M.D. I’ve been thinking about ordering the Zombie Survival Guide
Have you, or your readers read the Zombie Survival Guide? Does it have any real information or advice? Would you or your readers recommend it? Thank you Lance.
Lance, I’ve haven’t read the book, so I can’t give any insightful advice or a recommendation, but I’m sure some of the readers of this blog have. So I’ll turn this over to them – have you read the Zombie Survival Guide? Is it worthy for consideration as a true survival guide?
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I suggest reading the reviews on Amazon. Max Brooks is the son of comedian/director Mel Brooks. The book is for entertainment purposes, not prepping.
I received the Zombie Survival Guide for Christmas. It is cute and entertaining. It is not a serious survival guide. All info contained is found for free via Internet. It is a parody.
Thanks for the blog M.D.
Rabbit Priest
Day by Day Armageddon by JL Bourne was a fun book and actually had a little bit of info in it.
Brad in South FL
If there was a zombie apocalypse like in the book then it would be an excellent source of info. Will the dead walk the earth, probably not. I would use it as a launching point though to get your creative process going of what real things you can do to survive.
The Zombie Survival Guide is a little too tongue-in-cheek to be a real aid. Brooks's companion book, World War Z, that inspired him to write ZSG, is a novel that probably would be more help to a survivalist in that it would encourage a survival mindset. My advice: borrow both books from the Public Library.
Get it from the library but don't buy it unless you just really enjoy zombie type genre stuff.
On the other hand, ZSG is a great way to introduce just the right kind of person to prepping. It got my wife on board — she figures if you can survive zombies, you can survive anything, so now we're zombifying, not prepping. It isn't useless, but it isn't useful to a daily reader of this blog, either.
It is pretty tongue and cheek but has some good generic advice, it is good to store food, water, arms, ammo, have a bag packed and a plan, etc.
Better look at "ZOMPOC: How To Survive a Zombie Apocalypse" (Michael G. Thomas and Nick S. Thomas).
I have read the book cover to cover, I am 55, I see it as a great tool to get younger people interested in survival. If you wanted to write a survival book that wasn’t fiction, which involved killing attackers’ you wouldn’t find it on the shelves of Barns and nobles. It has to be taken as tong and cheek. If you don’t come away with something you are not reading between the lines, besides its funny. It’s a more interesting reading (today I prepared by polishing my mason jars of hard red wheat, and how I built a survival vehicle out of my snapper push mower deck).
Try The Last Centurion by John Ringo. It's a very timely book ans while it's not a survival guide it does offer a view of America after an economic collapse.
Max Brooks is a genius. His "Zombie Survival Guide" introduces many ethical, practical and "outside the box" ways at looking at survival, that apply to all survival situations, not just zombies. Even better is his "World War Z", a book about a worldwide invasion of zombies. His books make you think – what works, and what doesn't in a tactical situation. What might happen in a worldwide conflagration? One interesting thing from "World War Z" is that there is only one nuclear exchange between nations – Iran nukes Pakistan. I highly recommend both books. I read "Day by Day Apocalypse" as well, but it just didn't measure up, IMHO.
World War Z gave a good angle on how humanity wouldn't come back from the brink until it learned to drop everything extraneous and start working together. I liked Day by Day Apocalypse because it gave practical advice such as staying as a group, helping one another out, opsec, etc. Neither is a survival type novel, but there are elements there.
The book is written entirely for entertainment purposes. There are a few nuggets of gold throughout the book, but you would have to know what to look for already. "Tongue-in-cheek" is the perfect description for this book. It was humorous, but got old and repetitive towards the end. I got it because I'm a fan of everything Zombie and am happy with it for it's entertainment value.
The book is fun, but not really very useful in terms of what we will face during a collaspe. This is my general take on the Zombie genre.
It's not useful as a survival manual, but it's got goo information, and more importantly, inspiration.
Anything that makes you want to prepare is a good thing. I enjoyed the book and have read WWZ several times. Is it accurate info? Perhaps if you are fighting zombies. But if it inspires you to take a more detailed look at your preps then by all means read it.
The problem with most survival fiction is that it's written by survivalists. The info is good but the stories are poorly written. This is the exact opposite. It's a great story with a good preparedness message that's well written. WWZ is a better more entertaining read.
I am sure if you follow it's advice you would die horribly in a real collapse, but if it gets the juices flowing it's done it's job.
Regards,
Jaeger
I loved The zombie Survival Guide. I agree with most of the above posts. I also used the "Coming zombie/robot apocalypse" to get my wife to think about a troubling future. Start humorous and get slowly more serious. The best advice from the book is:
"You don't have to reload knives"
No-one likes Zombies. The best way to deal with them is to become proficient with a halberd (a sharp ice scraper would also work).
Having met Max personally, I can tell you that he is laughing at each and every one of you who took ZSG, his FIRST book, serious. He did research for the input but it is by no means any more a serious guide than Mad Magazine is a true social commentary.
I hate Zombies… they killed my little dog Buck…..
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