World War Z By Max Brooks To Be Discussed April 2008 Buy World War Z from Amazon.com Buy World War Z from Lambda Rising

Questions

1. The first book Max Brooks wrote in this world was The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead. For those people who have read the book, did World War Z read as if were the world in which the survival guide was written (as the oral history implies), or did things correlate just too perfectly between the two books? For those who hadn't read the survival guide first, are you now curious to read it?
    
2. World War Z is supposed to be an oral history compiled by a single narrator; however, large chunks of the book purport to be verbatim monologues. Are the various voices distinct enough to be believable as different people? Or does Brooks' voice pervade everything? Who was the most believable person in the book? The least believable?
    
3. Parts of World War Z are meant to be political satire. Is World War Z too forced at times to push the speculative fiction elements? Or does it work well? What vignettes feel the most "true"? The most false?
    
4. What types of little details of the history help make the personal histories ring true?
    
5. Does the format of the book -- a string of oral histories -- allow the plot to build and develop to climax?
    
6. For those who may have listened to the audiobook, were the actors well chosen? Did the abridged audiobook feel like a complete book?
    
7. Do you like the book?