Twilight of the Dead by Travis Adkins

Travis Adkins seems to be one of the darlings of Indie horror.

As something of a poster-boy for Permuted Press, Travis is everywhere zombies are. Bowie Ibarra’s Down The Road, recently re-released by Permuted, features Travis as both editor and Sensai, his introduction bigging-up Bowie as the ‘Tarantino of zombie fiction.’ Again by Permuted, The Undead Anthology is heralded in by Travis, speaking like some old, wise sailor, about all the wonderful variations of the undead theme therein for fans to flick their horror-hungry thumbs through.

Of course, the favour is returned. Dave Moody (he of Autumn novels fame) bigged-up by Adkins in the Undead Anthology, gets down to a little bigging-up himself in the recently unleashed special edition of Twilight Of The dead, demanding we give it our ‘full attention.’ However, back-slapping is what back-slapping does. As a big fan of Moody’s, I was keen to see whether or not I agreed with him – whether or not Adkins’ Twilight Of The Dead would shine in my estimation.

From the outset, it seemed there was nothing new here. Twilight Of The Dead features a fairly run-of-the-mill-blue-faced-wrinkly-zombie-horde doing its fairly-run-of-the-mill-blue-faced-wrinkly thing. All the usual hoo-haa we expect is present and accounted for – the military going corrupt, the rescue centres breaking down… stuff you would find in either Romero’s cinema or other similarly themed books, such as Ibarra’s Down The Road.

Fans of bizarre horror, or a little-of-the-out-of-the-ordinary would probably find what they’re looking for elsewhere, namely Andre Duza’s house, where the zombie cliché isn’t just refashioned but rather gang-banged into the fucked-up mojo that has good ol’ Andre effortlessly soaring up this reviewer’s top-ten reads.

It goes without saying that I like my horror puked-up and pretty.

Yet the trad road ain’t one I’m not partial to, either, and Twilight Of The Dead brings to the table its own innovations, it must be said. Refreshingly, for example, we have a female lead replacing the clichéd-chisel-jawed-Spambo, all too familiar in the genre. Even better, said lead, Courtney is a girl you’ll find it hard not to fall in love with, her sardonic sense of humour playing out as believable and delectable in equal measure.

The plotline of Twilight Of the Dead, albeit fairly familiar to begin with, eventually finds itself straying slightly left-of-centre. The survivors’ quest for visiting scientist, Dane’s so-called ‘cure’, drawing the settled community out of the relative comfort of their walled-city community, Eastpointe doesn’t pan out as grab-and-run as they might have hoped, leading to a more complex threat than at first anticipated.

Twilight Of The Dead, for me, is the Buffy of zombie literature, pasting together post-apocalyptic horror (and all its trimmings) with post-high-school romance, using a gob of gore-stained bubblegum. Adkins writes exceptionally well, making for an accessible and enjoyable slice of fiction, but for me, Twilight Of The Dead falls shy of being a classic. Trad fans are likely to prefer Moody’s Autumn series and quirky horror-ites would be more likely to steer towards Andre Duza’s Jesus Freaks or Dead Bitch Army, before reaching for this.

Whilst I wouldn’t entirely agree with Mr Moody’s description of Twilight Of The Dead as ‘full-on blood and guts and brains and bullets zombie Armageddon’, it does have elements of all of that going on. You’re unlikely to be disappointed, if that’s your bag. But I wouldn’t imagine you’d be blown away, either.

Review by Wayne Simmons (Spiral), of shiny-HOO-HAA.

You can order Premuted Press's Special Edition of Twilight of the Dead right here.