Are you looking for a quick read that's fast and scary? Cool, keep reading, but let me warn you....this isn't your classic zombie genre tale.

The Rising is the first book in a series of horror novels written by Brian Keene. Primarily an author of horror and crime fiction, Keene has often been credited with ushering in the new era of zombie popularity in pop culture. The Rising won the Bram Stoker Award for Best First Novel in 2003 and was optioned for both film and video game adaptation in 2004.

Details, details right? Let's get to the actual plot.

The dead are returning to earth as zombies, totally normal story line so far and I'm already hooked. But they are not just your regular, run-of-the-mill, brain-craving undead, they are smart creatures that can shoot guns and drive cars. AND it's not just undead people that the living have to contend with but all forms of undead animals, ranging from birds to deer. We start with our main character, Jim Thurmond, trapped in his bunker alone hiding from the terror outside. He receives a chance cell phone call and discovers that his young son is alive and hiding in his attic hundreds of miles away with his ex-wife. Despite overwhelming odds (would you want to fight a population of living dead that can wield weapons???), Jim vows to find his son Danny or die trying. Jim clumsily breaks out of his bunker and makes a break for it. Along the way to rescue his son he is joined by an elderly preacher, a scientist (who is possibly responsible for the undead plague), and a determined ex-prostitute/junkie. They must battle both the living and the undead. And for Jim and his companions, an even greater evil awaits them at the end of their journey. SPOILER! I won't spoil the ending of this story but, hint hint, neither will the author.

So, what did I like about this book? The stories of all the would-be survivors are slowly intertwined and mesh together nicely at the end of the novel. I love it when an authors pulls that off as well as Keene does. The character development is subtle but it's enough to grab the reader and encourage you to cheer for the survivors. There is plenty of zombie killing action and some truly disturbing imagery. Imagine being pecked to death by a murder of undead crows! I was also pleased that the main characters were not idiots. So often in zombie genre novels and films the main characters are dumb, they think that even though their friend has been savagely torn apart by zombies they still might have a fighting chance of surviving and not turning into a zombie themselves. In this book, they shoot to kill.

Now, what about the stuff I didn't like. Well, I realized while reading this novel I am truly an old-school zombie lover (I'm sure I've said that before). I don't like smart zombies. The logistics of a dead, decomposed corpse being able to shoot a gun or drive a car are too far-fetched for me to believe. It didn't ruin the book for me but there was always a little nagging voice in the back of my head saying "There is no way!". I can handle fast zombies or zombies that kill for the sheer evil of killing and not to quench the thirst for brains but not smart zombies. Got it?! Also, I didn't care for the explanation that some experiment opened some sort of inter-dimensional rift allowing demons to possess the dead. But that's a whole other thing.

Ok, wrappin' it up! Other than my personal qualms I have with the zombies this book is a great read, it's scary and action-packed. Any zombie genre lover will find it easy to get into this book. I'm definitely going to be picking up Keene's other books and I highly anticipate that they will be just as good.