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Autumn #1
Autumn
A bastard hybrid of War of the Worlds and Night of the Living Dead , Autumn chronicles the struggle of a small group of survivors forced to contend with a world torn apart by a deadly disease. After 99% of the population of the planet is killed in less than 24 hours, for the very few who have managed to stay alive, things are about to get much worse. Animated by "phase two" of some unknown contagion, the dead begin to rise. At first slow, blind, dumb and lumbering, quickly the bodies regain their most basic senses and abilities... sight, hearing, locomotion... As well as the instinct toward aggression and violence. Held back only by the restraints of their rapidly decomposing flesh, the dead seem to have only one single goal - to lumber forth and destroy the sole remaining attraction in the silent, lifeless those who have survived the plague, who now find themselves outnumbered 1,000,000 to 1...
Without ever using the 'Z' word, Autumn offers a new perspective on the traditional zombie story. There's no flesh eating, no fast-moving corpses, no gore for gore's sake. Combining the atmosphere and tone of George Romero's classic living dead films with the attitude and awareness of 28 Days (and Weeks) later, this horrifying and suspenseful novel is filled with relentless cold, dark fear.
Without ever using the 'Z' word, Autumn offers a new perspective on the traditional zombie story. There's no flesh eating, no fast-moving corpses, no gore for gore's sake. Combining the atmosphere and tone of George Romero's classic living dead films with the attitude and awareness of 28 Days (and Weeks) later, this horrifying and suspenseful novel is filled with relentless cold, dark fear.
308 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 2001
About the author
David Moody
68 books1,244 followersDavid Moody first released Hater in 2006, and without an agent, succeeded in selling the film rights for the novel to Mark Johnson (producer, Breaking Bad) and Guillermo Del Toro (director, The Shape of Water, Pan's Labyrinth). Moody's seminal zombie novel Autumn was made into a movie starring Dexter Fletcher and David Carradine. He has an unhealthy fascination with the end of the world and likes to write books about ordinary folks going through absolute hell. With the publication of continuing Hater and Autumn stories, Moody has cemented his reputation as a writer of suspense-laced SF/horror, and "farther out" genre books of all description.
Find out more about his work at www.davidmoody.net and www.infectedbooks.co.uk, and join Moody's mailing list to keep up with new releases.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 573 reviews
October 18, 2019
what i really like about this book is the main reason most of the people hate...... to be very slow, it is not fast pace, but all around the claustrophobic feeling due to living among the Zombie....
i suppose it should be the reason why it has been written in such way.....
Good job David Moody!!!
( i am not native english sorry for my grammar and syntax!)
i suppose it should be the reason why it has been written in such way.....
Good job David Moody!!!
( i am not native english sorry for my grammar and syntax!)
October 2, 2012
If this had been survival of the fittest in the beginning, the characters would have been the first to die, because some of the stuff they did was so stupid it was utterly jaw dropping. There's a moment in the book when they're hiding out and realise they're being steadily surrounded by zombies. Why? Because of a loud 'constantly thumping' generator, the house being lit up like Blackpool and smoke pouring out the chimney from a nice hearty fire. When they realise they might have to forgo these things, they get sad because they can't imagine life without treats. The country in tatters, friends and family dead, dead people walking around and potential human extinction is something they all make an effort to get over, but no electric to watch DVDs? Unacceptable, apparently.
The characters were infuriating. Apart from them boomeranging from one extreme personality to the next, they were such dull, one dimensional people I would have much preferred to go it alone than be stuck with them during the end of the world. One moment Michael is telling Emma that, regardless of her feelings or opinions, humanity is gone, never coming back, no use crying about blah blah blah, the next he's anxiously asking whether or not mankind can rebuild itself and what they can do. Carl goes outside, touches plenty of the zombies, Michael doesn't hesitate to hurtle through a crowd of them, then a few pages later they're too scared to go outside again and have to (alternately) talk each other round. I think the problem is they're never developed. The only one who does any sort of changing is Carl, and that's mostly downhill.
You know how in Dawn Of The Dead when Anna steps outside to see the world gone to hell? I love that. I love the uncertainty, the fear and the adrenaline fueled mayhem as survivors battle to save their arses. There is nothing of the sort here. People literally just drop down dead and then it's 10+ pages of the survivors being too scared to go outside. I didn't dislike the way the people died, nor the order of things when they started getting back up, but, my god, give me something to sink my teeth into. Where's the carnage?! The chaos? Save for the odd pile-up and the constant references to 'decaying corpses', there's nothing new and exciting happening. One character just goes home and goes back to bed 'in a panic' when things kick off.
The writing is very, very flat, not to mention fairly poor. It doesn't read easily and suffers from A LOT of repetition. The only way he can describe something is 'decayed/decaying', every character starts every second sentence 'Christ!' 'Jesus,...' or 'Bloody hell!'. The conversation goes round...and round...and round, no issue is ever resolved.
The constant exaggeration wasn't really necessary, since it didn't add any sort of fear to an already dull plot. I think the author used it as a (cheap) ploy to make the situation appear a lot more dangerous but, for reasons I'm not really sure about, it aggravated me. I get that the newly quiet world means sound carries and causes a chain reaction but the 'thousands upon thousands upon thousands' of 'decaying corpses' find their way to a house the main characters had trouble finding just stinks to me. Especially since the zombies were supposed to have to attention span of a 6 month old.
I did like the cycle of the zombies and how they became more vicious over a length of time. I also picked up on the enthusiasm of the author, which is always a good thing. I can't get away from the fact this book was published way before David Moody was ready, though. I know that it was put online for free when he was a 'frustrated writer', presumably when he had had no luck with traditional publishing houses. If so, reading through this shows that they were not wrong to turn him down. Saying that, I do realise this was written about 10 years ago and so I'm holding out for Autumn: The City to see if he's improved.
The characters were infuriating. Apart from them boomeranging from one extreme personality to the next, they were such dull, one dimensional people I would have much preferred to go it alone than be stuck with them during the end of the world. One moment Michael is telling Emma that, regardless of her feelings or opinions, humanity is gone, never coming back, no use crying about blah blah blah, the next he's anxiously asking whether or not mankind can rebuild itself and what they can do. Carl goes outside, touches plenty of the zombies, Michael doesn't hesitate to hurtle through a crowd of them, then a few pages later they're too scared to go outside again and have to (alternately) talk each other round. I think the problem is they're never developed. The only one who does any sort of changing is Carl, and that's mostly downhill.
You know how in Dawn Of The Dead when Anna steps outside to see the world gone to hell? I love that. I love the uncertainty, the fear and the adrenaline fueled mayhem as survivors battle to save their arses. There is nothing of the sort here. People literally just drop down dead and then it's 10+ pages of the survivors being too scared to go outside. I didn't dislike the way the people died, nor the order of things when they started getting back up, but, my god, give me something to sink my teeth into. Where's the carnage?! The chaos? Save for the odd pile-up and the constant references to 'decaying corpses', there's nothing new and exciting happening. One character just goes home and goes back to bed 'in a panic' when things kick off.
The writing is very, very flat, not to mention fairly poor. It doesn't read easily and suffers from A LOT of repetition. The only way he can describe something is 'decayed/decaying', every character starts every second sentence 'Christ!' 'Jesus,...' or 'Bloody hell!'. The conversation goes round...and round...and round, no issue is ever resolved.
The constant exaggeration wasn't really necessary, since it didn't add any sort of fear to an already dull plot. I think the author used it as a (cheap) ploy to make the situation appear a lot more dangerous but, for reasons I'm not really sure about, it aggravated me. I get that the newly quiet world means sound carries and causes a chain reaction but the 'thousands upon thousands upon thousands' of 'decaying corpses' find their way to a house the main characters had trouble finding just stinks to me. Especially since the zombies were supposed to have to attention span of a 6 month old.
I did like the cycle of the zombies and how they became more vicious over a length of time. I also picked up on the enthusiasm of the author, which is always a good thing. I can't get away from the fact this book was published way before David Moody was ready, though. I know that it was put online for free when he was a 'frustrated writer', presumably when he had had no luck with traditional publishing houses. If so, reading through this shows that they were not wrong to turn him down. Saying that, I do realise this was written about 10 years ago and so I'm holding out for Autumn: The City to see if he's improved.
February 20, 2012
4 Stars
I am not sure why the reviews are so all over the place with this book. This is a top notch zombie thriller that is a slight variation on the standard post apocalyptic story. This is my second David Moody novel which I have read, Hater being the first.
Things that make this book stand out. One interesting aspect was, wholly shit Moody wasted no time wiping out the human population. From one minute to the next, schools, towns, cities, and then countries fell dead to an apparent virus. A second cool part of this book was how those few survivors had to quickly come to grips with the fact that the world has ended, and that they were alive with no apparent direction to go. Michael, Carl, and Emma, our stories main heroes meet each other along with 23 other survivors soon after all has gone quiet in the world. This group thinks that they are safe together at the community center, but they quickly disagree as to their future. Without giving away any of the cool story line, things change and our 3 protagonists leave the safety of the group to find their own way. The last alternative take on this genre is the fact that the survivors were not killers. There are no kick ass zombie beheading stories, or mass killings to talk about. This book focused on what it would be like to lose everything. To lose all you ever had, ever loved, and ever dreamed. Then it forced them to decide how to go on. All great stuff.
