Most people didn't understand how strongly mothers felt toward their children from the moment they were born. That this screaming thing in your arms was your entire reason for being. That you would do anything to make it happy. That you would fight, kill, die.

- Chapter 11

This book is chilling, heartbreaking, gruesome, and I couldn't put it down. I don't want to give anything away, but what these parents are willing to do for their children is horrifying. The parents in this book are willing to go to extreme lengths to keep their children alive. DiLouie's writing is masterful and he makes the entire premise believable and so all the more terrifying. I highly recommend this book to horror fans everywhere.

One day, out of the blue, all the pre-pubescent children in the world drop dead. Three days later, they come back to life — and the only thing that can keep them alive is blood. Desperate to keep their young ones, parents and family friends and relatives donate as much blood as possible . . . but soon enough, civilization breaks down, for this is a vicious cycle. A pint of blood is good for only an hour or so of life. And in the meantime, the children’s bodies are decomposing, despite the fact that they are, in some form, alive.

Okay, this book is pulpy as hell. But I had fun. It’s an interesting take on the zombie apocalypse genre for sure, and I could not put it down. This one is tense from the first page (the reader can almost hear the clock ticking toward the inevitable). It is more than a little cheesy, but it also packs some punches.

What kept me turning the pages was the shifting perspectives. We get bits of the story from Joan and Doug, parents of two young kids affected by what is known as Herod’s Disease; Ramona, a single mother and career woman; David, a local pediatrician; and, from time to time, a couple of the children in their resurrected state. The story unfolds at a brisk clip, and I was never uninvolved. However, I really did not care for Doug. He was just obnoxious and bitchy. And the author pounds the reader over the head with the idea that Doug is sure everyone is out to get him, always has been — but we never really see why. I just didn’t care about him. He oozed with toxic masculinity and I found myself sighing when the book shifted to his perspective. Blah.

This is a really fun, creepy read. I do feel the story’s potential was not fully realized (it could have been much gorier and scarier, in my opinion) and Doug drove me batty! But I had a nice time.

Read for ‘The Dead Will Walk’ in Halloween Bingo.

To use a cliche comparison, this book feels like a Big Mac meal—tasty and fun, albeit without much nutritional value. :) 

Reading for my ‘The Dead Will Walk’ square. 

The follow-up to Pandemic sees Stephen Knight take the major reigns from Craig DiLouie and have to guide the reader through the often difficult second-book in a series.

Straight off, the best part of Slaughterhouse is how authentic it feels. Not the infected people who laugh like hyenas while they're trying to pull your larynx out through your ass, but rather the way in which the military characters in this book speak and behave screams believable. Not that I've ever been in the army, so I cannot accurately say, but compared to other books of this apocalyptic type, this one seems to be aiming to get it right.

Of course, that also works against Slaughterhouse insofar as making it a chore to read through the repetitive, technical nature of much of what is being described. But worse than that, is the way in which none of the characters - other than the single female POV character, Rawlings - seem to have any real depth to them. Instead they just felt like variations on military cliche. And as such, I cared barely at all when some of them died.

It's a shame, but this one just did not do it for me. I'm clearly in the minority looking at the other glowing reviews of Slaughterhouse online; which is a good thing because the third in the series is about to drop and I wish the authors every success with it.

I just won't be a part of it, because, sad to say, I'm going AWOL from this series.

2 Homicidal Maniacs Flying an Assault Helicopter for Slaughterhouse.