Undead Anonymous

I just recevied my first official review from Kirkus Reviews, which is slated to appear in their January 15, 2009 issue.  I have to say, it’s a good way to start off the New Year:

BREATHERS: A Zombie’s Lament

The dead shall walk the earth, and they’re hungry for…love?

Debut novelist Browne branches out from his mostly horror-related short stories and delivers a rousing entry in the Rom-Zom-Com genre.

Based on his short story “A Zombie’s Lament,” Browne’s mortality tale begins rather grimly but almost immediately picks up speed and humor to evolve into a terrific comedy about the perils and joys of life beyond death.

Browne’s hero is Andy Warner, who survived, so to speak, the car crash that killed his wife but lost his vocal chords along with his life. Reduced to a pathetic existence consisting mostly of downing his father’s wine collection, suffering Glade spray-downs from his mother and attending the occasional Undead Anonymous meeting, old Andy is in pretty wretched shape.

His afterlife takes a turn for the better when he meets Rita, a pale but lovely girl who slit her own throat, and Ray, a feisty undead hunter.  Before long, Andy is fighting against zombie discrimination, mutilation and other forms of abuse by those unenlightened “breathers”:

“After all, what do I have to lose by standing up for myself? If being a rotting corpse with no rights and no future isn’t the worst thing that can happen to me, it can’t be that much further to rock bottom.”

The book has its share of gruesomeness, but it also offers astute observations on the world in which we live.

A zombie comedy with brains.

To celebrate the upcoming publication of Breathers less than two months away, I’m throwing a contest in which I’ll be giving away a personally autographed Advanced Reader’s Copy of Breathers: A Zombie’s Lament by yours truly as first prize.

In addition, I’m offering a mass market paperback of the winner’s choice for the first and second runners-up.  Kind of like Miss America, only without the flowers and the tiara.

To enter, all you have to do is promote this contest and this web site and comment to this post with a link to the site or the blog or the group where you plugged Breathers and you’ll be entered to win.  Yeah, it’s that easy.

Winners will be selected by a random drawing of all entries.

The contest is open in all time zones and closes Sunday, January 18th at 11:59 PM, PST.

Good luck and thanks for the support!

Andy’s taking the day off to soak in some Pine-Sol, so I thought I’d take this opportunity to mention that, on my website at www.sgbrowne.com, I’ll be blogging about writing, the process of writing, the ego of writing, the business of writing, and the fact that, quite often, I don’t necessarily know what I’m talking about.

I’ll also be posting these blogs to my profiles on LiveJournal and MySpace, in case you’re interested in reading the posts or some of my archives there.

And beginning sometime next month, I’m going to begin an on-going blog about Breathers – from concept to publication.  A little self-indulgent?  Maybe.  But technically, all writing is self-indulgent.

I’ll start with the creative process I went through with Breathers, along with how at several points I had no idea how to finish it, then move on to the process of looking for an agent, which included 15 months and 82 rejections.  Finally, I’ll finish up with the business of the book deal, the editing process, and realizing that the book cover you get isn’t the one you always imagined.

In the immortal words of The King, thank you for listening.

S. G. Browne here, founder of Undead Anonymous and author of Breathers: A Zombie’s Lament – a dark comedy about undeath through the eyes of an ordinary zombie named Andy Warner.  Andy would have been here to welcome you himself, but he’s currently undergoing his weekly formaldehyde treatment, which helps to slow down the process of decomposition.

Andy will appear frequently here, providing some insight into the struggles of being a zombie in a world ruled by the living.  Also known as Breathers.  He’ll also provide occasional words of wisdom on his dry erase board, which he has to use to communicate since his vocal cords were damaged in the accident.  Occasionally, I’ll chime in with my own insights and updates.  You’ll also hear from several of Andy’s friends, who are members of Undead Anonymous – the support group which Andy attends to help him deal with his new existence.

The basic premise behind Breathers is a question I asked myself when I originally sat down to write a short story about zombies:

Is it necrophilia if you’re both dead?

More to the point, I wondered what it would be like to reanimate from the dead into a society where you had no rights, no hope, and got carted off by Animal Control whenever you stayed out after curfew.

While I realize a significant proportion of zombie film and literature focuses on the undead as antagonists, there is a growing community of zombie sympathizers, so I hope you’ll appreciate the viewpoint presented here, with the zombie as hero.