From Kevin Brockmeier, one of this generation's most inventive young writers, comes a striking new novel about death, life, and the mysterious place in between. The City is inhabited by those who have departed Earth but are still remembered by the living. They will reside in this afterlife until they are completely forgotten. But the City is shrinking, and the residents clearing out. Some of the holdouts, like Luka Sims, who produces the City’s only newspaper, are wondering what exactly is going on. Others, like Coleman Kinzler, believe it is the beginning of the end. Meanwhile, Laura Byrd is trapped in an Antarctic research station, her supplies are running low, her radio finds only static, and the power is failing. With little choice, Laura sets out across the ice to look for help, but time is running out. Kevin Brockmeier alternates these two storylines to create a lyrical and haunting story about love, loss and the power of memory.
A modern, all-encompassing exploration of what happens after death combines spirituality with philosophy, history, and science, all of which guide readers toward the timeless truth that human consciousness lives on after death.
Meet your new favorite undead character! (She's not dead yet, but she's getting there...) A sixteen-year-old girl wakes up in somebody's front yard, and cannot remember a single thing. All she knows is that she was abandoned, has a bite wound on her shoulder, and a hankering hunger for meat. Why would someone bite her? Who bit her? Are they still out there? Will they come back to finish their meal? And really, honestly, most importantly- who is she? THE DEAD LIFE is a humorous horror novel that will have you laughing out loud one moment and grossed out the next. Witty and gruesome, follow a teenager as she begins to understand her new life, temper her appetite, and solve the crime of who infected her with a deadly virus.
Book 2 in the hit zombie series readers have described as, "Stephen King's 'The Stand' meets 'The Walking Dead'."In the weeks after a virus decimated humanity and left less than 5,000 people alive in the U.S., a diverse group of survivors struggles to stay alive. Farmer, Wim Wagner has abandoned the safety of his farm in hopes of finding Ramey, the mysterious girl who flitted in and out of life in the midst of the outbreak. But, Ramey is on the road searching for her father and trying to locate the mysterious X on a map that promises safety.Meanwhile, survivors like Jorge and Bundy find themselves lost on the road, trying to locate other human beings and fighting off hordes of zombies. Some rescue missions end in success, but others in tragedy.Teenager, Mitch is trapped in a secret, underground bunker along with his mother and thousands of the undead. Mina has escaped the hospital after killing her father when he turned into a zombie.Grady desperately attempts to protect his autistic son after the boy died and returned as one of the undead.They're only a few of the men and women fighting survival in a world where the dead have returned to life and overtaken the country. Will they find each other on the road or are they destined to life and die alone?*****A post-apocalyptic, dystopian horror story, "Road of the Damned" is book 2 of the "Life of the Dead" saga. It tells the story of multiple men and women from all walks of life, dealing with a zombie apocalypse. Wim - a 30 year old farmer. Ramey - a high school drop out. Mead - a washed up line cook. Bundy - a 500 pound prisoner. Jorge - an army medic. Emory - a 80 year old millionaire. Juli - a lonely but resourceful suburbanite. Grady - father to an autistic son. Mitch - the spoiled son to a US Senator. Mina - a housekeeper caring for her abusive father. Solomon - a violent and cunning businessman. Aben - a homeless war veteran.What readers are saying: "I f*****g love this book, man!" Nathan "It's Stephen King's The Stand meets The Walking Dead! Graphic and well written with fully developed characters. Read it in a few hours. Can't wait for the next book!!" Audrey S."One of the best I've read in a long time." Bill H."Disgusting, poignant and fun." Rachel S."Loved this book! There are a lot of characters to meet and I can't wait to see if any of them cross paths in the series. It's a quick and easy read with a lot of action and some intense scenes! Looking forward to the next one." Amazon Customer"Holy Nutballs - This was Amazing" Amazon Reviewer"Just loving this story, can't wait for the next part. The characters are good and I like the authors style of writing and structure." Book Demon"4.5 stars. A good/solid zombie story with plenty of diverse characters." Dave"I really could not put this read down until it was done. The beginnings of all the characters were great and I can't wait to read what's in store for the next sequel. Thank you for a great, great read!! " KennG"The characters, in my opinion, were excellently written and developed. A very good book to read to occupy your time." Marcus
When civilization ends - When hundreds of millions of the dead return to eat the living - How will the remaining humans survive? One week ago there were over 300 million people living in America. Today there are less than 5000. After a man-made plague destroys the population cities burn, and the government crumbles when the dead come back to life as flesh-hungry zombies. Wim, a 30-year-old farmer, purposely kept himself cut off from other people, but when the undead arrive at his farm, intent on eating him, he's forced to venture out into the land around him and fight to save a world on which he long ago turned his back. Survivors from all walks of life - criminals and fry cooks, teenagers and soldiers - battle to survive zombies and each other as mankind races toward extinction. Book 1 in the epic "Life of Dead" zombie apocalypse saga.