The slow building of tension and danger, coupled with the slow changes to the world, after such an incredibly fast destruction gave this book an awesome feel of dread. While clearly a book one, it does have a good start and ending point. I look forward to reading the rest of this series. To me, this is a post apoc must read.
I am not sure why the reviews are so all over the place with this book. This is a top notch zombie thriller that is a slight variation on the standard post apocalyptic story. This is my second David Moody novel which I have read, Hater being the first.
Things that make this book stand out. One interesting aspect was, wholly shit Moody wasted no time wiping out the human population. From one minute to the next, schools, towns, cities, and then countries fell dead to an apparent virus. A second cool part of this book was how those few survivors had to quickly come to grips with the fact that the world has ended, and that they were alive with no apparent direction to go. Michael, Carl, and Emma, our stories main heroes meet each other along with 23 other survivors soon after all has gone quiet in the world. This group thinks that they are safe together at the community center, but they quickly disagree as to their future. Without giving away any of the cool story line, things change and our 3 protagonists leave the safety of the group to find their own way. The last alternative take on this genre is the fact that the survivors were not killers. There are no kick ass zombie beheading stories, or mass killings to talk about. This book focused on what it would be like to lose everything. To lose all you ever had, ever loved, and ever dreamed. Then it forced them to decide how to go on. All great stuff.
The slow building of tension and danger, coupled with the slow changes to the world, after such an incredibly fast destruction gave this book an awesome feel of dread. While clearly a book one, it does have a good start and ending point. I look forward to reading the rest of this series. To me, this is a post apoc must read.
October 10, 2012
Ninety-nine percent of the population has died in less than twenty-four hours, most of them dropping dead wherever they happened to be when the sickness struck.
A group of survivors makes its way to a flimsy community center.
When some of the dead suddenly struggle to their feet and begin to wander about, three of the group decide they might be better off holing up in the less populated countryside. The others, forgetting what happened to the idiots who decided to wait for help in the dining room of The Poseidon Adventure, decide to stay put.
This book is filled with characters who I DON'T WANT TO BE STUCK WITH IN ANY EMERGENCY. They show no foresight. True, they can be forgiven for not anticipating that the dead will become ambulators. Few people expect that to happen...BUT...no one even considered the possibility of marauding bands of armed and violent survivors coming to raid their meager food supplies?
Yeesh! These people have no imagination whatsoever!
The book has a long, s-l-o-w build up. The dead are pretty disoriented when they first stumble to their feet. Aside from the fact that they are CORPSES and they are WALKING AROUND, they're not scary at all. Anyone who thought last season's The Walking Dead was too boring, should probably stay away from this one. I, however, thought there was a great, encroaching creepiness, and I was kept pretty nervous waiting for the ax to fall.
And then, with no warning, the dead turn nasty. While they don't seem to be hungry for brains, they ARE REALLY PISSED at the living, and you basically don't want to mess with them. And before you know it, things are quickly looking hopeless for our intrepid little trio.
I'm torn between three and four stars. There is really nothing new here, but all the same, it kept me turning the pages. Apparently, there are sequels, but I probably won't continue with the series.
A group of survivors makes its way to a flimsy community center.
When some of the dead suddenly struggle to their feet and begin to wander about, three of the group decide they might be better off holing up in the less populated countryside. The others, forgetting what happened to the idiots who decided to wait for help in the dining room of The Poseidon Adventure, decide to stay put.
This book is filled with characters who I DON'T WANT TO BE STUCK WITH IN ANY EMERGENCY. They show no foresight. True, they can be forgiven for not anticipating that the dead will become ambulators. Few people expect that to happen...BUT...no one even considered the possibility of marauding bands of armed and violent survivors coming to raid their meager food supplies?
Yeesh! These people have no imagination whatsoever!
The book has a long, s-l-o-w build up. The dead are pretty disoriented when they first stumble to their feet. Aside from the fact that they are CORPSES and they are WALKING AROUND, they're not scary at all. Anyone who thought last season's The Walking Dead was too boring, should probably stay away from this one. I, however, thought there was a great, encroaching creepiness, and I was kept pretty nervous waiting for the ax to fall.
And then, with no warning, the dead turn nasty. While they don't seem to be hungry for brains, they ARE REALLY PISSED at the living, and you basically don't want to mess with them. And before you know it, things are quickly looking hopeless for our intrepid little trio.
I'm torn between three and four stars. There is really nothing new here, but all the same, it kept me turning the pages. Apparently, there are sequels, but I probably won't continue with the series.
May 29, 2007
“Billions died in less than 24 hours.”
Most zombie stories begin the same way. Take a random, ordinary day; add a mysterious plague that kills a great percentage of the population; focus on a handful of survivors as they seek each other out and come to terms with the fact that their loved ones are now flesh-eating undead. I really don’t see the need for re-writing the classic Night of the Living Dead gig, unless there’s a new (or at least interesting) twist to it. Like 28 Days Later, where the never-identified-as-zombies “Infected” have a very different sort of affliction, and even Shaun of the Dead with its comic twist. Autumn, sadly, offers nothing new or exciting in its story.
True to the genre formula, the book begins with an ordinary autumn day turned gruesome, as people begin to asphyxiate and literally drop dead, leaving very few survivors. By the end of the next day, half of the bodies “wake up” and start walking around aimlessly. And then they start reacting to sound and light… And then they start attacking the living... Not really all that suspenseful if you’ve ever seen a zombie flick.
But that’s ok, that’s what makes it a horror story. Author David Moody (if he - a horror writer - was actually born with that last name, it would be a crazy coincidence) still has a chance to wow me with his writing skills and characterization. We can look into the human condition; we can sympathize with the characters and bite our nails when it looks like they have no way out. We can be mentally transported to the cottage in which the survivors huddle and feel part of the story. At the very least, since it is a horror story after all, we can be supremely grossed out.
Or not.
Moody’s writing is disappointingly amateurish and repetitive (if I read the phrase “unexpected and inexplicable” one more time, I would have slammed my head into a wall). His descriptions are flat and the characters are mind-numbingly dull. We skim the surface of them – age, sex, occupation – but never delve into what they are feeling. Their interactions mainly consist of: “What should we do?” “I don’t know,” and, “Are you ok?” “Yes, are you ok?” I think the zombies could have had more interesting conversation!
The overall lack of suspense made the entire story seem anticlimactic. Nothing, truly nothing, happens. Even the undead are boring. They don’t eat a single brain in the entire book. Everyone knows zombies eat brains! I believe the closest we get is reading how one man is “swallowed up by the crowd” or something similarly un-detailed and not-interesting. Yawn.
Maybe the story gains momentum in one of the four sequels Moody penned for Autumn, but I’ll never know, because I won’t be reading them.
Most zombie stories begin the same way. Take a random, ordinary day; add a mysterious plague that kills a great percentage of the population; focus on a handful of survivors as they seek each other out and come to terms with the fact that their loved ones are now flesh-eating undead. I really don’t see the need for re-writing the classic Night of the Living Dead gig, unless there’s a new (or at least interesting) twist to it. Like 28 Days Later, where the never-identified-as-zombies “Infected” have a very different sort of affliction, and even Shaun of the Dead with its comic twist. Autumn, sadly, offers nothing new or exciting in its story.
True to the genre formula, the book begins with an ordinary autumn day turned gruesome, as people begin to asphyxiate and literally drop dead, leaving very few survivors. By the end of the next day, half of the bodies “wake up” and start walking around aimlessly. And then they start reacting to sound and light… And then they start attacking the living... Not really all that suspenseful if you’ve ever seen a zombie flick.
But that’s ok, that’s what makes it a horror story. Author David Moody (if he - a horror writer - was actually born with that last name, it would be a crazy coincidence) still has a chance to wow me with his writing skills and characterization. We can look into the human condition; we can sympathize with the characters and bite our nails when it looks like they have no way out. We can be mentally transported to the cottage in which the survivors huddle and feel part of the story. At the very least, since it is a horror story after all, we can be supremely grossed out.
Or not.
Moody’s writing is disappointingly amateurish and repetitive (if I read the phrase “unexpected and inexplicable” one more time, I would have slammed my head into a wall). His descriptions are flat and the characters are mind-numbingly dull. We skim the surface of them – age, sex, occupation – but never delve into what they are feeling. Their interactions mainly consist of: “What should we do?” “I don’t know,” and, “Are you ok?” “Yes, are you ok?” I think the zombies could have had more interesting conversation!
The overall lack of suspense made the entire story seem anticlimactic. Nothing, truly nothing, happens. Even the undead are boring. They don’t eat a single brain in the entire book. Everyone knows zombies eat brains! I believe the closest we get is reading how one man is “swallowed up by the crowd” or something similarly un-detailed and not-interesting. Yawn.
Maybe the story gains momentum in one of the four sequels Moody penned for Autumn, but I’ll never know, because I won’t be reading them.
April 20, 2018
11am Tues Sept
99% of the world’s population is dead
Okay.
I didn’t realize that this was previously released for free online and made into a series and a movie. If this were published today, I would say that it was unoriginal and offered nothing new other than a glimpse into the lives of some survivors. Seeing that it’s more than ten years old, it was probably fresh back then. Let me walk this back a bit, the dead here are... different, so that's original.
