The Dead [Paperback]

Mark E. Rogers (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 2001

The Judge came like a thief in the night. No one knew that the world had ended---until the sun began to rot in the sky, and the graves opened, and angels from Hell clothed themselves in the flesh of corpses...Long out of print, this murderous theological fantasy presents an epic vision of damnation and redemption, supercharged with mayhem, terror, and old-time religion. Looking for a good scare? Try The Dead, and bite off more than you can chew.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Born in 1952, author-illustrator Mark E. Rogers is best known for the Samurai Cat books: The Adventures of Samurai Cat, More Adventures of Samurai Cat, Samurai Cat in the Real World, The Sword of Samurai Cat, and Samurai Cat Goes to the Movies. The sixth and final installment in the series, Samurai Cat Goes to Hell, was recently published by TOR. His other books include The Dead, Zorachus, The Nightmare of God, The Expected One, The Devouring Void, and The Riddled Man. One of his novellas, The Runestone, was made into a movie; and The Dead is presently under development as a feature film---with a screenplay by Mark---at KNB-EFX. Mark's work has been adapted by Marvel comics, and has appeared on the cover of Cricket Magazine; he's published three art portfolios, and a collection of his pin-up paintings, Nothing But A Smile, is due in mid-2000 from Xenophile Books. Mark lives in Newark, Delaware, with his wife Kate---a philosophy professor at the U of D---and their four lovely kids, Sophie, Jeannie, Patrick, and Nick.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

THE DEAD

Mark E. Rogers

The moon looked as if it were hanging directly over the border between sea and beach; the surf was a silverlit fury of water and spray.

Hell, Gary thought, If that moon was any brighter, there'd be a rainbow. He took a hit from his flask.

The wind began to blow harder. Despite the warmth the liquor sent coursing through his veins, the breeze still cut.

God, is this really July?

He began thinking about that nice warm bed back at the house. Yes, it was time to head on home. Maybe there'd be news about mom....

"Dammit, God," he said, "I know I don't believe in you, but please let her be okay."

He was about to get up when he noticed something drifting in on one of the combers. Dark and rectangular, it looked almost like a piece of plywood; then he saw it was riding too high in the water. Back of some kind of flotation cushion, maybe.....But there was something about the stability of its movements that suggested something heavy beneath it.

Holy shit, he thought. A flotation cushion. And just about the size of an airline seatback.

The waves pushed it closer to the shore. Soon it was in the surf. Gary sat motionless, hoping his worst suspicion would not be confirmed. He tried to think of something else that could be attached----

(With a seatbelt, Gary?)

to an airliner flotation seatback, something else besides a......

The object tilted in the surf, and a wave caught it, tumbling the whole mass over. Sitting there serenely, as though he were asleep and not a day-old drowned corpse, was a dead gentleman in a business suit. It was hard to tell at that distance, but he seemed to have a large crab clinging to his face.

Gary felt suddenly sick, but parts of his mind remained strangely objective about the whole business. Should he try to haul the guy up on the beach? What exactly should he say when he phoned the cops?

Still he had not moved. Civic duty or no, he found he had no inclination to. Used to dead bodies neatly tucked into coffins, behaving themselves at funeral parlors, he was totally unprepared to deal with one in the process of washing ashore. And this one was an Italian tourist, no less. All the way from Rome, maybe, four thousand miles to drown off the Jersey coast.

The seat shifted with each wave, but it had pretty much run aground. Surf sloshed over the man's face, but the crab was still clinging to him. Looked like it had him by the mouth. Big damn crab.

No seafood for a year, Gary told himself.

That was when he saw the corpse reach up and tear the crustacean off.

What the----

A wave splashed over the body. When it receded, the corpse's hand was back at its side.

Old eyes playing tricks on you, Gary thought. Too much scotch. Wasn't any crab to begin with----

This line of argument was cut short as the corpse's pale hands whipped to the seatbelt and undid it.

Gary pressed himself slowly back against the boulder, trying to melt into the stone, even as he ran through the very compelling reasons why he had nothing to fear and could not possibly have seen what he had just seen.....

With a fearsomely quick movement, the corpse rolled from the seat, knocking it on its side as it passed over the armrest; then in an explosive splash it jacknifed up into a sitting position. Chin dripping foam, it appeared to be eyeing the jetty.

Jesus Oh God can it see me........?

