Let’s Read World War Z pt. 10: Featuring Special Guest Appearance by Nelson Mandela

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Here it is, our final World War Z post!

For reasons outlined previously (the rest of the book doesn’t have a whole lot to discuss, basically), we’re going to end our look at Max Brooks zombie opus here. Don’t worry though, because we’re going out on easily the strangest and most ridiculous chapter of the book, as well as frankly one of the stupidest things I’ve ever seen in a published novel. If you think I’m hyping it up too much, just wait.

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Let's Read World War Z Pt. 9: Hoorah

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I’m skipping quickly over another chapter that doesn’t have much of interest besides revealing that post-zombie Russia is now a “Holy Empire”, this being one of three things countries can be in the near future along with Federations and New Republics. The chapter after that opens in Barbados and talks more about how the carribean is an economic hot zone because the various island nations were able to mostly avoid zombies…somehow. We were told before that they can cross oceans and that infected ships were a vector to transport them around the world, but apparently none of that was a threat to small island countries with lots of hard to defend coastline.

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Let's Read World War Z Pt. 4: Is that a Desert Eagle in your pocket

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Out framing story this time is kind of strange. Taking place in THE AMAZON RAINFOREST, BRAZIL, fictional Max Brooks arrives at a secret settlement built by an indigenous tribe who survived the zombie apocalypse because they build houses suspended in trees. I have no idea if this is based on a real culture, although they may have been inspired by these people.

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Let's Read World War Z ch. 2: Zombies Unlimited

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Before we get back into the origins of the zombie apocalypse in China, I want to go back and mention something from the book's opening. See, WWZ presents itself as taking place in our future, but there's a really obvious clue indicating that this is actually an alternate universe:

It is no great secret that global life expectancy is a mere shadow of its former prewar figure. Malnutrition, pollution, the rise of previously eradicated ailments, even in the United States, with its resurgent economy and universal health care are the present reality;

Universal healthcare? In America? What's Max Brooks trying to suggest here, that proud freedom-loving Americans would let the zombies win  by giving up the open marketplace of private insurance that George Washington personally fought and died for? I think I'm going to be sick .

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Let's Read World War Z pt. 1: When zombies were cool

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Who's ready for a new let's read series?

Yes, The Overton Window remains unfinished. My fun neurological condition has fluctuated to the point where I feel like I can work on something, but I'm still not able to handle Glenn Beck's prose or the somewhat complicated political hot takes that responding to it entails. Instead we're going to sink our teeth into the lean, nutrition-free corpse that is Max Brooks' World War Z: An Oral History of The Zombie War.

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Let's Read The Kingkiller Chronicle sex comic

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No, this is not a joke.

I check in occasionally on r/KingkillerChronicle to see if there's been any news on the third book, or if that big ambitious multimedia adaptation is any closer to being an actual thing (it isn't). Usually it's just the dedicated fans becoming collectively more and more fed up with the failure of Doors of Stone to materialize, but today I found something different. Something both terrible and wondrous.

I found a sex toy review/sex ed webcomic featuring a strip written by Patrick Rothfuss, in which he interviews his characters about their sexual identities.

Reminder: still not joking. This is real. Link is NSFW, in case it wasn't obvious.

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Let's Read The Overton Window pt. 15: The World According To Glenn Beck

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Content Warning for rape and child abuse. You can read an edited version of this post that doesn’t deal as heavily with those topics here.

Chapter 31 opens with Noah and Arthur facing off in Arthur’s office. Noah tries to apologize for his subterfuge, but Arthur is suspiciously laid-back about the whole thing, saying that there's no way Noah could have seen through Molly's seductive wiles.

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Let's Read The Overton Window pt. 10: This is a sneaking mission

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We're back from our hiatus! Unfortunately, posting will still resume on a slower schedule, as I'm experiencing new and exciting Brain Symptoms. I'm planning on tidying up some choice pieces of content from my old site and bringing them over, so that will hopefully plug up the gaps.

In case you've forgotten what's going on in The Overton Window, here's a recap: Noah Gardner, rich young PR executive, has entered the orbit of Molly Ross, a member of the goofily-named Founders Keepers, a "patriot" group convinced that America is sliding towards tyranny. Noah actually knows for a fact that this is the case because he was in the room when his dad offered to help some government employees enact a plan that will end with a new world order taking over the country, but he doesn't seem to have processed this for some reason. When we last left them, they were sneaking into Noah's company to look for evidence of the plot at Molly's urging.

Meanwhile, Danny Bailey, another Trapper Keeper and Youtube sensation, has been recruited by an FBI agent named Stuart Kearns, ostensibly to participate in a sting operation looking to arrest militia members who might be plotting nefarious deeds. In reality, Kearns is working with the evil conspiracy and is duping both Danny and the militia chuds into carrying out a real terrorist attack in order to create a pretext for the new world order plot (this hasn't actually been revealed yet in the part of the book we've covered, but it's incredibly obvious).

All that aside, lets get back into it.

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Let's Read The Overton Window pt. 9: www.stuartkearns.com

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Programming note: updates will be less frequent for the forseeable future, due to Brain Problems

As chapter fifteen opens, Noah brings Molly to his fancy rich-guy apartment, humble-bragging about how he lives near the Met and all the big embassies because he's such a mister fancy pants. It feels like approximately a month in real time since anything interesting has happened.

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