Sometimes we read these stories and gloss over or miss how catastrophic an event like this is. In this one 99% of the people in the world dies in 24 hrs. Shortly thereafter some of them start moving, and then they become violent. Even if you left out the reanimating part, being in the 1% that is still alive has to be frightening. The feeling of aloneness has to be suffocating.
My mom says I'm antisocial - I like to think of myself as a loner, like Lone Wolf AKA Leonard "Lenny" Kosnowski. Even for me, being this alone is overwhelming. To want to befriend anyone to preserve your sanity; to need to befriend even unlikable people to preserve your life. Not to mention, surviving in a world where you have to fend for yourself: where all of the conveniences that you’ve grown accustomed to are no longer available, or won’t be for much longer. No more Diet Pepsi :( Scary, right?
There is something in the writing that makes this feel real. Maybe because there are no superhero types; just real ordinary people caught up in something that none of them (except our preppers in the NW) are prepared for. Their fears, hopes, and indecision are believable. Their stupid mistakes, a little less believable. To be fair, some of the mistakes are due to lack of imagination. There’s one scene where I’m yelling at them to take this particular item with them to protect their hideout but they don’t. They could’ve used it, but then there would have been less tension in the story. Silly me, always wanting to be safe.
I didn’t like any of the characters. Which is understandable given the circumstances. These are adults faced with a catastrophic event with nowhere to turn to for guidance, answers or security. Freaking out a bit is par for the course.
The author co-wrote the screenplay for the movie Autumn (2009). It was bad. Just goes to show you that even having the author write the screenplay won’t guarantee a good product. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it but IIRC, it could have benefited from good actors and a bigger budget. If it couldn’t get both, then better actors. The atmosphere the author created in the book obviously didn’t translate to the big screen.
I enjoyed this for what it was, but I am not sure if I’ll continue with the series. Having said that, I recommend you read this book, then watch the movie.
How cool is that cover? I wrote this review just so I could show it off on my blog🙂 Okay, 90% cover, 10% to share my thoughts 😛
99% of the world’s population is dead
Okay.
I didn’t realize that this was previously released for free online and made into a series and a movie. If this were published today, I would say that it was unoriginal and offered nothing new other than a glimpse into the lives of some survivors. Seeing that it’s more than ten years old, it was probably fresh back then. Let me walk this back a bit, the dead here are... different, so that's original.
Sometimes we read these stories and gloss over or miss how catastrophic an event like this is. In this one 99% of the people in the world dies in 24 hrs. Shortly thereafter some of them start moving, and then they become violent. Even if you left out the reanimating part, being in the 1% that is still alive has to be frightening. The feeling of aloneness has to be suffocating.
My mom says I'm antisocial - I like to think of myself as a loner, like Lone Wolf AKA Leonard "Lenny" Kosnowski. Even for me, being this alone is overwhelming. To want to befriend anyone to preserve your sanity; to need to befriend even unlikable people to preserve your life. Not to mention, surviving in a world where you have to fend for yourself: where all of the conveniences that you’ve grown accustomed to are no longer available, or won’t be for much longer. No more Diet Pepsi :( Scary, right?
There is something in the writing that makes this feel real. Maybe because there are no superhero types; just real ordinary people caught up in something that none of them (except our preppers in the NW) are prepared for. Their fears, hopes, and indecision are believable. Their stupid mistakes, a little less believable. To be fair, some of the mistakes are due to lack of imagination. There’s one scene where I’m yelling at them to take this particular item with them to protect their hideout but they don’t. They could’ve used it, but then there would have been less tension in the story. Silly me, always wanting to be safe.
I didn’t like any of the characters. Which is understandable given the circumstances. These are adults faced with a catastrophic event with nowhere to turn to for guidance, answers or security. Freaking out a bit is par for the course.
The author co-wrote the screenplay for the movie Autumn (2009). It was bad. Just goes to show you that even having the author write the screenplay won’t guarantee a good product. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it but IIRC, it could have benefited from good actors and a bigger budget. If it couldn’t get both, then better actors. The atmosphere the author created in the book obviously didn’t translate to the big screen.
I enjoyed this for what it was, but I am not sure if I’ll continue with the series. Having said that, I recommend you read this book, then watch the movie.
How cool is that cover? I wrote this review just so I could show it off on my blog🙂 Okay, 90% cover, 10% to share my thoughts 😛
March 4, 2012
This was a really good zombie book. I liked how it took a different perspective on the zomibie topic by focusing on the characters so much and how they are dealing with the fact that the world they knew is gone and the new one is full of zombies. It had more of a real time feel to it than other zombie stories. Everything is happening slowly and you felt like you were right there with the charcters seeing it as it happened and feeling like they do, totally devastated wondering what in the world to do now. It seemed more realistic too than other zombie stories because there was no one person that became a hero and knew automatically what to do. These people seemed more true to how normal, every day regular people would respond in this situation. A lot was focused on the people's emotions and mental state, how they were coping with their loss. Not as action pakced as other zombie books but I think that will change in the next books as the zombies in this first book are slowly becoming more active and out to get people. It is like they are changing and learning how to be better zombies. Like they didn't know what to do at first. They didn't react to sounds or run or try to jump ofer fences. But unfortunately they are learning and will make it harder for people to escape them. Therefore, the reader has something new to look forward to in the next books.
I liked the characrters in this book and can't wait to see how they fare in the next one.
I liked the characrters in this book and can't wait to see how they fare in the next one.
June 14, 2016
So creepy and atmospheric ! I need to stop reading zombies because yesterday I found myself buying extra tins :o
December 14, 2008
I just finished AUTUMN by David Moody and, uh, wow. I will never get those hours back.
First off, I want to get in contact with this author and ask him. Am I supposed to like Michael? I mean that as a serious question, because I can't tell. I mean, if I'm meant to go "Wow, what a lol edgy lol aspie douchebag." and dislike him, then A+ job David Moody! You managed to make a detestable main character!
If not, uh... I mean, there are large parts of this book that read like a teenage boy's idea -- and you all know the kind of teenage boy I'm talking about -- of how they would react to the end of the world that's ~cool~ and ~suave~ and ~can't understand why everyone's so upset about things~.
Which is really fucking annoying.
Hell, I would argue that one of the reasons why Carl's mental state deteriorated so quickly was not because that's the sort of person he was, not fully because he lost his wife and daughter, but because Michael was an asshole and encourage Emma to be one too. There's a reason humans were given both the capacity to reason and the ability to give comfort, and that's to reason out when it's time to do the latter.
In any case, I hope this was the first book he's ever written, because it reads like one. The characters barely have different voices. The writing is stilted, the characters nearly always exist in a white room, and their dialogue is completely bereft of context descriptions.
I think that's one of the things I hated the most. There would be lines upon lines of just dialogue, and nothing else, and I hated that. For god's sake you idiot, tell us what your characters are doing while they're talking to each other.
And, you know, I think a lot of my disappointment would have been... not so disappointed if it had a rocks fall ending. Rocks fall; everyone dies would be the perfect ending for AUTUMN, especially considering that it's a look at the ~human condition~ in the wake of an apocalypse.
A shitty look.
After Carl goes down on the first floor of the house, it would have been amazing if Michael and Emma both ended up being ripped apart by zombies as they tried to escape. The other three books could follow different groups of people, and it would have been a good plot, if not an actual good book.
But no, Michael and Emma both get away. And, you know, I argue against the idea that characters need to grow over the course of a book. I think because I've never actually read a bok where there was no character growth.
I mean, hi, it's not hard, just make it so that Michael realizes he's a but of a twat and you've got character growth for your main character. Instead, no, Emma gets character growth in that she starts to realize that ~Michael's right~ about the way to go about dealing with the whole tragedy, and starts to admire him for being so strong.
...David Moody, you are a bit of a failbot, and I don't think I much like you. That said, I'm probably going to read the other books because they're short and I would like to know what else I absolutely hate about your writing.
First off, I want to get in contact with this author and ask him. Am I supposed to like Michael? I mean that as a serious question, because I can't tell. I mean, if I'm meant to go "Wow, what a lol edgy lol aspie douchebag." and dislike him, then A+ job David Moody! You managed to make a detestable main character!
If not, uh... I mean, there are large parts of this book that read like a teenage boy's idea -- and you all know the kind of teenage boy I'm talking about -- of how they would react to the end of the world that's ~cool~ and ~suave~ and ~can't understand why everyone's so upset about things~.
Which is really fucking annoying.
Hell, I would argue that one of the reasons why Carl's mental state deteriorated so quickly was not because that's the sort of person he was, not fully because he lost his wife and daughter, but because Michael was an asshole and encourage Emma to be one too. There's a reason humans were given both the capacity to reason and the ability to give comfort, and that's to reason out when it's time to do the latter.
In any case, I hope this was the first book he's ever written, because it reads like one. The characters barely have different voices. The writing is stilted, the characters nearly always exist in a white room, and their dialogue is completely bereft of context descriptions.
I think that's one of the things I hated the most. There would be lines upon lines of just dialogue, and nothing else, and I hated that. For god's sake you idiot, tell us what your characters are doing while they're talking to each other.