But if the corpse was aware of Gary, it paid him no heed; its face swivelled seaward and jerked to a crisp, precise halt. Gary guessed he could not be all that obvious, with his dark-blue jacket and pants against the dark granite. There wasonly his pasty white face, and there was nothing to be done about that, not even cover it with his pasty white hands.....All he could do was press himself flatter and flatter against the stone and pray to Jesus Christ Almighty that he was just too damn drunk and none of this was happening.....

The corpse shot to its feet like a spear thrust up out of the surf. Gary's eyes darted eastward, out to sea, towards the spot it seemed to be staring at.

Three round things appeared in the trough between two waves and started towards the shore. Swells rolled over them, but each time they reappeared, closer to the beach. After a time they were clearly recognizeable as heads, rising slowly from the water, faces pale beneath dark hanging hair. Shiny black shoulders broke the surface; white collars gleamed. Pressing purposefully through the foam, barely staggering as waves crashed into them, the figures halted suddenly where the water was only knee-deep.

The corpse strode out to meet them, splashing through the shallows like an overwound toy soldier. As it came up beside them, they pivotted mechanically around; the four marched back out into the Atlantic, finally sinking from sight.

Frigid sweat poured down Gary's face.

Gone, he thought. They're gone.

He was leaping from stone to stone down towards the beach before he even realized it. Bounding onto the sand, he pelted across the beach to the boardwalk, not stopping till he reached his parents' house.

Product Details

• Paperback: 303 pages
• Publisher: Infinity Publishing (PA) (February 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0741405563
• ISBN-13: 978-0741405562
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (94 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,768,436 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

49 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fun, fast paced, different, November 3, 2006

By 

Patrick S. Dorazio "Author of The Dark Trilogy" (Cincinnati, Ohio) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Dead (Paperback)

I am a big fan of zombie fiction. I have read most of what Amazon has to offer and will continue to seek out more as more product is produced. After reading some of the reviews of this book, I was pretty prepared to be disappointed in this novel as a real diversion from standard zombie fiction that gets preachy and rather annoying. I was happily mistaken in that presumption.

Certainly, this book utilizes christianity as a background with which to play with. The dead here are angry, vicious, damned souls that want nothing more than to destroy the rest of humanity, to pull them down to their own cursed level instead of being mindless flesh eaters. They rip and tear at people but do not devour them-it is not their purpose to consume the living but to have them join them in their agony.

Unlike "The Rising" and "City of the Dead" by Brian Keene, you do not get the sense that these cursed souls from the abyss or their demon overseer are being forced to act like Romero zombies because the author wants to bridge the gap between Romero and the Bible. At least that is not the sense I got. I am not saying that Brian Keene didn't do a good job of it, but this felt more biblical, more epic in nature. I got the feeling that the Mark Rogers created these creatures and felt no need to slap an added layer of "varnish" on them to make them more like other similar creatures in other works.

I would agree that the main characters do fit into some stereotypical molds-the agnostic, the atheist, the religious zealots, etc. It did not detract from the overall story though. They were only stereotypes on the surface-the character development was still satisfactory and individualized these people quite well. The ones that must fight to live after the "rapture" have to find ways to escape the ever increasing army of the dead and find ways to come to grips with this new reality-that they must change their beliefs, their attitudes if they want to transcend it. Survival here is not the true goal, at least not on this plane of existence.

Obviously, this is not your typical zombie work and if you go into it expecting that, like some other reviewers, you will probably be upset and feel you were jipped. Especially if you feel like the author is somehow getting all "high and mighty" with his message. In my view, it was very well done though. You don't have to agree with the christian view points or perceptions of the apocalypse to find this work interesting to say the least and quite an fun action adventure to boot. The action sequences are well written and keep things moving at a rapid pace.

Some have said there was a lot of editing errors in this book. I just read "Zombies in my Hometown" and I can say with all honestly this book is infinitely superior as far as the editing is concerned to many of the books out there in the genre. Yes, there were spelling errors and I got the sense that the font was changed before the book went to press and some of the words were jammed together because of it, but unless you cannot tolerate a few mistakes here and there, you should be able to get through it with minimal anguish. After all the self published zombie works I have read lately, I consider this book towards the higher end of the scale as far as editing is concerned. Of course, compared to highly polished works produced by big publishing houses it is lacking, but again it is nothing that will really bog you down.

I am a person who enjoys a lively debate; a good argument about religion and philosophy. While some of the conversations going on in this novel did seem a bit contrived they still brought up interesting points of view and commentary that was stimulating to read through. I don't have to agree with everything put in print or get angry at someone for speaking out for something I might disagree with so none of it upset me. I honestly did not feel that the author was preaching but was posing different ideas and giving his characters the passion to state them.

