. Billions are dead, non-infected humanity lives in underground bunkers and an island laboratory might be the one thing that can possibly unlock the secrets of ANSD.

Sounds awesome right? Then again in the wrong hands the above plot could go horribly disaster zone coughcoughdeankoontzcoughcough wrong. Right now Dean Koontz is tearing out his hair plugs and stomping his feet. Calm the bleep down Dean! I read and actually thought Funhouse was a hoot. And your literary biography is great. I just don’t think your take on the basic The Zombie Autopsies plot would be very good. And don’t go strutting around too cocky Mr King, Cell wasn’t very good either. Many an eyeroll betwixt the first and final pages.

Part of what makes The Zombie Autopsies so good is that Steven C. Schlozman is a doctor. A doctor that has the rare of gift of making the tricky science bits seem so basic and easy that even my stuffed dragon baby Bob could understand them. (Bob: “I smart! I not dumb! I real!”) And like Michael Crichton, Schlozman has the knack of making you believe as you sit on your couch “yeah I can totally see this being true and going down”.

If I had to break down The Zombie Autopsies for a Hollywood pitch it would be “okay imagine Max Brooks’ Zombie Survival Guide had a baby with Michael Crichton and Margaret Atwood’s Haidmaid’s Tale now where’s my $30 million?”

So if Shaun of the Dead and The Zombie Survival Guide are in your favorites, scamper down to the library or Barnes & Noble and splash out the $20 for The Zombie Autopsies. Me? I’m off to fill my weekly intralibrary loan request with all zombie things starting with World War Z!