And, you know, I think a lot of my disappointment would have been... not so disappointed if it had a rocks fall ending. Rocks fall; everyone dies would be the perfect ending for AUTUMN, especially considering that it's a look at the ~human condition~ in the wake of an apocalypse.
A shitty look.
After Carl goes down on the first floor of the house, it would have been amazing if Michael and Emma both ended up being ripped apart by zombies as they tried to escape. The other three books could follow different groups of people, and it would have been a good plot, if not an actual good book.
But no, Michael and Emma both get away. And, you know, I argue against the idea that characters need to grow over the course of a book. I think because I've never actually read a bok where there was no character growth.
I mean, hi, it's not hard, just make it so that Michael realizes he's a but of a twat and you've got character growth for your main character. Instead, no, Emma gets character growth in that she starts to realize that ~Michael's right~ about the way to go about dealing with the whole tragedy, and starts to admire him for being so strong.
...David Moody, you are a bit of a failbot, and I don't think I much like you. That said, I'm probably going to read the other books because they're short and I would like to know what else I absolutely hate about your writing.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 11, 2021
Aside from each... character... speaking like... this... (which is a HUGE pet peeve of mine), they insisted upon repeating their opinions in four different ways each before the story line could move on. Each scene was described a handful of different times, and it took forever for them to stop talking and just do something - well, that would imply that they actually did anything at all. The zombies never actually became zombies - just animated corpses - and it was overall boring. The entire story line just consists of survivors congregating, hiding, running to a different safe place, hiding, getting supplies, hiding, getting supplies, hiding, and then getting supplies. And then oh no, they can't hide! So they run. And hide. That's seriously about that. Save yourself the trouble and don't bother reading this book.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
September 15, 2020
Where has this book all my life? Why didn't I know that I needed to read a well written zombie apocalypse series to tell me just how much being an avid reader means to me?
I could go into all the "gory", yet deliciously written details of this book, but then I would just spoil it for you. Just read it and I promise it's worth the read. Listen at me, already recommending a series I haven't even finished yet. Yes, sounds just like me.
I could go into all the "gory", yet deliciously written details of this book, but then I would just spoil it for you. Just read it and I promise it's worth the read. Listen at me, already recommending a series I haven't even finished yet. Yes, sounds just like me.
May 22, 2011
If there is such a thing as “a nice little zombie story” then Moody’s Autumn is it. It sticks fairly close to Romero zombie canon right down to the survivors barricading themselves in a farmhouse. What I did enjoy tremendously was Moody’s slow build. Some have found it annoying and dull – I was actually grooving it. First everyone drops dead – shock, horror! Then a third of the corpses gets up and begins to walk again. WTF!!!??? Holy Moses on a crutch!
Then as if you aren’t PTSD’ing enough, the brainless, wandering, dumb-like-cattle corpses suddenly start to be attracted to noise, to light and finally to YOU. They’re slow, they’re stupid, but they’re determined and now seem to have a single-minded purpose. To grab at you. To pull at you. One of them coming at you is laughable. Twenty a bit upsetting. These zombies aren’t biting yet, gutting you and pulling out your insides, but a hundred can smother you. A thousand will crush you. Where do you go? How do you keep them away from you? And is such a world really worth fighting to survive?
The zombies are never called zombies of course. I’m hard-pressed to think of a zombie apocalypse in fiction where the creatures already existed in popular culture when the real thing comes along. The only example that comes to mind is the classic, not-to-be-missed horror/comedy Return of the Living Dead . If you haven’t seen this movie yet, what the hell are you waiting for??? An actual zombie apocalypse? In it, the dead come to life and start lurching around screaming for brains and correct me if I’m wrong zombie-lovers, but this may be the first time ever on film that we get the now famous imagery of zombies hungering for brains. I think the whole “brains and zombies” thing definitely started with this movie. What’s more, the characters first try to kill a zombie by putting a pick-axe through its skull and then when that doesn’t work, chopping its head, which still doesn’t work prompting the following memorable dialogue:
[image error]
Burt: I thought you said if we destroyed the brain, it'd die!
Frank: It worked in the movie!
Burt Wilson: Well, it ain't working now, Frank!
Freddy: You mean the movie lied?
Yes! The movie lied. But I digress.
Overall, there’s nothing hugely original or compelling in Moody’s little zombie tale, but I still had a great time reading it. The prose is a little rough (and it could use some editing), but this gives the novel a pulpy feel that works so well for this genre. I will definitely be reading on in this series, suspecting the zombies are only going to get much worse (if they don’t rot away to skeletons first, because they do appear to be still decaying!). Recommended for zombie lovers and apocalypse addicts everywhere.
Then as if you aren’t PTSD’ing enough, the brainless, wandering, dumb-like-cattle corpses suddenly start to be attracted to noise, to light and finally to YOU. They’re slow, they’re stupid, but they’re determined and now seem to have a single-minded purpose. To grab at you. To pull at you. One of them coming at you is laughable. Twenty a bit upsetting. These zombies aren’t biting yet, gutting you and pulling out your insides, but a hundred can smother you. A thousand will crush you. Where do you go? How do you keep them away from you? And is such a world really worth fighting to survive?
The zombies are never called zombies of course. I’m hard-pressed to think of a zombie apocalypse in fiction where the creatures already existed in popular culture when the real thing comes along. The only example that comes to mind is the classic, not-to-be-missed horror/comedy Return of the Living Dead . If you haven’t seen this movie yet, what the hell are you waiting for??? An actual zombie apocalypse? In it, the dead come to life and start lurching around screaming for brains and correct me if I’m wrong zombie-lovers, but this may be the first time ever on film that we get the now famous imagery of zombies hungering for brains. I think the whole “brains and zombies” thing definitely started with this movie. What’s more, the characters first try to kill a zombie by putting a pick-axe through its skull and then when that doesn’t work, chopping its head, which still doesn’t work prompting the following memorable dialogue:
[image error]
Burt: I thought you said if we destroyed the brain, it'd die!
Frank: It worked in the movie!
Burt Wilson: Well, it ain't working now, Frank!
Freddy: You mean the movie lied?
Yes! The movie lied. But I digress.
Overall, there’s nothing hugely original or compelling in Moody’s little zombie tale, but I still had a great time reading it. The prose is a little rough (and it could use some editing), but this gives the novel a pulpy feel that works so well for this genre. I will definitely be reading on in this series, suspecting the zombies are only going to get much worse (if they don’t rot away to skeletons first, because they do appear to be still decaying!). Recommended for zombie lovers and apocalypse addicts everywhere.
August 17, 2013
DO NOT READ THIS BOOK!
I'm serious.
This book is so full of mistakes I don't even know where to begin, but I try...
1:
First of all, this Moody guy doesn't know how to write a real conversation.
About 90% of all conversations in the book look like:
- What are we gonna do?
- I don't know.
- I'm afraid! What shall we do?
- I don't know.
- Are you okay?
- Yeah.
2.:
There are serious mistakes in story, which completely contradicts the story and the world where the story is set.
For example:
A-
The survivors in the farm house eat breakfast every morning, lunch, etc... They use cutlery and plates for the eating.
Okay, but how do they do the dishes?
The story says, everybody died. There's no electricity, no TV, no radio, nothing. So I guess, then there's no tap water too right?
How do they clean the plates if there's no tap water?
I think without tap water people would simply use their hands to eat.
B-
While driving on the highway, one of the survivor shouts at the driver something like:
"HEY! I told you to turn right you idiot! Why did you turn left?
Now we'll never find that house!"
What??!
This is a HUGE mistake! You found out this story Mr. Moody right? Don't you remember your own story?
You told us that there're no people anymore, no police, no laws, no rules, no judges, no prisons.
So why does the driver need to keep the laws of driving?
Who the hell cares anymore? Why doesn't he simply turn back and leaves the highway in the other direction? Or why doesn't he switch the car in backward more and goes back?
This mistake is so stupid! I think the writer really forgot the world where his story is set and he reacted (I mean the character) as someone would react in the normal everyday world where there are still laws for driving.
C-
When the survivors found the house they are looking for, they think:
"This house will be perfect! This is a big house and SAFE."
What the f*ck does SAFE mean?
HELLO!! Mr. Moody!!! Did you forgot the story of your own book again??!
Remember!! Wake up!
Everybody is DEAD! There are no criminals, no bad people, no burglars.
Why should be the house safe? Safe from WHO?
The zombies at this stage of the book are completely HARMLESS, okay? They are just wondering around like drunken, retarded idiots.
So why are they looking for a safe house? Nobody wants to hurt them!
This is a huge mistake again!
It actually happens more times. When one of them goes into a coffee shop, the girl asks: "Are you sure it's safe to go in there?"
Why the hell shouldn't it be safe?? HELLO??!!
No one wants to hurt them at this stage of the book! NO THREATS at all.
Actually at this stage of the book, the world is the safest place ever.
No criminals, no crime, no dangerous zombies (yet), so why are they worrying so f*cking much?
And the last thought about this piece of garbage:
The book is advertised as "Without ever using the 'Z' word, Autumn offers a new perspective on the traditional zombie story."
Why don't you use the Zombie word in your book Mr. Moody?
