Kiss Of Life (Generation Dead #2)

*Spoilers......and overall uninteresting if you haven't read Generation Dead*
After Adam is killed by Pete, a zombie hater, he returns to life.  Phoebe  feels love and guilt that Adam died saving her.  Since Adam is techincally still walking around, Pete was not convicted of murder.  Phoebe spends a lot of time with Adam since she was told that love brings the undead back faster.  Adam struggles with simple movement and speech.  The rights of the undead are being tried.  Groups are out to see the zombies returned to complete death or to do scientific research on them.

I could go on and on but the book really wasn't as good as the first one.  I was excited to pick this book up to see what happened with the zombie love triangle between Phoebe and Adam and Tommy.  I wish I had only checked it out from the library instead of purchasing it.  It took forever for the book to go anywhere.  Not until the very end is there very much action but it felt unfinished.  I hate second books that are merely a bridge to book three.

I will definitely read the next book in the series, "Passing Strange", because it has one of the better characters, Karen, a zombie sometimes passing as human.  By the end of the book we are unsure what has happened to her.  I have the feeling that there will be loose ends even as the series wraps up.  I also have suspicions about what will happen next and will be glad to have everything explained.

Rating 3 Meh.......
Rating PG 13 Death, zombies, murder, torture, language.

The Dead-Tossed Waves

The Dead-Tossed Waves by Carrie Ryan (sequel to The Forest of Hands and Teeth)

Years have passed since Mary left the Forest of Hands and Teeth.  She lives at the edge of the ocean, caring for the lighthouse and the beach.  Her own daughter, Gabry, is not as daring and adventurous as Mary.  Gabry wants nothing more than to be safe and stay in her small seaside town with her new love Catcher.

As many teens are prone to do, Gabry follows her friends outside of the barriers that keep the village safe from the Mudo.  When a Breaker attacks the group of friends, turning many into the undead, Gabry flees to the safety inside of the barriers.  Catcher is contaminated with a Mudo bite.  The ones not 'turned' are captured by the Recruiters and locked up to await punishment for endangering the whole community.

Mary decides it is time to go back to the Forest and reclaim the past she left behind.  Gabry, too afraid to follow her mother, stays behind.  Gabry wonders why she can't be brave like her mother and adventerous like her friends.  When she finds out Catcher is still alive and outside of the barriers, but contaminated with the virus that will turn him into an undead, Gabry tries to find the inner gumption to leave the community and brave the dangers outside of the barriers for the boy she always saw herself loving.

At the beginning of the book I felt a little like I wasn't reading a sequel.  The unconsecrated are now called Mudo, meaning 'mute'.  The fast Mudo are called Breakers.  You turn Breaker if there are not enough Mudo around when you are infected.  I didn't feel like these were covered very well.  I felt like I walked into the middle of a conversation.  Then the more I thought about it, I realized that this was many years after the first book and it took place in a society that knew more about the zombies. 

I would have like to delve into the reason for the zombies and how the rest of the new civilization worked.  I do however LOVE this author's writing style and the way she puts the words together.  She uses very descriptive words in a way that I would not think to put them together, but then somehow you understand exactly what she was trying to evoke.

I am pretty sure that I marked a lot of quotes but now that I am looking at my markers I see that my kidlets have pulled most of them out:(

"His words cut into me, his desires and dreams mingling with my own, throwning at me everything I've lost.  Everything that will never be mine."

Gabry's life strays completely from the narrow path she saw for herself in the future and she miraculously steps onto it with bravery that I don't know if I could muster.

Rating 4  Great, great writing style.  I was still interested in the Mudo virus and the society that was built up after the Return, which I didn't get many answers to.
Rating PG  No language or sexuality really.  Just some sensual kissing and peril.

The Forest of Hands and Teeth

The Forest of Hands and Teeth by Carrie Ryan

Mary lives in the Forest of Hands and Teeth.  She lives in a village within the confine of fences that keep her and her village safe from the Unconsecrated.  The Unconsecrated have overtaken everything since the Return.  Mary wonders if there is anything outside of the forest, if there is anyone left.
Mary's mother has tempted her with stories of the ocean and now she cannot rest.  Nothing can satisfy her desire to see what is beyond the forest.......to make it to the salty ocean.  Even the love of one boy, the exquisitely haunting desire for another, the mysterious threats of the Sisterhood, or the danger of becoming Unconsecrated herself, nothing is enough to stop her need to go beyond.

I finished this book very quickly, but I am still haunted by the acute pain left by Travis (Mary's love).  Travis is betrothed to Cass, Mary's bestfriend.  He is also the brother of Harry, Mary's betrothed.  Although the book is about zombies that have come about by a virus at some point in the future, it still has the feeling of being in the past.  Between the fear for their lives and the desire for something Mary can't have, the book was gripping, and tore at my heart.

Book quotes that I LOVE.....
Mary says....."Tonight my body pulses with awareness as I kneel by his bed, our fingers intertwined.  We've been sharing each other's breath for what seems like weeks now even though it's only been a few moments.  It's as if there is infinity between our lips and we will never actually touch.  Like math, where dividing by half can last for eternity."

"Suddenly he doesn't feel like my friend but like something more and I have to force myself to remember that he is not mine to desire."    (ugh.......so painful!)

"In the last few days I had already begun to imagine what Travis's and my children would look like, how their tiny hands would curl around my finger.  I had already dreamed an entire life between Travis and me.  And now that was the only life that we would ever lead together-the one in my dreams."

"It is not about surviving.  It should be about love.  When you know love.. that's what makes this life worth it.  When you live with it every day.  Wake up with it, hold on to it during the thunder and after a nightmare.  When love is your refuge from the death that surrounds us all and when it fills you so tight that you can't express it."

Rating 5  This was a good book.  It may not be super fantastic but it still left me feeling it after more than one day so.......I have to give it credit.
Rating PG  It's totally clean despite the desire thick enough to cut with a knife.  The zombies (Unconsecrated) are trying to kill everyone, so the threat is a little scary.

Generation Dead

Generation Dead by Daniel Waters

First off........I love the cover.

Teens all over America are returning from the dead. With so many 'differently biotic' stumbling around new ways of tolerance and rights must be navigated.
Phoebe and Adam (Goth girl and Lame Man) have been best friends and neighbors for year. Their high school has a good undead program and is attracting the undead from all around. Phoebe takes a shine to Tommy, one of the undead boys. Tommy joins the football team that Adam plays for. Attention is quickly drawn to Tommy and the rights of the undead are challenged.
By cover appearances you get the feeling this will be teen fluff and giggles over the 'corpsicles, wormburgers, zombies....etc.......'. Turns out that even though the language is timely, witty, and spunky, the core issues are not light reading. It is a new age battle over equality. Once the living die, their death certificate strips them of all the rights Americans take for granted.....even the right to go on living.
I would have loved it if the book delved further into the reason for the dead returning to life. It felt like a gaping hole not knowing what made the zombies tick......although I guess it leaves it open for imagination. The civil rights movement in a fresh way was definitely something to think about. Although you could surely see the tides washing ashore in the same paths taken by the former civil rights movement.....peaceable vs. violent.
By the end of the book I was surprised and sad. This was a great read. It was light enough verbally to still be a fun read despite the depth it touched on.
Rating 4.5
Rating PG violence