The Rising [Unabridged] [Audio CD]

Brian Keene (Author), Peter Delloro (Reader)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 2008

Nothing stays dead for long. The dead are returning to life, intelligent, determined...and very hungry. Escape seems impossible for Jim Thurmond, one of the few left alive in this nightmare world. But Jim's young son is also alive and in grave danger hundreds of miles away. Despite astronomical odds, Jim vows to find him - or die trying. Joined by an elderly preacher, a guilt-ridden scientist and an ex-prostitute, Jim sets out on a cross-country rescue mission. Together they must battle both the living and the living dead...and the even greater evil that awaits them at the end of their journey.

Product Details

• Audio CD
• Publisher: Audio Realms; Unabridged edition (December 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1897304447
• ISBN-13: 978-1897304440
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.3 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (280 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,445,198 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

BRIAN KEENE is the author of over thirty books, including Darkness on the Edge of Town, Dead Sea, Urban Gothic, Ghoul and The Rising. He has also collaborated on novels with J.F. Gonzalez and Nick Mamatas. He also writes comic books such as The Last Zombie, Doom Patrol and Dead of Night: Devil Slayer. His work has been translated into German, Spanish, Polish, Italian, French and Taiwanese. Two of his works -- Ghoul and The Ties That Bind -- have been adapted for film. Keene's work has been praised in such diverse places as The New York Times, The History Channel, The Howard Stern Show, CNN.com, Publisher's Weekly, Fangoria, and Rue Morgue Magazine.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

89 of 104 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good old fashioned zombie fun, January 10, 2004

By 

Jeffrey Leach (Omaha, NE USA) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Rising (Mass Market Paperback)

I enjoy reading all types of horror stories, but I have always had a special place in my heart for apocalyptic tales. I don't know what it is about these sorts of yarns, but give me a disastrous end of the world scenario along with a band of disparate and desperate survivors attempting to eke out an existence in a devastated world and I am there. I've probably read Stephen King's "The Stand" at least four times, along with "On the Beach," "Earth Abides," "Swan Song," and many, many more stories concerning the end of humanity. The method of destruction doesn't make much of a difference in whether I will read the story, either. Give me nuclear bombs raining down from the heavens, killer viruses or related plagues, or out of control technology, and I'm happy. Brian Keene took a slightly different tack with his horror novel "The Rising." Instead of vaporizing cities with megaton yield weapons or employing a killer flu, he decided good old-fashioned zombies would do the trick. Yep, the world as we know it doesn't go out with a bang in Keene's book; it goes out with chomp, a chew, and a swallow. "The Rising" is light years ahead of the other apocalyptic zombie book I read a couple of years ago, Candace Caponegro's "The Breeze Horror."

We learn quickly that the world went insane when some scientists working in one of those secret weapons laboratories experimented with a new particle accelerator. Whoops. The experiment had all sorts of important functions, at least on paper, but warnings that strange incidents could take place went largely ignored by the technicians involved in the project. When reports began surfacing about the recently dead suddenly reanimating and wreaking havoc, people wrote it off as nonsense. Predicatably, the problem soon proved horribly true, resulting in escalating and ever widening scenes of violent death at the hands of the hungry undead. Society went under with astonishing speed as the flesheaters promptly attacked any living creature within reach, thereby exponentially increasing their own numbers while achieving a comparative decrease in human numbers. Electric power, cell phones, the Internet, the government, and radio and television stations began to fail in various parts of the country as the zombies rampaged. This further isolated survivors, although a few stalwart souls doggedly hang on in the face of total insanity.

One of these survivors is Jim Thurmond, a construction worker living in West Virginia. Hiding away in a bomb shelter he constructed in case the world ended from Y2K, Thurmond now uses it to hold off packs of roving beasties, one of them his recently deceased second wife. Jim laments his condition, sick to the very marrow of his being that he will never again see Danny, his son from his first marriage. Thurmond's son lives in far off New Jersey, a long trip under normal circumstances but now seemingly unreachable considering current affairs. Then something amazing happens that sends Jim off on a quest fraught with peril: his nearly dead cell phone rings with a message from his son. Danny whispers into the phone that things are bad where he is at but that he and his mother are currently hiding from the zombies. Thurmond resolves to leave that very minute in order to rescue his son. Just getting out of the bomb shelter presents a host of gruesome problems, problems requiring Jim to commit violence against his former neighbors and even his reanimated wife. Thurmond learns a few other things too, namely that the zombies he encounters do not resemble the shambling creatures from horror movies. The undead in this world possess the ability to think, drive cars, use weapons, and set traps for the living. New Jersey looks further and further away with every passing second.

