Plague of the Dead

The Morningstar Strain, Book 1

By: Z. A. Recht

Narrated by: Oliver Wyman

Length: 10 hrs and 55 mins

Publisher's summary

The end begins with a viral outbreak unlike anything mankind has ever encountered before. The infected are subject to delirium, fever, a dramatic increase in violent behavior, and a one-hundred percent mortality rate. Death. But it doesn't end there. The victims return from death to walk the earth.

When a massive military operation fails to contain the plague of the living dead it escalates into a global pandemic. In one fell swoop, the necessities of life become much more basic. Gone are petty everyday concerns. Gone are the amenities of civilized life. Yet a single law of nature remains: Live, or die. Kill, or be killed. On one side of the world, a battle-hardened General surveys the remnants of his command: a young medic, a veteran photographer, a brash Private, and dozens of refugees, all are his responsibility-all thousands of miles from home. Back in the United States, an Army Colonel discovers the darker side of Morningstar virus and begins to collaborate with a well-known journalist to leak the information to the public...The Morningstar Saga has begun.

©2006 Z.A. Recht (P)2009 Audible, Inc.

good enough even with factual errors

one of the things that bug me is that that class of ship has one to two ASW Helos. they never mention that. Even if they weren't on board they have two hangers plus the landing pad. Still a good story. I was in the Navy and my brother was the EMO on one also. Don't know much about the Army stuff though.

Wonderfully grounded zombie series

I'm super happy to have found this series. It was written in 2006, so its a lot more grounded and focused on, you know, the scientific zombie side rather than the strange crop up of "Every supernatural villain and their brother is coming into the world at once" trend we are seeing.

I'd say the series is a mix of World War Z (Max Brooks), Day by Day Armageddon (J.L. Bourne), and The Extinction Cycle (Nicholas Sansbury Smith) and another positive is we get some interesting voice talent on the part of Oliver Wyman. Very happy with my purchase, will be listening to more of the series.

Love this series.

Would you listen to Plague of the Dead again? Why?

I will definitely listen to this one again. Very realistic for a zombie story.

What did you like best about this story?

Good character development and good zombie descriptions i.e. Shamblers versus Sprinters.

What did you like about the performance? What did you dislike?

Pretty good performance for a single narrator. He did well at differentiating between male and female voices.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would be the tag line be?

The best zombie story I've listened to in years.

Good zombie tale.

Decent story, great narrator. Good character development and inter-play. If you like sci-fi; you will enjoy. If looking for literature, move on.

well written and read!

with many zombie storys out there, this hold up to the best. looking forward to finishing the series

The Narrator sounded too much like Casey Kasem

Overall the book was decent not the best but not the worst either. My only problem was that narrator sound too much like Casey Kasem. It is hard to be scared when you keep thinking that he will start anouncing the "Top 40" any second.

My Pet Peeve: Characters acting stupid

Cool setup is ruined by the stupidity of the characters and the tactics they use against the zombies. Apparently nukes, email and cell phones didn’t exist in 2007. I wanted to like it but the dumb decisions of the characters ruined it.

Exciting Listen!

Listened to this 3 times, intriguing story, with tons of detail! To bad we lost this writer so soon...

One of the best Zombie series out there

The Morningstar Series is fantastic and keeps you on the edge of your seat at all times.

Makes my top 10 Zombie Stories of all time!!

This series is great!! Definitely needs to be a movie series!! This story starts from all these different places and times that are so far apart. But by the second book you see it all coming together for a great finale in book 3 (when it comes out on audio). The narrator did such an awesome job. I think the best narrating i've heard so far. Love the military side of this zombie apocalypse, with the Suez Canal and small pacific Islands. I had fun google earthing while listening to this story. It was like I was following them the whole time. Then the goverment red taping the scientist. Story had alot of escaping, from dirty authorities from hords of zombies. And you think main characters don't die, well not in a apocalypse! Book 1 does not disappoint!!

Big Art