Zombies - they seem to be everywhere in horror fiction. Not as bad as the re-invented sparkly, boyfriend material vampires, but still, there does seem to be a proliferation of them. So, when I was offered a copy of Sunny With A Chance Of Zombies (henceforth 'Sunny') my first thought was ....deep sigh......more zombies!
But I looked at the premise and the tag line on the back page "....a sensational selection of strangely uplifting stories to help raise a smile at the end of the world." and decided it might well be worth a look. It didn't harm matters that it's published by Knightwatch Press who have, in my opinion, a good track record with horror collections.
So, to the stories....12 in all, and, to be fair, all pretty good. The idea was for something a bit different, 'uplifting' and that is what you get, a lot of different outlooks on the Zombie Apocalypse and the future after it. There is humour here among the horror but there is also a kind of romance (Paradise by Nikki Tanner being a good example), revenge (Thirty Minutes Or It's Free by Anthony Cowin) and even a tale set in the world of illegal zombie racing (Run, Rabbit by Louise Maskill).
As a collection 'Sunny' certainly does what it set out to achieve and gives me hope for the future of zombie fiction (to be honest I'm really hoping for another volume of these tales). With 'Sunny' editor Dion Winton-Polak has put together something that zombie fans will love, with plenty of variety and that little bit of something different we've probably all been secretly hoping for.
The cover art is pretty good too
9/10 stars
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