Other poor souls wander through the deteriorating cities and countryside of the United States. Thurmond meets Martin, an elderly black minister, soon after he leaves his house. The two join forces to find Danny and soon run into plenty of life threatening situations, everything from packs of roving zombies to backwoods cannibals seeking some extra food to undead wildlife. At the same time, Frankie, a down on her luck heroin user and woman of the night who narrowly escapes disaster in the Baltimore Zoo also begins a trek out of the cities and into the country. We also keep tabs on one of the scientists in charge of the particle accelerator as he too seeks his destiny in a world full of the undead. You know all of these people will come together at some point in the novel; seeing how Keene pulls it off is the fun part. The conclusion to the story delivers plenty of gory violence, but also gives us an ending that raises more questions than answers. Keene's story is one of the few mass-market horror paperbacks I have read in the past few years that makes you think after you finish the book.

Several scenes of contrived coincidences, a bit of annoyance concerning Thurmond's robot-like determination to save his son, and a few characters who could have benefited from some better development isn't enough to hurt this book in the least. There is plenty of heavy gore, mach speed pacing, and an imaginative plot that doesn't give you all the answers. Even better, Keene used his apocalyptic tale as a vehicle by juxtaposing unconditional love and hope with death and destruction. "The Rising" is a good tale well told, although if the author plans a sequel perhaps he should reconsider. The conclusion is more powerful left just as it is, something a follow up novel would ruin.

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Zombie tale for the 21st Century, April 10, 2007

By 

John Upton "fiction-fiend" (Connecticut) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Rising (Mass Market Paperback)

George Romero introduced the world to the hunger of the living dead Night of the Living Dead (Colorized / Black and White). His initial three films are tentpoles in the realm of horror and remained untouchable even to this day. If you wrote about zombies then you looked to Romero's vision for guidance and inspiration. It wasn't until films such as "The Evil Dead" The Evil Dead/Evil Dead 2 - Book Of The Dead Collection and "Re-animator" Re-Animator that the zombie began to evolve. Instead of the slow ambling gait the public had known and trusted, we are introduced to zombies who could run. If the idea of being eaten alive wasn't bad enough, now we were being chased and no amount of cardio was going to help us (Zombies are dead so its not like they are going to get winded). This little change improved the zombie's status in the pantheon of monsters. I figured this was as far as the zombie genre could be taken. What other changes could be made to make zombies worse?

Then I read "The Rising".

If you are a fan of horror fiction then Brian Keene's "The Rising" is NOT unknown to you. This book is one of the most original ventures into the zombie genre you can find and I guarantee it will be emulated in the years to come. Brian Keene's zombies still hunger for the living and have the capacity to move fast after you but the worse aspect is that they think. These zombies operate vehicles, use weapons, and work together. They actually plot courses of action. How screwed is the human race?

If this wasn't bad enough, re-animation of the dead is not exclusive to the human animal. Prepare for flocks of undead birds and other forms of wildlife. Still don't think there's enough danger? Another threat in the book, probably the worst, doesn't come from the dead but from the living. There were points in the book where I was actually rooting for the zombies because the human characters were so evil.

Every great horror writer has a book that puts them on the map and "The Rising" is Brian Keene's announcement of his arrival. There are already a lot of people calling him "the next Stephen King" but I think Brian Keene stands on his own. He takes no prisoners in his style of writing and isn't afraid to take risks. If you want a "safe" read that rehashes the same old genre standards then go somewhere else. I think there will come a day when we will be calling a new horror author "the next Brian Keene". Jump on board now while the journey is just getting started. I have a feeling you won't be disappointed.

(On a side note, pick up Brian Keene's "City of the Dead"City Of The Dead which is a direct sequel to "The Rising". There are a lot of people who hated "The Rising" because of the end. The sequel begins immediately after.)