I will state for the record that my opinions are influenced by the fact that I grew up Catholic-went to Catholic schools, the whole nine yards. As I grew to adulthood I spent a great deal of time questioning my own and other religions and am not a practicing Catholic or a member of any other churches at this time. Despite that, I am always interested and open to various view points on both God and religion and so reading this book was, for me, an interesting exploration of both of those topics.

As I stated in the title of my review, this book is fun, fast paced, and different than a "normal" zombie novel. If you are generally open to seeking out something a little different in the undead realm that has some religious undertones to it you might enjoy it, but if you are looking for just a traditional undead tale with no hint of the "wrath of God" then this book might not be to your taste.

39 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good, fast-paced fun, April 21, 2008

By 

Tim H. (New England, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Dead (Paperback)

From the man who brought the world the genius of the Samurai Cat series comes this horror novel about the Rapture. Written in the late 1980s, this was reissued in 2000 by a small print-on-demand publisher who clearly have no editors to catch spelling errors. That quibble aside, the book is pretty well-written. It tells the story of two brothers in a seaside NJ town, back there with family to bury their father. Suddenly the sun gets ulcerous, the righteous vanish from the Earth, and the dead rise from their graves and form an army to take over the planet from the living. Hunted through the houses and sewers of suburban Jersey, the family blows away walking, talking corpses while simultaneously having long, drawn-out discussions with a priest about faith, God, the Bible, and other religions. It is precisely these monologues which grind the narrative to a halt. It's great that the book has more on its mind than a gorefest, but I found myself getting frustrated when the characters kept acting like one-dimensional props (e.g. "I am a militant atheist, hear me roar!") and treading the same ground in their arguments, over and over. Still, this is a fun book and its short length means you can plow through it in a couple of days. It's definitely worth checking out for fans of the fear-based book genres and zombie tales in general.

45 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Zombie Apocalypse, Old Testament-Style, April 9, 2007

By 

Michael J. Tresca "Talien" (Fairfield, CT USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Dead (Paperback)

I met Mark Rogers at a fiction convention. Bored and sensing a kindred spirit, I hung around Mark's table, a little lost in the swirl of all the agents, publishers, and hopeful authors like myself.

When I mentioned that I write book reviews, Mark offered me not just one book, but all of them - literally, the entire pile of books he had on his table. I just couldn't do take him up on his offer; as much as I'd love to write reviews for all of his books, the odds of me finishing any of them in a reasonable period of time (say, before I see him again in a year at another convention) were low. So I only picked up a few. Then he asked me the magic question: "Are there are any in particular you're interested in?"

I pointed at The Dead, with its disturbing cover of a wicked-looking dead man. And thus I became acquainted with Mark's style of horror.

Mark is what I like to call a double-threat. Mark's not just an artist; he's an amazing talent reminiscent of Frank Frazetta. After reading The Dead, it's apparent that he's also an exceptional author. It just isn't fair!

When I picked up The Dead, Mark warned me "there are typos." That's not entirely true. I found only one actual misspelling. But something happened during layout, such that every few paragraphs two words run together. Somehow, these kinds of errors offend me far less than misspellings.

I expected a zombie book. In fact, I was intrigued how one writes a zombie-themed novel. After awhile the zombies have to get a little boring, right? What I got instead was something completely different: a good old-fashioned fire-and-brimstone tale of the apocalypse, complete with the dead walking the earth to claim souls for Hell.

The Dead is basically a morality play, detailing the efforts of a few tough characters strong enough to survive. All the familiar apocalyptic elements are here, from nature reclaiming technology to good people suddenly spirited away to Heaven, from preachers touting the end of the world to survivalists loaded with artillery. They're all front and center in The Dead, and Mark gleefully kills them off one by one.

Mark's greatest skill is in his imagery. He has an artist's talent for visualizing the indescribable; his description of the palpable evil that one of the zombies gives off, like "that scene in Indiana Jones where the Nazi pugilist is about to hit the whirling blade" will stick with me for the rest of my life. Mark doesn't just describe events; he actually paints pictures of them in your mind, filling in every color and texture.

The book isn't perfect, however. Some characters (notably the wife of the protagonist) seem undeveloped, while others (Steve) show up out of nowhere. The events of the world are summarized in narration rather than left a mystery, which detracts from some of the horror. For those seeking definitive answers as to which side Rogers comes down on philosophically, he dodges the question: what happens to all those folks who aren't Christian? Good question...

Still, The Dead is a terrifying tale, especially so for Roman Catholics with a healthy dose of Italian guilt. You'll never look at your zombies the same way again.