If you write a zombie book then why don't you call them zombies?!
This is so stupid.
If you write a book about a pirate captain, will you call him the "guy with the parrot on his shoulder"? Or "the guy with the fake, wooden leg"?
If you write about something but you never say the actual word out loud, that WILL NOT make the book any better, believe me.
- Next time when you try to write a zombie book, call the damned zombies zombies!
- And try to avoid serous mistakes which contradict your entire story line.
- Try to write real conversations about real characters!
- Try to write action scenes with suspense, and not f*cking boring, endless, aimless, retarded conversations such as "What are we gonna do?", "Dunno...".
I seriously advice everybody to avoid the books of this amateur writer. It really p*ssed me off.
I'm serious.
This book is so full of mistakes I don't even know where to begin, but I try...
1:
First of all, this Moody guy doesn't know how to write a real conversation.
About 90% of all conversations in the book look like:
- What are we gonna do?
- I don't know.
- I'm afraid! What shall we do?
- I don't know.
- Are you okay?
- Yeah.
2.:
There are serious mistakes in story, which completely contradicts the story and the world where the story is set.
For example:
A-
The survivors in the farm house eat breakfast every morning, lunch, etc... They use cutlery and plates for the eating.
Okay, but how do they do the dishes?
The story says, everybody died. There's no electricity, no TV, no radio, nothing. So I guess, then there's no tap water too right?
How do they clean the plates if there's no tap water?
I think without tap water people would simply use their hands to eat.
B-
While driving on the highway, one of the survivor shouts at the driver something like:
"HEY! I told you to turn right you idiot! Why did you turn left?
Now we'll never find that house!"
What??!
This is a HUGE mistake! You found out this story Mr. Moody right? Don't you remember your own story?
You told us that there're no people anymore, no police, no laws, no rules, no judges, no prisons.
So why does the driver need to keep the laws of driving?
Who the hell cares anymore? Why doesn't he simply turn back and leaves the highway in the other direction? Or why doesn't he switch the car in backward more and goes back?
This mistake is so stupid! I think the writer really forgot the world where his story is set and he reacted (I mean the character) as someone would react in the normal everyday world where there are still laws for driving.
C-
When the survivors found the house they are looking for, they think:
"This house will be perfect! This is a big house and SAFE."
What the f*ck does SAFE mean?
HELLO!! Mr. Moody!!! Did you forgot the story of your own book again??!
Remember!! Wake up!
Everybody is DEAD! There are no criminals, no bad people, no burglars.
Why should be the house safe? Safe from WHO?
The zombies at this stage of the book are completely HARMLESS, okay? They are just wondering around like drunken, retarded idiots.
So why are they looking for a safe house? Nobody wants to hurt them!
This is a huge mistake again!
It actually happens more times. When one of them goes into a coffee shop, the girl asks: "Are you sure it's safe to go in there?"
Why the hell shouldn't it be safe?? HELLO??!!
No one wants to hurt them at this stage of the book! NO THREATS at all.
Actually at this stage of the book, the world is the safest place ever.
No criminals, no crime, no dangerous zombies (yet), so why are they worrying so f*cking much?
And the last thought about this piece of garbage:
The book is advertised as "Without ever using the 'Z' word, Autumn offers a new perspective on the traditional zombie story."
Why don't you use the Zombie word in your book Mr. Moody?
If you write a zombie book then why don't you call them zombies?!
This is so stupid.
If you write a book about a pirate captain, will you call him the "guy with the parrot on his shoulder"? Or "the guy with the fake, wooden leg"?
If you write about something but you never say the actual word out loud, that WILL NOT make the book any better, believe me.
- Next time when you try to write a zombie book, call the damned zombies zombies!
- And try to avoid serous mistakes which contradict your entire story line.
- Try to write real conversations about real characters!
- Try to write action scenes with suspense, and not f*cking boring, endless, aimless, retarded conversations such as "What are we gonna do?", "Dunno...".
I seriously advice everybody to avoid the books of this amateur writer. It really p*ssed me off.
July 4, 2011
First off, I would like to say David Moody is a very nice man who sent me copies of his first two books, which I greatly appreciated. He also started off self-publishing and landed a book deal, and I am very honored to have followed in his and J.L.Bourne's footsteps.
That being said, I had not had a chance to read his AUTUMN series since its original inception online. Back in the day I read the first chapter, but then swore off zombie stories until I finished my own zombie series, AS THE WORLD DIES. Therefore, I was excited to dive back into the story and find out what happened after the world died.
First off, I can see why zombie genre fanatics may not like this book. Moody's zombies are NOT the traditional zombie. They do not chow down on the living, but they do become increasingly dangerous as the book continues. I have only read the first two books, so I don't know if the undead ever develop a taste for human flesh, but they do seem intent on squashing all life where they find it. For purists this may diminish the threat from the undead, and I will admit I did miss that element of the story, but Moody did a very good job making the undead dangerous when in vast numbers.
There was quite a few things I really enjoyed about this novel. First off, the death of the entire world is truly horrifying. I also enjoyed how the dead don't immediately get up and start attacking the living. The gradual build up to the undead becoming truly dangerous was enjoyable because it lulled the survivors into a false sense of superiority. Moody's descriptions are also quite vivid and one particular sequence dealing with a running generator and the response of the undead was very well done.
This Texan did have a little trouble with what I realized was a very British response to the events in the book. The folks in this book take the "stiff upper lip" stuff very seriously. At times they show very little emotion, which struck me as odd until I talked to two of my friends who are expatriates of Great Britain. "Oh, yes. That's a very English response," they assured me. This is actually one of the things I ended up liking about the book. It was interesting to see another cultural reaction to the world dying and the undead taking over.
As a post apocalyptic book, this story is very solid. As a "zombie" book, I can see where purists of the genre may get annoyed.
I only give this book four stars because the second book, Autumn: The City, was even better than this one.
That being said, I had not had a chance to read his AUTUMN series since its original inception online. Back in the day I read the first chapter, but then swore off zombie stories until I finished my own zombie series, AS THE WORLD DIES. Therefore, I was excited to dive back into the story and find out what happened after the world died.
First off, I can see why zombie genre fanatics may not like this book. Moody's zombies are NOT the traditional zombie. They do not chow down on the living, but they do become increasingly dangerous as the book continues. I have only read the first two books, so I don't know if the undead ever develop a taste for human flesh, but they do seem intent on squashing all life where they find it. For purists this may diminish the threat from the undead, and I will admit I did miss that element of the story, but Moody did a very good job making the undead dangerous when in vast numbers.
There was quite a few things I really enjoyed about this novel. First off, the death of the entire world is truly horrifying. I also enjoyed how the dead don't immediately get up and start attacking the living. The gradual build up to the undead becoming truly dangerous was enjoyable because it lulled the survivors into a false sense of superiority. Moody's descriptions are also quite vivid and one particular sequence dealing with a running generator and the response of the undead was very well done.
This Texan did have a little trouble with what I realized was a very British response to the events in the book. The folks in this book take the "stiff upper lip" stuff very seriously. At times they show very little emotion, which struck me as odd until I talked to two of my friends who are expatriates of Great Britain. "Oh, yes. That's a very English response," they assured me. This is actually one of the things I ended up liking about the book. It was interesting to see another cultural reaction to the world dying and the undead taking over.
As a post apocalyptic book, this story is very solid. As a "zombie" book, I can see where purists of the genre may get annoyed.
I only give this book four stars because the second book, Autumn: The City, was even better than this one.
October 2, 2018
Una mañana de septiembre en una aparentemente apacible ciudad inglesa cientos de personas empiezan a sufrir síntomas de asfixia, hemorragias y finalmente la muerte. Y cuando digo cientos, digo parcialmente toda la población. Sólo unos pocos supervivientes se mantienen en pie. Esta es su historia.
El estilo narrativo puede parecer frío, casi aséptico. Aunque hay persecuciones, no he sentido el stress y los nervios de otros libros a la hora de leer la parte en que los protagonistas se enfrentan a los no-muertos. No hay el típico ataque zombie que saltas de la silla, todo es "pausado", pero aún así cuando lo dejas te das cuenta que has estado en vilo, pendiente de cada palabra.
Pero es que en este libro lo importante no son las persecuciones, no hay un ataque fulminante. Todo va degradándose de forma paulatina, centrándose en la forma de reaccionar de los supervivientes; mostrándonos varios tipos: los que prefieren mantenerse ocultos en el primer sitio que pillan, los que buscan sobrevivir de forma activa y los que no pueden superar el pasado. Y es que te deja pensando cómo reaccionaría yo?
El estilo narrativo puede parecer frío, casi aséptico. Aunque hay persecuciones, no he sentido el stress y los nervios de otros libros a la hora de leer la parte en que los protagonistas se enfrentan a los no-muertos. No hay el típico ataque zombie que saltas de la silla, todo es "pausado", pero aún así cuando lo dejas te das cuenta que has estado en vilo, pendiente de cada palabra.
Pero es que en este libro lo importante no son las persecuciones, no hay un ataque fulminante. Todo va degradándose de forma paulatina, centrándose en la forma de reaccionar de los supervivientes; mostrándonos varios tipos: los que prefieren mantenerse ocultos en el primer sitio que pillan, los que buscan sobrevivir de forma activa y los que no pueden superar el pasado. Y es que te deja pensando cómo reaccionaría yo?