37 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars I only made it 9 pages...see how far you can make it!, September 10, 2008

By 

J. Calton (Columbia, MO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Rising (Mass Market Paperback)

For anyone who hasn't read this book and is not insane, I stopped reading before the TENTH PAGE and am here to save you even that much trouble. Here's what you have to look forward to in the first nine pages, encapsulated with snarky commentary:

PAGE 5 (first page):

--Protagonist trapped in shelter with (identifiable, talking) zombie relatives and neighbors outside trying to get in and eat him. I Am Legend comes to mind (the book, not Wil Smith).

PAGE 6:

--He drains his wife's savings [he's a penniless bum, see below] to build a bunker/shelter for Y2K and she doesn't believe they need it. A wacky savings-draining project would never happen in any house where the wife has her own money, ever.

--The bunker is 10x15 and "holds four people comfortably." It also contains the following: three _pallets_ of bottled water, a 55 gallon drum, a generator, a toilet, a shelf of books, a desktop PC, a portable stereo and music collection, canned goods, dry goods, toilet paper (takes up a lot of space), medical supplies, guns, and "lots of ammunition". Completely unrealistic that it even holds ONE person comfortably. Four would kill each other within 48 hours.

PAGE 7

--The world died because when the zombies broke out, nobody cared...because after September 11, 2001 people had learned that disaster warnings were meaningless. [No, I'm not making that up.]

--In the far flung distant future of 2005, mankind has perfected cloning, sent a human mission to the moon (current estimate is 2037. It certainly didn't happen 3 years ago), "defeats terrorism" and are about to cure cancer.

--His first wife and his son had been "the core of his world" (lame phrasing)...until she ran off with a guy from work and still got custody of the kid(?)

--"One night stands that blurred together;" "beer and bimbos" every other weekend...in Lewisburg, West Virginia, population 3500 and full of old people (median age 46).

PAGE 8:

--The only times Jim was "truly happy" were with his son. [see below]

--His ex-wife and son move to New Jersey with her new husband. But he doesn't try to relocate, too...even though he loves his son sooo much. [see below again]

--("More women and one night stands"--in Lewisburg)

--He loses his job and his home. He is now completely free to go to New Jersey to live in an alley near his son, who is his whole world and reason for existing, but he doesn't.

--He met his new wife through "Mike and Melissa." He says that like we (the readers) already know them. No reference given. No explanation for how they know each other. Also, do married couples commonly hang out with homeless drunks? [see below]

--He lost his drivers licence, apartment, job, and--of course--"his self-respect". The only thing he had was an alcohol addiction. So, with all of this, "Mike and Melissa" decide to set up their lonely divorcee friend Carrie with him. On their first blind date with this hobo, she immediately fell in love (I guess) and "she saved him" (of course).

--8 months ago Carrie found out she was pregnant (and still no baby). How did she find out so quickly?

--Jim "loved her so much it hurt--" as if this tired metaphor wasn't bad enough he goes on to explain "--an actual, physical hurt deep inside his chest.

PAGE 9

--"Shuddering, Jim recalled..." Has anyone ever really shuddered? Has anyone ever shuddered _in recollection_?

--"The dead were coming back to life, not as mindless eating machines as in old horror movies..." Here's where you know this book is going to go wrong. "Here's my twist on the zombie tale: all the things that make zombies compelling...I'm not using."

PAGE 10:

--His wife gets sick and dies because they had "run out of pre-natal vitamins." Seriously? What did humans do before pharmaceutical companies made our lives all better?

--He suddenly says "as her condition worsened" without previously introducing her illness...or condition.

--Next paragraph is predictably sappy, then says "THE pneumonia had finally killed her." Huh? What pneumonia? A "THE" right there indicates the one you had already told us about. But you didn't. And never mention it again, I might add.

--How do you get pneumonia in a tiny room with a 55 gallon kerosene heater? [see also p. 12]

--She was 9 months pregnant...did the baby have pneumonia, too? Oops. The son-loving protagonist doesn't even mention that he lost a wife AND unborn child. Really dedicated family man, there.

PAGE 11:

--Protagonist doesn't properly dispose of his dead wife even though he knows he should...because he loves her (corpse) so much. I Am Legend again.

