The Rise of the Zombie, with Sharon Stevenson

Today I'm happy to welcome guest blogger Sharon Stevenson (whom I interviewed last May), here to tell us about her new zombie novel.

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The Rise of the Zombie

Zombies; they’re dead, they shamble, they eat brains and they have horrific table manners.  That’s the classic monstrous version of the walking dead I’m talking about here, in case you didn’t guess.  I first stumbled across these creatures in late night horror movies and have sporadically had my eye on them ever since.  Had I known they were going to keep on multiplying like they have I might have paid them a little more attention…

But I didn’t and now we’ve got an apocalypse on our hands.  The rise of the zombie is here, and it came staggering along behind The Walking Dead.  There are a ton of classic horror monsters now shuffling alongside a few newer-fangled romantic types.  Zombies are everywhere and they are completely unavoidable. 

So what can you do?

There are several options, of course:

Join the horde – you can pull off the dead-and-hungry-for-brains look.

Hide quietly in a cupboard and hope they don’t find you.

Fall in love with one of them - just make sure he’s not only after you for your brain.

Wait and pray for Daryl Dixon to come and save you.

Grab a weapon and get busy.

Well, I went for the final option.  I picked up my pen and got writing, and I was surprised to find the first zombie idea that popped into my head wasn’t a horror, or even apocalypse based story.  I’d absorbed all the virus outbreak zombie stories I could force into my head until my brain screamed stop and they started to melt out of my ears.  My imagination refused to even go there.  Instead, given my fondness for the urban fantasy genre, I came up with the idea of magically reanimated humans being raised to serve king and country.  My main character is one of these magically reanimated dead guys (aka zombies) and he’s determined to escape enslavement. 

It isn’t easy being a magically reanimated dead guy.  Take Pete’s undead word for it…

Pete has been murdered by a mentally unhinged and suicidal one night stand. As if that wasn't bad enough, he's been reanimated for reasons unknown by… persons unknown.  Afraid of who his owner may be and what they have planned for his undead ass, Pete does the only thing he can; he goes on the run.  Can Pete escape enslavement when it's what he's been raised for? 

‘Raised: Part One’ is the first book in the series and totally free to download.  Check it out at these great places:

Amazon | Sony Ereader Store | Smashwords | Barnes and Noble

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About the Author:

I’m the twisted mind behind The Gallows Novels and the brand new After Death Series.  If you want to know a bit about me, here it is:  I spend too much time indoors and probably watch too many horror films.  Some of my favourite things are; Alone time, people who know when to shut up, having a drink, eating pizza (usually after having too much drink the night before), reading books, adult swim cartoons, bad horror and sci-fi movies, proper good TV shows like Dexter & The Walking Dead, and last but not least having a laugh with my hilarious other half – this would usually include some of the above. 

The Gallows Novels are Modern Fantasy books set in an alternate reality Scotland, complete with entirely fictional towns and supernatural entities such as vampires, witches, fairies and werewolves.

This is a continuing series, with 4 books out now.  Book number 5 is currently underway, due for release in summer 2014.

Warning - these books are Adult Modern Fantasy, not YA.  They are littered with profanity and may be considered sexually rampant by more conservative readers!

The books are exclusive to Amazon for Kindle:

Amazon UK | Amazon US

The After Death Series is all about magically reanimated dead guy Pete as he does his best to avoid enslavement.  This is the beginning of a series of short urban fantasy novels set in an independent Scotland ruled over by a powerful King.  Part Two will be released in the summer 2014.

Available at:

Amazon UK | Amazon US

You can find Sharon at http://sharonstevensonauthor.com/

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