November 5, 2010
I really wanted to like this... I really, really did. But after about a hundred pages, I just couldn't continue. The dialog was stilted, the actions of the survivors was *horribly* unrealistic, and there were little writing issues that I found incredibly jarring. I'm told that it does get better, but I'd long since stopped caring for any of the characters, and there's simply too many books on my plate to bother with this mediocre effort. For those looking for zombies, I'm sure you can find something in this book to love after you've plowed through most of the all-too-saturated market. But for me, I'm sure I can find another zombie book that'll fit the bill, and be a lot more enjoyable to read as well.
However, since I literally couldn't finish reading this book, take my review with a grain of salt. Consider it a cautious warning, and do a little leg work before picking it up just to make sure it might appeal to you. I think you'll likely find there's much better alternatives out there, but, hey! Zombies!
However, since I literally couldn't finish reading this book, take my review with a grain of salt. Consider it a cautious warning, and do a little leg work before picking it up just to make sure it might appeal to you. I think you'll likely find there's much better alternatives out there, but, hey! Zombies!
October 23, 2016
This year has been the year of interesting ratings. Some guilty pleasures are getting 4 and 5 star ratings, because I got a lot of enjoyment out of them not necessarily about "quality". What constituents quality is subjective anyway.
It was a quick zombie read, and it was exactly what I needed. It's right smack-dab in the middle between low brow and high brow.
Zombies. <3
It was a quick zombie read, and it was exactly what I needed. It's right smack-dab in the middle between low brow and high brow.
Zombies. <3
October 7, 2009
I was initially put off by the speed of the infection and death - and the author did specify that it was only a few moments between the two, thus making it very hard for me to believe the disease. I mean, it has to spread somehow, and that somehow hasn't yet been explained, leaving me very frustrated. Starting the story with something that feels unbelievable (the bad kind) made me stumble -- as did the immediate loss of power, phone lines, etc. I'm not talking a day or a couple hours - I'm talking maybe two minutes.
I did, however, like the dichotomy of an unbelievably swift death and the slow, glacier pace at which the dead returned. It was more than a day between when the disease struck and when the dead began moving, and more time passed between then and when the dead began to be able to... function, for lack of a better word. I'm so used to the stories where the transformation from dead to undead is flash-fast, that this was a nice change of pace. It's also interesting (though not unique) that not everyone who died rises again. There are plenty of bodies that just stay dead. This makes things a bit more manageable for the survivors, of course... but all of this also makes for a rather slow start. It doesn't quite become a psychological piece until much later either, thus the slow zombification process doesn't help the telling of the story, other than to get the characters used to the wandering dead, and it should let them feel at least somewhat safe, as they begin to draw conclusions about the walking dead.
But they never do feel safe, or even safer. There is always a sense of foreboding in their thoughts and actions, as though they are, much as the reader is, just waiting for the zombies to get going and start nomming on people. It makes for an uncomfortable read, as I spent a lot of the story feeling as though the fourth wall had been violated, carefully reconstructed, and everyone was wandering about whistling and saying "what fourth wall? I don't see any fourth wall, do you?" (An example: they find a rifle and their first thought is of defense, not hunting. The rifle could be a great way to supplement their food stores (which sound relatively limited), and food is always an immediate concern. But instead, they moan and groan about how they hope they'll never have to use the gun, how they don't need it and should get rid of it, etc.)
Once we finally DO get zombies, they're pretty watered down. They're the standard shamblers, but they're weaker than normal. Thus the relentlessness you often sense in zombie stories is lacking here - the zombies can barely cross any barrier at all. Still, the author uses the phrase "constant and relentless" like a motto, frequently reminding readers that something or other - usually fear - is constant and relentless.
On top of that, I didn't really care for the characters. Their stupidity might have had something to do with it, but... I never really felt close to them, or felt that I understood them.
I did, however, like the dichotomy of an unbelievably swift death and the slow, glacier pace at which the dead returned. It was more than a day between when the disease struck and when the dead began moving, and more time passed between then and when the dead began to be able to... function, for lack of a better word. I'm so used to the stories where the transformation from dead to undead is flash-fast, that this was a nice change of pace. It's also interesting (though not unique) that not everyone who died rises again. There are plenty of bodies that just stay dead. This makes things a bit more manageable for the survivors, of course... but all of this also makes for a rather slow start. It doesn't quite become a psychological piece until much later either, thus the slow zombification process doesn't help the telling of the story, other than to get the characters used to the wandering dead, and it should let them feel at least somewhat safe, as they begin to draw conclusions about the walking dead.
But they never do feel safe, or even safer. There is always a sense of foreboding in their thoughts and actions, as though they are, much as the reader is, just waiting for the zombies to get going and start nomming on people. It makes for an uncomfortable read, as I spent a lot of the story feeling as though the fourth wall had been violated, carefully reconstructed, and everyone was wandering about whistling and saying "what fourth wall? I don't see any fourth wall, do you?" (An example: they find a rifle and their first thought is of defense, not hunting. The rifle could be a great way to supplement their food stores (which sound relatively limited), and food is always an immediate concern. But instead, they moan and groan about how they hope they'll never have to use the gun, how they don't need it and should get rid of it, etc.)
Once we finally DO get zombies, they're pretty watered down. They're the standard shamblers, but they're weaker than normal. Thus the relentlessness you often sense in zombie stories is lacking here - the zombies can barely cross any barrier at all. Still, the author uses the phrase "constant and relentless" like a motto, frequently reminding readers that something or other - usually fear - is constant and relentless.
On top of that, I didn't really care for the characters. Their stupidity might have had something to do with it, but... I never really felt close to them, or felt that I understood them.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
February 15, 2015
5 out of 5 Zombie bites
I love a good Zombie read, and this definitely was. Focusing more on the characters and not the mindless hordes trampling the countryside. We see emotions run high, and depressingly low; as the main characters try to deal with a tragedy that has no explanation. At the end you are left wondering, "what next?"
It is like watching an episode of "The Walking Dead." Slow character build-up, giving you just enough to keep you interested; but not enough to know what they are truly thinking, feeling; and what motivates their behaviors and reaction to the end of it all.
I am ready to read the next book, and see where it takes me.
**Update: I have been thinking about how fantastic this series is... i mean it is consistently good from book to book. I would be doing a disservice to Mr Moody if I did not increase the stars. **
I love a good Zombie read, and this definitely was. Focusing more on the characters and not the mindless hordes trampling the countryside. We see emotions run high, and depressingly low; as the main characters try to deal with a tragedy that has no explanation. At the end you are left wondering, "what next?"
It is like watching an episode of "The Walking Dead." Slow character build-up, giving you just enough to keep you interested; but not enough to know what they are truly thinking, feeling; and what motivates their behaviors and reaction to the end of it all.
I am ready to read the next book, and see where it takes me.
**Update: I have been thinking about how fantastic this series is... i mean it is consistently good from book to book. I would be doing a disservice to Mr Moody if I did not increase the stars. **
January 30, 2012
The characters are wooden. The dialogue is wooden. I'm sure if you read this on an e-reader it would turn to wood.
Shelved as 'dnf-2022'
May 19, 2022I got about halfway but was bored for so much of it.
October 17, 2019
This was a little different to the norm, less blood and gore and more survival for those who've never seen TWD lol I liked it enough to read the next one at some point.
May 30, 2014
If you had in view when you got this book or if you got it just because you heard that is a zombie story, then you should know that you’ll not find “brain eaters” or something like “Return of Living Dead”.
This book is about people. About living people who still have feelings, emotions, passions and dramas. Moody, like he accustomed us, (look at the “Hater”), steps abruptly into action, without too many descriptions and without wasting time. The explanation of the pandemic or apocalypse (as you prefer) is left to the reader’s choice.
The characters are suddenly pulled from the daily routine and transported into a world of death (of the humans, not of the animals), and the few survivors who are gathering together (you’ll see by yourself how) are witnessing with horror to the metamorphosis of the majority of the corpses which infest the city. The living-deads, as I said, do not move too fast and they do not rise with the instant hunger for human flesh. They are used by the author to mark the tension of those who survive.
The three main characters (Carl, Emma and Michael), launch themselves into a race of survival, but not by shooting in all directions, but trying to restore the most elementary conditions of civilization which has disappeared, like: toilet, electricity and basic daily food. Carl is torn apart by the loss of his wife and daughter, and Emma and Michael look for each other, live together without developing a romantic relation but one based on compassion and emotional support. They are not prepaired, they are not heroes, but common people who difficultly manage to survive the conditions that fate has imposed onto them.
The end is neither Hollywood like, nor tragic. The key word is hope, hope of survival, hope of the future.
I recommend reading this book not for the walking monsters, but for the basic human feelings of the characters that are found in each of us and which, due to daily struggles, we do not let unfold as much we should.
Read it and learn again to listen and cherish the one next to you.
by GZM
http://www.mythicalbooks.blogspot.ro/...
This book is about people. About living people who still have feelings, emotions, passions and dramas. Moody, like he accustomed us, (look at the “Hater”), steps abruptly into action, without too many descriptions and without wasting time. The explanation of the pandemic or apocalypse (as you prefer) is left to the reader’s choice.