--He buried her under the "pine tree they had planted that summer...and held hands beneath that tree only months before." 1) Gag. 2) That tree grew awfully fast. 3) The zombies just stood there and let you dig a 6' pit?

--(He uses the word "blasphemous" awkwardly here.)

--The phones go out as well as the internet. But "his cellular was a powerful unit, able to transmit and receive beyond the concrete [underground] bunker." No way this works. No. Way. I guess that's alright, giving us this random piece of information not connected to anything whatsoever. Sure, it's unbelievable, but it's not like it's gonna ring. Obviously.

--"In the rush [he never tells us about the rush] to get to the bunker he had forgotten the charger." But he remembered to grab months (days? weeks?) worth of backup cell phone batteries? Why not just get it when the zombies were letting you stand around the back yard and dig all day?

--Also, I don't really know what "sleep mode" is for a phone. Either it's receiving, or it's off.

PAGE 12 (almost done)

--Jim goes to open the refrigerator and drink the last beer, then throw the can into the corner. Now we find out that in addition to the list above, there is also a full-size refrigerator (it's big enough to make him cold) in there and enough beer to last a former alcoholic for months, as well as a corner full of beer cans? Where does this guy sleep? Where do the four people sleep comfortably.

--NOTE: Jim is not killing himself because he lost his family days (weeks? months?) ago...he's killing himself because the beer ran out.

--He "shivered in the air pouring from the open refrigerator." There are so many things wrong with this. Before, it says he's freezing and uses the heat sparingly. If he's already freezing, how bad can the refrigerator really be? Also...the heat displacement from the fridge would heat a 10x15 space quite handily. By the way, I assume he vents his generator outside somehow. Not so good in an enclosed space. The generator would also generate heat. In fact, that little room is probably uncomfortably warm.

--He starts to kill himself. **SPOILER** He doesn't. The book keeps going. Whew! I was afraid the next 300 pages might be blank.

--He starts looking at photos and acting all maudlin. Photos which thankfully he remembered to bring with him in his rush to make it to the shelter. Photos he KNEW he would need later to remember his dead wife. "Hey, Jim, what are those pictures for?" "Don't worry about it, honey. I just want to have a picture of the person I'm going be crammed into a tiny box with for the next six months in case I forget what she looks like. Four inches away from me. Sleeping in a pile of toilet paper. Twenty-four hours a day." [In case you haven't noticed the book is full of discrepancies and vagaries in the timeline in just the first 9 pages. =]

--The photo, predictably, is them at the beach and happens to be the day she got pregnant. Not the day she TOLD him...the day she GOT pregnant.

--In this scene, the author actually says, "the woman who had been...so full of life." Like, in a book about zombies. That cliche is so bad that it isn't even used in soaps or romance novels anymore. I don't watch soaps or read romance novels, but I'm pretty sure this is true.

PAGE 13 (the ninth page!)

--Okay, there's no way this could get any more sappy, right?

The other photo is on a perfect summer day, of him and his son--who looks just like him, of course--who is holding up his soapbox derby trophy. (That he won with his new dad in New Jersey. Seriously.) This is so sappy, it's unbelievable that it appears in a horror novel. Even for contrast, or character motivation.

This is where I put down the book in disgust for a whole day. I came back later to skim it and see how bad it could get...so you don't have to!

BONUS PAGES!

PAGE 14:

--A phone conversation between Jim and his son that will literally make you vomit. Literally. Like, on the book. And then you'll have to make up something when you return it to the librarian.

PAGE 15:

--He cocks the slide on his Ruger and starts to squeeze the trigger (which takes a really long time in tense moments) and...

his cell phone rings! You know, the one with super powers?

--Allow me to interject that for the past 6 pages, he has been telling us that the only times Jim was truly happy is to talk to his son on the phone. Talking On the phone. With his son...

--And when his phone rings, he doesn't answer it. He...doesn't answer it?

--[P.S. Cell phones always have caller ID. Can you guess who it was? I won't tell you, because I don't want to spoil it.]

PAGE 16 (twelfth page of the book, if you've made it this far)

--He picks it up as soon as it stops ringing. Mere seconds later, to check his messages (but doesn't check the caller ID to notice... Read more ›