Excellent storytelling format.

I highly recommend listening to the oral history, which is told by a full cast of narrators and features a well-rounded detail oriented take on the Z-epidemic!

Wonderfully thought out!

I will definitely need to check out another Max Brooks book after this gem!

5 Stars!

Probably due for a re-listen

Reread via audiobook 2023
4 stars

This was a book that improved for me in audio format. It’s a full cast production that comes off basically like a bunch of episodes of This American Life but telling the story of humanity’s war with the zombie plague.

A great audio production that affirms my experience that epistolary formats are for me much more enjoyable as audio than in print.

Note: Just a heads up that there is more than one version of this audiobook, some of which are abridged versions of the original text. For the unabridged version, look for World War Z: The Complete Edition released in 2013 and should clock at 12hr 9m in length.

Read in print 2016
3.5 stars

My last book of 2016!

I wasn't sure I would like this one but it turned out to be quite good, although not outstanding. The "story" is told by way of interviews with a variety of characters (fictional non-fiction) and I thought the chosen format worked effectively for what it was.

If I'm being totally honest I do prefer a more traditional story format - you couldn't exactly get attached to or work up emotions about the "characters" in this book - but I do love my zombie books.

Actually just listened to 'World War Z' 2x in a row. Absolutely love hearing the stories after the fact and listening to the introspective and reflective dialogue exchanges with an interviewer. This cast could not be any more impressive and talented. Diehard zombie fans should not pass this one by.

At this current moment in time my husband and I do not actually have a working will. We are the legal definition of intestate. We have not yet made any preparations for our death and we only have life insurance/house insurance because his mother organized the whole damn thing (come to mention it she is also the reason we have electricity, water and a phone line - the internet though was all us because we'd die without it.)

So believe me when I say that we don't organize... anything. Except our zombie kit. That's right. We have a zombie kit. Should zombies suddenly strike while I type out this review we would be able to take our son and get in our car and drive away without a backward glance. Everything we need is in the boot of the car. If we're holed up inside the house we have our second zombie kit to live off of and use to defend ourselves. We have several plans in place as to where to go, what to do if we're separated at time of crisis, who we're taking with us, how we'll stay in contact etc.

Some may call his paranoia. Some may call this stupidity. Do you know what I call these naysayers?

Zombie food.

It is this obsessive and weird need to ensure survival during a zombie apocalypse, despite every rational reason to believe that all our efforts are for naught, that has made me the prime candidate and target group of this book.

It is not the norm of the zombie genre. In general a zombie movie tends to be about a small group of individuals against the undead hordes looking to floss with intestines.

This book is not about a small group of individuals - it is about a large collection of humanity. This book is how HUMANITY would survive and deal with a zombie infestation. It is a collection of small, broken narratives from people all over the world, across many social, economic and political classes.

Some of them were amazing, others horrifying. Some were inspirational, others so depressing or introspective that I wondered if there was any hope.

I would argue that many of the "voices" from certain nationalities were not really very accurate and didn't really match the cultural region they came from - but I'm lazy. Either you "get" the voice of the narratives or you don't.

This book was a fascinating, thoughtful read in a field that I'm personally obsessed with. I could easily understand how those who've never stayed up until three in the morning, drunk off their heads with a group of people yelling that if they head into the city then they're zombie meat (Zombie meat I say! You ridiculous idiots!) probably will find this book a hard read.

It's also a difficult read in the sense that you are continually sucked into one story, only to have it end abruptly and shift to another. I kept getting frustrated and wanting to scream, "No! Go back! I want to know what else happened!" but alas. It's like little snap shots from all over the world, except when it comes to several of the snapshots, I'd really rather see the whole picture.

Other than that, I loved it. I had a hoot reading it. It gave me plenty of fodder with which to have many drunken debates with my husband, brothers and friends.

Much to their disgust...

’I told him that we might be facing fifty million monsters, but those monsters would be facing the gods’

Second Read ; Mar 23 2025 - Mar 26 2025