The characters are suddenly pulled from the daily routine and transported into a world of death (of the humans, not of the animals), and the few survivors who are gathering together (you’ll see by yourself how) are witnessing with horror to the metamorphosis of the majority of the corpses which infest the city. The living-deads, as I said, do not move too fast and they do not rise with the instant hunger for human flesh. They are used by the author to mark the tension of those who survive.
The three main characters (Carl, Emma and Michael), launch themselves into a race of survival, but not by shooting in all directions, but trying to restore the most elementary conditions of civilization which has disappeared, like: toilet, electricity and basic daily food. Carl is torn apart by the loss of his wife and daughter, and Emma and Michael look for each other, live together without developing a romantic relation but one based on compassion and emotional support. They are not prepaired, they are not heroes, but common people who difficultly manage to survive the conditions that fate has imposed onto them.
The end is neither Hollywood like, nor tragic. The key word is hope, hope of survival, hope of the future.
I recommend reading this book not for the walking monsters, but for the basic human feelings of the characters that are found in each of us and which, due to daily struggles, we do not let unfold as much we should.
Read it and learn again to listen and cherish the one next to you.
by GZM
http://www.mythicalbooks.blogspot.ro/...
March 8, 2015
Autumn delves into the darkness of the apocalypse. David Moody has a knack for looking at the end of the world through the eyes of the average person. There are no superheroes, just people like you and me trying to survive.
In Autumn, almost everyone dies in one fell swoop. The few survivors are terrified, they don’t know what to do or why it happened. The main focus is on a handful of survivors, Michael, Emma and Carl; what they do, how they react and handle the end of the world.
David Moody has created a great group of characters. He has built them up as people that the reader can relate to; we could be one of them. The reader can feel the pain of their loss and the frustration that each of them feels by just trying to survive. When I care this much about the characters, the author has done his job.
Autumn is the first of five books. I first read his Hater Series over a year ago. Reading Autumn now, I had to ask myself why I waited so long to get this book. This is one of those books that leaves you with the nagging question, “Could I have done anything different? If the shit hit the fan, could I survive?”
In Autumn, almost everyone dies in one fell swoop. The few survivors are terrified, they don’t know what to do or why it happened. The main focus is on a handful of survivors, Michael, Emma and Carl; what they do, how they react and handle the end of the world.
David Moody has created a great group of characters. He has built them up as people that the reader can relate to; we could be one of them. The reader can feel the pain of their loss and the frustration that each of them feels by just trying to survive. When I care this much about the characters, the author has done his job.
Autumn is the first of five books. I first read his Hater Series over a year ago. Reading Autumn now, I had to ask myself why I waited so long to get this book. This is one of those books that leaves you with the nagging question, “Could I have done anything different? If the shit hit the fan, could I survive?”
November 21, 2016
I was only the second chapter into this but gave up on it. Now, I don't need it pointed zombie novels are not likely to be great literature. I get that. But this was almost unreadable. Boring (and how anyone could make the end of the world boring defeats me), flat, odd. I mean, if you've suddenly discovered everyone dead, why would you hole up in an abandoned scout hut? I was pondering this last night, feeling guilty about abandoning this series so soon. If I discovered all my work colleagues and the rest of Dunedin dead why would I immediately find an old shack with no facilities to stay in? I think the 5-star hotel down the road might be my first port of call. You see what I'm saying? Anyway, I might come back to this one if I run out of books on my imminent trip home. It's nearly 40 hours, so that's a lot of reading. But I have 200 books ready to go, so badly written zombie novels may not get a look in.
October 25, 2018
Very simple and straightforward Z-word book.
The characters I found bland and bordering on stupid. Their fascination with playing with dead bodies in the name of "understanding" was just weird. My LAST instinct when seeing a rotting body is to touch it. But maybe that is just me.
Plus the fact that they seem to have no inclination to plan ahead. I mean you can't sit barricaded in a house forever. No one considers making a garden or something? Weapons? No?
I don't think I'll be continuing with the series.
The characters I found bland and bordering on stupid. Their fascination with playing with dead bodies in the name of "understanding" was just weird. My LAST instinct when seeing a rotting body is to touch it. But maybe that is just me.
Plus the fact that they seem to have no inclination to plan ahead. I mean you can't sit barricaded in a house forever. No one considers making a garden or something? Weapons? No?
I don't think I'll be continuing with the series.
November 9, 2015
Wow! Really good book. Read in less than 24 hours can't wait to read the 2nd book in this series!
December 2, 2011
Um... Depressed people are... depressed?
In the first three chapters of Autumn, everybody dies. No spoiler there, it's on the back of the book. Some people don't die, but they have to stand there and watch everyone else die.
Carl is somehow immune, but finds his wife and baby dead in their home. Naturally he covers them with a blanket and leaves, because when your family dies the best thing to do is go for a brisk walk.
Micheal is standing in a classroom adressing a ridiculously mean group of students when suddenly they all start coughing, and die. Finding that every person in the school has died but him, he shrugs his shoulders and also decides to go for a walk.
Emma walks into a convenience store where she sees a group of people dying horribly, so she goes home and climbs into bed with a blanket on her head
And that's what pretty much happens in Autumn, the most uneventful apolcalyptic "thriller" since Mad Max 4: The Couch Warrior. Some of the dead bodies get up and start walking around, but they don't really do anything, and neither do the survivors, who are neatly divided between people who want to walk around and people who want to put a blanket over their heads. The only conflict emerges when one character wants to walk aound and one wants to put a blanket over their head and they disagree, angrily. Everybody is just too bummed out about what happened to even worry about things like food, and every third paragraph someone is moping over everything they've lost. Agressively moping. Eventually Micheal, Carl and Emma decide to drive away from the other survivors to find a different place to put blankets on their heads, because you can't fill fifty pages with JUST moping.
Everybody has a job to do. Carl's job is to stare out the window and not care about anything. Micheal's job is to have ideas, get angry at the others for not having ideas, and then not follow through on his ideas because they're just too much work. Emma's job is to start conversations, all of which go like this:
'Emma knew no one was going to say anything, so she might as well say something.
"What are we going to do. about [plot point]?" She asked inquisitively.
"I think we should [plot point] as soon as possible." Micheal answered irritably.
"Ok," said Emma, acknowledgingly.
An awkward silence followed.'
None of the characters like each other, and none of them make any attempt to identify with other or gain some closure for their shared loss, which is all any of them think about, endlessly. Sometimes, for no reason, they get into shouting matches over nothing:
"Listen, you son of a bitch, we need to BLAH BLAH right away!"
"Oh yeah? Well here's something you didn't think about, asshole! I agree with you completely!"
"Come over here and say that, you prick!"
Exchanges like this are meant to hide the fact that nothing has happened for a hundred and fifty pages, but it doesn't work because we've also been reading the last hundred and fifty pages.
Finally the zombies remember that, hey, we're zombies, dammit, we're supposed to fuck some shit up! So they start attacking. Things start to pick up. Mutual need brings our three miserable heroes together to fight the menace, and excitement abounds, right?
Nope. Here's the moment I realized the Maudlin Bus was only passing through Excitement Town and not stopping. Bear in mind that I'm paraphrasing:
Micheal walked around the farmhouse feeling his optimism grow. Now that the zombies were coming to eat their faces he felt better for the first time in days. He had a plan, it was a good plan, they could fight off the zombies and...
And then for no good reason he suddenly thought about some woman he'd never spoken to at work and with a crashing pang of despair he realized that she was dead. He sat down on the steps and wept for her, and for the kid at the burger king, and Liam Neeson, and everybody else, until I just wanted to climb inside the book Thursday Next-style and smack him in the head and say "Stop it! Just stop it!"
And there it is. No matter how long this goes on, it's never going to change for them. If they survive for ten years, find other survivors, have children, and rebuild society, they're still going to break down every time they see a Coke bottle because it will remind them that everybody who ever worked for Coke is dead.
People, where are the good zombie novels??? Why is every book in this genre that I've managed to find a piece of pointless crap? Bear in mind that the best zombie movie ever made was pretty much two hours of people smoking next to cardboard boxes and shopping in an abandoned mall, so the standards aren't that high. I just want a book that at least tries to be scary, with characters I don't hate in situations that don't make me want to bash my head through a wall. Am I asking too much?
And I just want to add that Autumn, after ten years of being a free E-book, has just recently been released in print, and Lucky Me, I got to be among the first to pay money to read this crap. .
In the first three chapters of Autumn, everybody dies. No spoiler there, it's on the back of the book. Some people don't die, but they have to stand there and watch everyone else die.
Carl is somehow immune, but finds his wife and baby dead in their home. Naturally he covers them with a blanket and leaves, because when your family dies the best thing to do is go for a brisk walk.
Micheal is standing in a classroom adressing a ridiculously mean group of students when suddenly they all start coughing, and die. Finding that every person in the school has died but him, he shrugs his shoulders and also decides to go for a walk.
