Top Ten Tuesdays are hosted by The Broke and The Bookish, and feature lists related to all things bookish–characters, authors, titles, and favorites. They’re an excellent way to find new interesting books on a variety of topics, and to find bloggers that love the books you do.
Check out their blog for their top ten and lists of other bloggers who participate!
August 5: Top Ten Books I’d Give To Readers Who Have Never Read X (examples: New Adult novels, historical fiction, a certain author, books about a certain topic, etc)
I chose People Who Don’t Read Zombie Books, because it’s a favorite topic of mine, and plenty of people don’t appreciate it. Here are some fun, unique, or otherwise interesting stories that happen to have zombies.
1. Allison Hewitt is Trapped; Madeleine Roux. Bookstore employee blogs the zombie apocalypse, and then takes action when things get even grimmer, proving that bookish people can kick some living dead butt.
2. Boneshaker; Cherie Priest. Steampunk zombies, with the required goggles (and face masks, the zombies are created by a gas). A city surrounded by the gas, and people who live there anyway–very, very carefully.
3. Enclave; Ann Aguirre. A YA dystopia, with people living in tunnels underground, scavenging and fighting off the Freaks, shambling cannibals–and surviving okay. Until the Freaks start organizing…
4. Ex-Heroes; Peter Clines. Superheroes fighting to keep a small town’s worth of people safe from the zombies hordes, the beginning of an excellent series, and will answer the question you never knew you needed answered–what happens when a superhero is bitten by a zombie?
5. Feed; Mira Grant. A modern zombie outbreak, caused by artificially created viruses mutating–now everyone’s infected, and everyone turns when they die. Keeping society going is a struggle, but some brave bloggers provide connection, information, and sometimes go poke the zombies with a stick.
6. Forest of Hands and Teeth; Carrie Ryan. A world where the zombie hordes were never beat back, and humans retreated to walled cities to survive, surrounded by forests full of the dead. A lyrical story. Also, an interesting religious story line woven into the apocalypse.
7. Married with Zombies; Jesse Peterson. Romances more your thing? Then this cute story about a couple dealing with a rocky marriage and zombies might be your cup of tea. A cute, fun story–with zombies.
8. My Life as a White Trash Zombie; Diana Rowland. An interesting kind of zombie–the sort that stays intelligent so long as they have a steady diet of human brains. A heroine from the wrong side of the tracks, who’s determined to turn her second life around.
9. World War Z; Max Brooks. Despite the terrible movie, this is a great book. Thoughtful, it raises a lot of questions about the morality of war–what cost is too high to win? Interviews of survivors, it’s easily read in chunks, but forms a cohesive story.
10. Zombies vs Unicorns; Holly Black. A short story collection, with some outstanding (and usually funny) stories about zombies–and unicorns, too, if you’re into that kind of thing. The authors’ comments on which is better, the walking dead or mythical beast, are hilarious, too.
caitlinsternwrites 
Hmmm. Enclave sounds really cool! Also, My Life as a White Trash Zombie. Interesting title and cover. I’ll have to check both of these out. 🙂
My TTT is on dystopian fiction.
All the White Trash Zombie books–book 4 just came out–have funny titles and equally spectacular covers.
Enclave is part of a complete set–the Razorland trilogy.
Both have impressive, strong, independent female leads, I recommend them both!
Awesome! I’ll check them out. 🙂
Funnily enough, I just finished Zombies vs. Unicorns this afternoon! It’s a great story collection, and I would definitely have to pick up The Forest of Hands and Teeth solely because I loved Carrie Ryan’s “Bougainvillea”. Zombies win in my book for that story.
I’m honestly ridiculously fond of unicorns, too, so Zombies vs. Unicorns was win-win, for me.
And isn’t it great how collections can introduce you to new authors? 🙂
This is a great list. I’ve read four of our choices this week – I did fancy the White Trash Zombie book as well but then just never got round to picking it up and sort of moved on as you do!
Lynn 😀
So many books… so little time. 😉
Hey! A category aimed at ME. I just don’t get the appeal of zombies, usually, so this is a good list for trying out a couple more. As you know, I read (and LOVED) the whole Carrie Ryan series. The Forest of Hands & Teeth was a title I just could not resist, and the story was dark and wonderful, and as you say, beautifully written. I’ve also looked at Zombies vs Unicorns and thought I would enjoy that one, but when I went back, I couldn’t find it with the funny cover. That cover was worth the cost of the book! Last time I checked, I couldn’t even find it on amazon, but I’m going to look again. I’m pretty sure I’d enjoy that one. And I promise to try at least one more, though just looking at the White Trash one makes me kinda sick. Think I’ll start with something other than that. I don’t even think I’d like that girl before she zombied up on us. 😀 Great list, Caitlin, and good idea!
Not so much aimed at you, though I did think of you. Plenty of people don’t see the appeal of zombies–or the dystopia they overlap with.
The Z vs. U cover is great–there are a bunch of zombies and unicorns underneath the cutouts.
As they say, a reader for every book–but not every book is for every reader. You read what you like!
Oh, I didn’t mean you aimed it at me, specifically. 🙂 It just IS one of the topics I’m generally not interested in. I looked at every single little drawing on the cover and inside the cover of Z vs U. Nicki and I were laughing our heads off at the little scenes. SO funny. And I didn’t get the book. 😦 When I went back, thinking I really should, it was gone, alas. Still hoping to find that one. The cover alone was worth it.
Yes! So many good ones!
At first I thought I’d have a hard time finding ten, but in the end I had to cut a bunch of them. I especially like the unique zombies, so those ones got to stay.
And I just got The Girl with All the Gifts from the library, so I’m excited.
Omg I’ve heard good things about that one! Hope that it’s as good as I’ve heard it is! And that’s so true! I never realise just how much zombie books I’ve read!
I read the short story that eventually became the book, and it was amazing. I have high hopes. 🙂
Thanks for this! Despite loving horror (books and movies), I’ve never been a fan of zombie books. My dad tried to get me to read The Return Man and was gobsmacked when I told him I’d given up after three pages. I was just bored. But I might give World War Z a go – I actually loved the film!
You have to read what you like, nothing wrong with that. But sometimes it’s good to try something new, just in case.
The book and film don’t have much in common, but I found the book quite interesting.
I love the sound of Allison Hewitt is trapped! I haven’t read any Zombie books (shamefully) but I think that might be a good starting place.
– Annette
A good starting place for any genre is, I think, where it intersects another interest of yours.
And there’s plenty of those genre blends out there. Enjoy!