What Does Dead Mean? is a beautifully illustrated book that guides children gently through 17 of the 'big' questions they often ask about death and dying. Questions such as 'Is being dead like sleeping?', 'Why do people have to die?' and 'Where do dead people go?' are answered simply, truthfully and clearly to help adults explain to children what happens when someone dies. Prompts encourage children to explore the concepts by talking about, drawing or painting what they think or feel about the questions and answers. Suitable for children aged 4+, this is an ideal book for parents and carers to read with their children, as well as teachers, therapists and counsellors working with young children.
In 1927, Oxford University Press published the first western-language translation of a collection of Tibetan funerary texts (the Great Liberation upon Hearing in the Bardo) under the title The Tibetan Book of the Dead. Since that time, the work has established a powerful hold on the western popular imagination, and is now considered a classic of spiritual literature. Over the years, The Tibetan Book of the Dead has inspired numerous commentaries, an illustrated edition, a play, a video series, and even an opera. Translators, scholars, and popular devotees of the book have claimed to explain its esoteric ideas and reveal its hidden meaning. Few, however, have uttered a word about its history. Bryan J. Cuevas seeks to fill this gap in our knowledge by offering the first comprehensive historical study of the Great Liberation upon Hearing in the Bardo, and by grounding it firmly in the context of Tibetan history and culture. He begins by discussing the many ways the texts have been understood (and misunderstood) by westerners, beginning with its first editor, the Oxford-educated anthropologist Walter Y. Evans-Wentz, and continuing through the present day. The remarkable fame of the book in the west, Cuevas argues, is strikingly disproportionate to how the original Tibetan texts were perceived in their own country. Cuevas tells the story of how The Tibetan Book of the Dead was compiled in Tibet, of the lives of those who preserved and transmitted it, and explores the history of the rituals through which the life of the dead is imagined in Tibetan society. This book provides not only a fascinating look at a popular and enduring spiritual work, but also a much-needed corrective to the proliferation of ahistorical scholarship surrounding The Tibetan Book of the Dead.
The meaning of our concern for mortal remains—from antiquity through the twentieth century The Greek philosopher Diogenes said that when he died his body should be tossed over the city walls for beasts to scavenge. Why should he or anyone else care what became of his corpse? In The Work of the Dead, acclaimed cultural historian Thomas Laqueur examines why humanity has universally rejected Diogenes's argument. No culture has been indifferent to mortal remains. Even in our supposedly disenchanted scientific age, the dead body still matters—for individuals, communities, and nations. A remarkably ambitious history, The Work of the Dead offers a compelling and richly detailed account of how and why the living have cared for the dead, from antiquity to the twentieth century. The book draws on a vast range of sources—from mortuary archaeology, medical tracts, letters, songs, poems, and novels to painting and landscapes in order to recover the work that the dead do for the living: making human communities that connect the past and the future. Laqueur shows how the churchyard became the dominant resting place of the dead during the Middle Ages and why the cemetery largely supplanted it during the modern period. He traces how and why since the nineteenth century we have come to gather the names of the dead on great lists and memorials and why being buried without a name has become so disturbing. And finally, he tells how modern cremation, begun as a fantasy of stripping death of its history, ultimately failed—and how even the ashes of the victims of the Holocaust have been preserved in culture. A fascinating chronicle of how we shape the dead and are in turn shaped by them, this is a landmark work of cultural history.
Diogenes died by holding his breath. Plato allegedly died of a lice infestation. Diderot choked to death on an apricot. Nietzsche made a long, soft-brained and dribbling descent into oblivion after kissing a horse in Turin. From the self-mocking haikus of Zen masters on their deathbeds to the last words (gasps) of modern-day sages, The Book of Dead Philosophers chronicles the deaths of almost 200 philosophers-tales of weirdness, madness, suicide, murder, pathos and bad luck. In this elegant and amusing book, Simon Critchley argues that the question of what constitutes a 'good death' has been the central preoccupation of philosophy since ancient times. As he brilliantly demonstrates, looking at what the great thinkers have said about death inspires a life-affirming enquiry into the meaning and possibility of human happiness. In learning how to die, we learn how to live.
