CHURCH OF THE LAST LAMB

A restless schoolteacher journeys to the heart of darkness to prove his worth during the zombie apocalypse.

We’re 15 years into the end of the world and the whole deal sucks for Dr. Jonathan Greenway. The mild-mannered professor was fortunate to be teaching a class for the U.S. Army when the dead began rising from their graves. Now he’s a second-class citizen at a fortified base somewhere in the American Rust Belt, splitting his time teaching “New History” to thankless child soldiers and literally shoveling shit at the biomass factory. As he yearns for a stable life with his girlfriend, Jon’s temper runs afoul of the fascist tinpot dictator that runs the joint, and he’s quickly banished to a rapidly dwindling reconnaissance squad. Not that the “Chum Bums,” as they’re known, are crack soldiers—their commanding officer is still haunted from having to icepick his infant daughter, while the rest are expendable conscripts at best. When surveillance reveals a remote church with the power to instantly kill zombies dead (again), the Bums set out on the treacherous journey to investigate. Beset by the dead as well as the Calaveras, a masked death cult from Mexico, Greenway and his comrades finally manage to reach their goal. At the titular refuge, they find that mad chemist James Warnocky has warped theology, science, and alchemy into an infernal combination, though one that holds promise to perform exactly as promised. It’s a good old-fashioned bone-and-gristle cruncher right up George A. Romero’s alley, but there’s more to it. The writing is crisp, punctuated with military patois and medieval violence while Greenway struggles not just to make sense of the horror, but his own place in it. Much like the experiences found in The Walking Dead and 28 Days Later, what’s wrong in this world is human, not some dark force waiting to ambush a hero with a heart of gold. It’s just us.

Smart, bleak, and rare—a wide-eyed stare into the abyss sans hope or hysteria.