Zombie Book Club

We’re buzzing with anticipation for Tina Romero’s upcoming queer‑zombie film Queens of the Dead! From the moment we caught the first trailer; a glitter‑soaked Neon lit warehouse rave gone horribly right, we’ve been dissecting the film’s bold premise, the promise of sequined power tools and six‑inch heeled zombies, and the way Tina Romero’s DJ‑nightlife roots could translate into kinetic, club‑ready choreography. We can’t wait to se...

In this episode we sit down with Sarah Lyons Fleming, the brilliant mind behind the Until the End of the World series (as well as her other series; City and Cascadia), which feels more like a well‑stocked pantry than a barren wasteland. She enthralls us with the gritty logistics of life after the collapse, cozy survival, acorn flour, and how community‑first storytelling can outshine lone‑wolf power fantasies.

Beyond the gore, Sarah ...

The undead gather for the inaugural ZombieWeen 2025 showdown, where the court of the apocalypse crowns a new monarch of the undead. Leah and Dan usher listeners into a night of witty banter, improvised challenges, and razor‑sharp satire—all framed by a Jeopardy‑style board that pits “Zombie Survival 101,” “Horror Tropes,” “Apocalypse Etiquette,” “Zombie Blockbusters,” and “Dating While Undead” against one another. Contestants—inclu...

We crack open Resident Evil (2002) to expose Umbrella Corp’s playbook: a secret underground lab, an AI “Red Queen” that chooses lethal containment over humanity, and a virus that turns a research facility into an underground tomb. By mapping the film’s thrills onto today’s corporate landscape, we explore how shareholder‑driven incentives, corporate personhood, and profit‑first logic can become a real‑world horror story—​a corporate...

The plan for this episode was simple: fire zombies, protest frogs, and a life update. What we got was a quiet living room, two handheld mics, and the kind of day that makes everything else feel small. Our old boy Nero, a once-feral, endlessly loving dog who shaped our routines and taught us patience, took a sharp turn. We walked into the ER carrying an 80lb dog like a duffle bag and left with a simple truth: sometimes love is mercy...

Can a film adaptation ever capture the quiet ache of its source? In this crossover with Wicked Words Book Club, we dissect Isaac Marion’s Warm Bodies and its sleek, sanitized movie version, tracing the emotional, ideological, and tonal shifts that split page and screen. We celebrate the bits that land, like visual metaphors of zombified liminality and clever sight gags, and lament the simplifications that undercut weight: interchan...

Join us for a smart, irreverent dive into Aquarium of the Dead with marine biologist and festival fanatic Jacob Quijas. We map undead tropes onto real marine science—waves, buoyancy, detritivores, keystone species—and even speculate: can the ocean digest zombies faster than we expect and would their bones become coral?

Then we dive in to the movie: shark mix-ups, roaring octopi, and what Aquarium of the Dead gets hilariously wrong a...

When a zombie named 'R' rescues a living girl instead of devouring her, everything shifts. Told through R’s reflective, darkly witty inner monologue, Warm Bodies challenges our assumptions of life, death, and what it means to feel. As R consumes Perry’s brain and begins to access memories, he forges a strange intimacy with Perry’s consciousness—raising the question: whose identity is really influencing R’s journey?

In this...

This episode digs into how the Trump Administration has rolled back decades of clean energy progress—through sweeping executive orders, budget cuts, and cancelled programs—and how those moves are hitting communities of color, the poor, and Indigenous Nations the hardest. Leah shares her own loss of work in environmental justice, and we break down what that means in real terms: higher energy bills, fewer clean-energy jobs, loss of p...

Jason Strutz joins us on Zombie Book Club Ep 113 to talk about Returned, his medieval horror graphic novel where the undead aren’t just monsters — they’re souls trapped in bodies that have turned violent, forced to watch as loved ones try to bring them back. When warrior Vale dies and becomes one such undead, her partner Hal and their son Ragno must navigate the horror, the betrayal, and the slim chance of redemption.

We dive into h...

In this episode, we bring you face-to-face with acclaimed author Alice B. Sullivan, as we crack open The Collapse: Book 0 in her Aftermath series. Alice takes us behind the scenes of how a character backstory written in just three whirlwind weeks during the pandemic became a full-blown prequel, introducing young Sadie and her fearless Yorkshire Terrier, Trooper. Prepare to reframe your assumptions about apocalypse pets—Alice argues...

Join us as we dive into “The Dead‑Weight Resistance” with returning guest Jo Salazar, author of The Dead Weight and its thrilling sequel. We explore Quinn’s journey in post-apocalyptic St. Louis—her fight for healthcare, her emotional trauma, and the chance to redefine herself when no one knows her past. Jo shares how stepping away from social work into full-time writing has changed her life, and what drew her to themes of identity...

The tension was palpable as we welcomed comic creators Laurie Calcaterra and Brandon Starocci to the Summerween Slamdown - a bare-knuckle brawl between frenemies that would determine the fate of Laurie's zombie crown and Brandon's prized mustache. What began as online beef culminated in this explosive showdown, judged by none other than 2024 Zombie-ween king and horror author Sylvester Barzey.

Contact & Socia...

In this provocative and poignant episode, we sit down with author KQ Watson to explore her short story Wheelchair Seating for the Apocalypse. Far from your average survival tale, this narrative focuses on a wheelchair user who chooses to opt out of enduring a zombie-infested world—prompting a powerful and compassionate exploration of autonomy, dignity, and the underrepresented voices in apocalyptic fiction.

We dive into the ethics o...

In this special “get to know us” episode, Dan and Leah pull back the curtain on the Zombie Book Club. From meeting on ICQ in the internet’s dark ages to building a zombie-obsessed home in Vermont, they share their origin story, their love for all things undead, and why they use the apocalypse as a lens to talk about capitalism, climate collapse, and representation. You’ll hear about Dan’s zombie novel-in-progress, Leah’s creepy-coo...

When Rod becomes the only sentient zombie in a world overrun with mindless undead, he adopts a squirrel sidekick (Grim), starts naming zombies, and invents a lifestyle fueled by mealworms.

Things shift dramatically when he meets Bethany—a gritty survivor who doesn’t immediately try to destroy him. Together, they explore what it even means to be alive: grief, identity, free will, and the deep loneliness of being neither ful...

Death is broken—and in Path of the Pale Rider’s horrifying new issue #7, Laurie Calcaterra pushes the apocalypse boundary even further. From prophetic themes to theatrical horror, this is storytelling at its most disturbing and relevant.

Join us for an immersive chat with Laurie—creator, visionary, and hot sauce witch—as she breaks down the creative grind behind Issue 7 and teases collectible surprises like Sad Pancake figurines, “R...

Brave the wasteland pantry with us as twelve zombie‑fiction creatives—competing under our B.I.T.E. rubric—turn shelf‑stable staples like peanut butter pretzels, Belgian beer, macaroni, donuts, and yes, human flesh into horrifyingly inventive three‑course feasts. From “cheese‑dusted long pork with peach hummus” to “scrotum balls in blood sauce,” this tongue‑in‑cheek culinary horror explores how desperation, and sheer imagination col...

Courtney Konstantin, author of the Sundown series and Babysitter of the Apocalypse, joins Dan and Leah to unpack the human drama behind her zombie narratives. From flawed heroes and makeshift families to cult leaders exploiting the end of the world, Courtney shares how she builds rich characters and real-world villains that outshine the undead.

Expect candid chatter about taking care of toddlers when the world’s ending, the unconven...