Book Review: Gomers, Chuck Dixon
Zombie fiction that isn't boring.
At Upstream Reviews, we try not to review the same author twice in one month… But I was on a roll.
As I mentioned in my Blooded review, Chuck Dixon sent us a box of physical books that I had to unearth after my cross-country move. This is the second book I pulled out of the box: Gomers.
I typically hate Zombie fiction. It’s slow. Boring. Filled with stupid tropes and dumber people, with plots that are fueled largely by bad decision making. If you’ve seen one zombie film, you have seen all of them. Don’t even get me started on The Boring Dead.
In literature, there are exceptions. Daniel Humphreys has a “zombie” apocalypse that is populated with smart people. There is John Ringo’s Black Tide Rising.
Then there is Gomers… where apparently, sometimes survivors have to be just smart enough.
The Story
Mercy and her family are travelers, American Gypsies, living on small jobs and petty crimes. When a zombie outbreak breaks out, Mercy’s family think that they can wait it out in a motel until the whole thing blows over… until it doesn’t. When Mercy’s family is kidnapped by the local gang, she’s on a mission to take them back.
In another part of the world are Jim Kim and Smash, two college students who are holding up in their apartment, gaming until the internet goes out, and surviving on ramen. They refuse to use “the Z word.” When they finally decide to get out of their apartment building to hole up in somewhere new, they make a surprisingly smart decision—Tool Town (read: “really not home depot”), with food, rainwater collection systems, etc.
When they finally break into Tool Town, they find it’s already occupied by Richard Cazadesus, or “Caz,” an EOD Marine veteran, with his dog Wendy. Caz used to be an EMT, and they had a term for deadbeat homeless who’d try to get a hospital bed for the night: Gomers, or “Get Out of My Emergency Room.” After that, they start on creating defenses using Tool Town’s how-to books and materials, and create their own farm in landscape blocks. And there was much MacGyvering.
Then, 60% of the way through the book, Mercy literally crashes into Tool Town’s parking lot. And we’re off to the races.
Gomers was fun. It’s more of a slice of live novel during the zombie apocalypse, with a collection of pretty normal people.
This lacks some of the frenetic action of Black Tide Rising during its initial zombie outbreak, and fast-forwards through a lot of the usual zombie tropes. There are some engagements in the first few chapters, but it otherwise feels like a slow burn as Mercy and the gamers watch society falls apart from a relatively safe distance.
Also, it’s nice to encounter zombie literature that lacks pretentious lectures about society and sociology. The closes we get is a quite sketch from Caz:
“No rule of law any more. Not out in the suburbs. I saw some gangs roaming. They up-armored trucks and the roll on whatever they want and take everything. There’s no strategy to it that I can see.”
We don’t get a lecture on sociology. It’s a nice change.
And yes, there is a lot of time and energy spent on how things get done.
As for the ending … I would like a second book, but Chuck Dixon may be too busy with Levon Cade scripts.
Overall, I like it better than Black Tide Rising.
The Characters
Gomers’ characters are well-sketched and quickly filled out as people and personalities. And a lot of the responses to the zombie outbreak are sensible replies by everyday people.
Caz is neither a jarhead nor a PTSD mess. He may be the most normal person in this novel, but with a solid knowledge base for survival.
Mercy is also pretty normal. She’s used to operating without societal norms, so she’s not terribly adversely impacted when society falls apart … until she is. Then she steps up pretty admirably.
Jim Kim and Smash are an interesting duality. Jim Kim is the son of Korean immigrants, and Smash is Shaggy from Scooby-Doo. They have the occasional moments of innovation that don’t quite reach Bruce Campbell from Evil Dead, but those moments are smart enough to get them through—such as using Gore-Tex and duct tape are anti-zombie armor, and setting off car alarms to distract the undead.
The World
The world is very much one part standard zombie film and one part Mad Max. The social order has broken down. No one has really laid eyes on government forces and no one really wants to see what the survivor “camps” look like. There is no reason for the zombie outbreak. It’s just sort of there so the story can happen, and I’m okay with that.
Funny enough, there is a line in here about “The World stinks. It’s the new normal.” I didn’t expect to read the term “new normal” in a book from 2015, but here we are.
Politics
Not applicable.
Content Warning
There’s nothing excessively gory in this one. I’m not even sure there’s much harsh language.
Who is it for?
If you liked Black Tide Rising, you’ll enjoy this. In fact, this could be see as on par with any of the five hundred side stories set in the BTR universe.
Why buy it?
It’s a fun zombie outbreak novel that lacks the pretention normally associated with the genre. I like it better than Black Tide Rising.