Ten years ago today, with little fanfare and even less expectation on my part, I released ISOLATION. It was my second zombie-themed novella of that summer after THE COST OF LIVING, though this one had a very different genesis. It began as an unfinished AUTUMN short story called KING OF THE DEAD, then it almost became a short film (that I’m sure would have been great had both mine and director WILL WRIGHT‘s real world commitments not got in the way). I went back to my original manuscript, took it out of the world of AUTUMN, and turned it into something else entirely.
ISOLATION: STORIES FROM THE WORLD OF THE UNDEAD (to give it its full title), has been available as a free download for several years now, and with fortuitous timing, as I write this it just so happens to be number 1 on Amazon.co.uk in the Horror Short Stories, British & Irish Short Stories, and World Literature Short Stories categories. Literature – now there’s a word I don’t often hear spoken in the same sentence as one of my books!
All joking apart, even after all these years I still love ISOLATION. The intersecting character arcs of Keith and Anna, our hapless duel leads, is something I remain very proud of. It’s gratifying that their grubby little story has outlasted any reanimated corpse and still finds an audience today. Most months there seems to be a burst of interest where anything up to a thousand copies will disappear in a matter of hours, and I still find that incredible. If you haven’t read the book, the synopsis is below, followed by all the necessary details.
Keith’s in his early twenties. No girlfriend, no hobbies, no future. He spends his days working in an office and his evenings, weekends and just about all his free time looking after his alcoholic dad.
And then the zombie apocalypse changes everything.
Suddenly Keith’s free. For the first time in a long time, he’s got nothing to worry about (apart from several hundred thousand reanimated corpses heading his way).
But then he meets Anna, and everything changes again. Cocky, cool, confident… she’s everything Keith isn’t. Holed-up together in an isolated bungalow, besieged by the living dead, will they survive, or will they tear each other apart before the dead get anywhere near?
ISOLATION is available as a permanently free eBook from all major retailers, and as a superbly narrated audiobook (by CHRISTOPHER LAWSON) from AUDIBLE. You can find it in print as part of LAST OF THE LIVING. A German translation – ISOLATION: GESCHICHTEN AUS DER WELT DER UNTOTEN – is also available.