Emma walks into a convenience store where she sees a group of people dying horribly, so she goes home and climbs into bed with a blanket on her head
And that's what pretty much happens in Autumn, the most uneventful apolcalyptic "thriller" since Mad Max 4: The Couch Warrior. Some of the dead bodies get up and start walking around, but they don't really do anything, and neither do the survivors, who are neatly divided between people who want to walk around and people who want to put a blanket over their heads. The only conflict emerges when one character wants to walk aound and one wants to put a blanket over their head and they disagree, angrily. Everybody is just too bummed out about what happened to even worry about things like food, and every third paragraph someone is moping over everything they've lost. Agressively moping. Eventually Micheal, Carl and Emma decide to drive away from the other survivors to find a different place to put blankets on their heads, because you can't fill fifty pages with JUST moping.
Everybody has a job to do. Carl's job is to stare out the window and not care about anything. Micheal's job is to have ideas, get angry at the others for not having ideas, and then not follow through on his ideas because they're just too much work. Emma's job is to start conversations, all of which go like this:
'Emma knew no one was going to say anything, so she might as well say something.
"What are we going to do. about [plot point]?" She asked inquisitively.
"I think we should [plot point] as soon as possible." Micheal answered irritably.
"Ok," said Emma, acknowledgingly.
An awkward silence followed.'
None of the characters like each other, and none of them make any attempt to identify with other or gain some closure for their shared loss, which is all any of them think about, endlessly. Sometimes, for no reason, they get into shouting matches over nothing:
"Listen, you son of a bitch, we need to BLAH BLAH right away!"
"Oh yeah? Well here's something you didn't think about, asshole! I agree with you completely!"
"Come over here and say that, you prick!"
Exchanges like this are meant to hide the fact that nothing has happened for a hundred and fifty pages, but it doesn't work because we've also been reading the last hundred and fifty pages.
Finally the zombies remember that, hey, we're zombies, dammit, we're supposed to fuck some shit up! So they start attacking. Things start to pick up. Mutual need brings our three miserable heroes together to fight the menace, and excitement abounds, right?
Nope. Here's the moment I realized the Maudlin Bus was only passing through Excitement Town and not stopping. Bear in mind that I'm paraphrasing:
Micheal walked around the farmhouse feeling his optimism grow. Now that the zombies were coming to eat their faces he felt better for the first time in days. He had a plan, it was a good plan, they could fight off the zombies and...
And then for no good reason he suddenly thought about some woman he'd never spoken to at work and with a crashing pang of despair he realized that she was dead. He sat down on the steps and wept for her, and for the kid at the burger king, and Liam Neeson, and everybody else, until I just wanted to climb inside the book Thursday Next-style and smack him in the head and say "Stop it! Just stop it!"
And there it is. No matter how long this goes on, it's never going to change for them. If they survive for ten years, find other survivors, have children, and rebuild society, they're still going to break down every time they see a Coke bottle because it will remind them that everybody who ever worked for Coke is dead.
People, where are the good zombie novels??? Why is every book in this genre that I've managed to find a piece of pointless crap? Bear in mind that the best zombie movie ever made was pretty much two hours of people smoking next to cardboard boxes and shopping in an abandoned mall, so the standards aren't that high. I just want a book that at least tries to be scary, with characters I don't hate in situations that don't make me want to bash my head through a wall. Am I asking too much?
And I just want to add that Autumn, after ten years of being a free E-book, has just recently been released in print, and Lucky Me, I got to be among the first to pay money to read this crap. .
March 23, 2019
Having only discovered David Moody recently, reading and enjoying the Hater trilogy, time to see what Autumn is like. Yes, it is another zombie series but at least the dead didn't rise straight away and the dead died in a quick, horrific manner. The zombies in Autumn are the traditional stumbling types where it is sheer numbers that overwhelm. Not original however it was good enough to keep me hooked. Hooked enough to find out what happens next to the very few survivors.
Ray Smillie
Ray Smillie
October 3, 2013
I'm still confused as to whether this was a serious effort or if David Moody is a giant troll who purposely wrote a book that is everything a zombie apocalypse book should not be, just to see if people would actually say it was good because, hey, zombies! But in all honesty, parts of this book (read: most) were so comically bad that I thought, surely this must be a joke. He - he can't be serious....can he? Really?
To make a laundry list of Reasons Why "Autumn" is One of the Worst Attempts at Literature I've Ever Read would take more time and effort than I'm willing to put in. In short, see previous sentence. Between the complete lack of character development, slow-moving plot that never really goes anywhere at all, laughably stupid survival decisions made by equally stupid Rick Grimes wannabes, and writing that stank more than a "decaying corpse" (oh, and did I mention the redundancy?), "Autumn" read more like a teenager's fan fiction than a book that should be for public consumption. The characters were not just flat and predictable; they were downright /unbearable/. Michael went from a socially-awkward IT nerd to a sad attempt at a hard-ass survivalist equipped to handle the end of the world without a single emotion in one moment, then be sobbing in the next. He had no development whatsoever, made no sense, threw tantrums every other page yet was suppose to be that "cool and collected" guy, and really he was just a complete asshole. Emma was a whiny, useless, wishy-washy crybaby; if Moody was aiming for thinly-veiled misogyny he succeeded swimmingly. Carl was the most interesting of the bunch, and even he made me want to chew sand rather than read about him. Each character was so indistinct from the next that I literally gave up keeping Michael and Carl straight about halfway through the book. And you know what? It /didn't make a difference./ That's bad.
I'll give Moody props for the "evolving zombies" plot. That could have been intriguing, but against a background of shit nothing ever really looks appealing. Not to mention it took three-quarters of the book for them to even display any aggression. The rest of the time it was just Michael, Carl and Emma getting in circular arguments, crying, deliberating on the future, getting mad, pouting, magically knowing how to build a fortress out of found materials, arguing again, crying some more, and fighting about the future again. Oh, and then more crying.
For my part, zombie apocalypses should be filthy, gritty, violent, loud, raw, angry, crushing, and very, very psychological. Isn't that why we as a culture are so obsessed by the idea of zombies, after all? There is something so captivating - and nothing quite as terrifying - as a human being who is no longer "human," without social order or conscience. It's a huge mindjob, or at least it should be; "Autumn" did not have that at all. It had no urgency, no psychological horror, no rawness or real grit or struggle. It tried to have violence, but its execution was more like that of an adolescent death-metal fan's livejournal fiction. As a whole, the book just fell flat and left me thoroughly disappointed, with a bad taste in my mouth about anything else Moody has penned. I wanted to read this whole series, but the thought of trudging through another river of shit like "Autumn," with two main characters I already harbor an established hatred for, just isn't much for motivation.
I really hate disliking books. I do my best to find at least one tiny ray of awesome in almost every book I pick up, but "Autumn" unfortunately is one that I have absolutely nothing positive to say about.
To make a laundry list of Reasons Why "Autumn" is One of the Worst Attempts at Literature I've Ever Read would take more time and effort than I'm willing to put in. In short, see previous sentence. Between the complete lack of character development, slow-moving plot that never really goes anywhere at all, laughably stupid survival decisions made by equally stupid Rick Grimes wannabes, and writing that stank more than a "decaying corpse" (oh, and did I mention the redundancy?), "Autumn" read more like a teenager's fan fiction than a book that should be for public consumption. The characters were not just flat and predictable; they were downright /unbearable/. Michael went from a socially-awkward IT nerd to a sad attempt at a hard-ass survivalist equipped to handle the end of the world without a single emotion in one moment, then be sobbing in the next. He had no development whatsoever, made no sense, threw tantrums every other page yet was suppose to be that "cool and collected" guy, and really he was just a complete asshole. Emma was a whiny, useless, wishy-washy crybaby; if Moody was aiming for thinly-veiled misogyny he succeeded swimmingly. Carl was the most interesting of the bunch, and even he made me want to chew sand rather than read about him. Each character was so indistinct from the next that I literally gave up keeping Michael and Carl straight about halfway through the book. And you know what? It /didn't make a difference./ That's bad.
I'll give Moody props for the "evolving zombies" plot. That could have been intriguing, but against a background of shit nothing ever really looks appealing. Not to mention it took three-quarters of the book for them to even display any aggression. The rest of the time it was just Michael, Carl and Emma getting in circular arguments, crying, deliberating on the future, getting mad, pouting, magically knowing how to build a fortress out of found materials, arguing again, crying some more, and fighting about the future again. Oh, and then more crying.
For my part, zombie apocalypses should be filthy, gritty, violent, loud, raw, angry, crushing, and very, very psychological. Isn't that why we as a culture are so obsessed by the idea of zombies, after all? There is something so captivating - and nothing quite as terrifying - as a human being who is no longer "human," without social order or conscience. It's a huge mindjob, or at least it should be; "Autumn" did not have that at all. It had no urgency, no psychological horror, no rawness or real grit or struggle. It tried to have violence, but its execution was more like that of an adolescent death-metal fan's livejournal fiction. As a whole, the book just fell flat and left me thoroughly disappointed, with a bad taste in my mouth about anything else Moody has penned. I wanted to read this whole series, but the thought of trudging through another river of shit like "Autumn," with two main characters I already harbor an established hatred for, just isn't much for motivation.
I really hate disliking books. I do my best to find at least one tiny ray of awesome in almost every book I pick up, but "Autumn" unfortunately is one that I have absolutely nothing positive to say about.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
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