The fact that I was able to put it down and savor it is truly a testament to not only my will power, but the brilliance of Isaac Marion’s prose as well.  Don’t think a story told by a zombie could be poetic and moving?  Think again.  But it’s not just a love story, oh my no.  It’s a social commentary as well.  One which vaguely reminds me of Daniel Quinn’s “Ishmael” and his explanation of how things (things being society) came to be and why we must embrace change.  But that’s really neither here nor there.  My point is this: if you ever follow one piece of my advice it should be this –   read “Warm Bodies.”  I promise you will devour it.  Pun very much intended.  And with that I am pleased as punch to introduce you to my new favorite author, Isaac Marion.  Enjoy, my dears.

The Same 7:

Isaac Marion

 
 
1) In 10 words or less tell us what makes you so freakin’ awesome…and don’t be modest. Let ‘er rip.
 

Raised in the woods. Forced to love books. Thick beard.
 
 

2) Did you (or do you currently) have an imaginary friend(s)? If so, tell us a little about him/her/it/them.
 

I don’t have imaginary friends, I have imaginary enemies. My imaginary arch nemesis lives in the back of my brain and controls my subconscious and autonomic functions. He resents me for having control of the body and getting to have all the fun while he works and works, so he tries to sabotage my life whenever possible by making me blush and sweat and get cotton mouth and insomnia and strange obsessions.

 
 
3) Do you believe in ghosts?
 

I believe they could quite easily be real. I think if they are real, it’s unlikely they are conscious beings. More likely they’re echoes of some sort, residual imprints on some frequency of reality we don’t have access to.

 
 
4) What one thing scares the ever-loving crap out of you more than anything else in the whole wide world?
 

Vast mouths in space or the ocean. The thought of something incomprehensibly large opening up and swallowing me down.

 
 
5) Sunrise, sunset, new moon or full moon?
 

Sunrise, because I almost never see it so it feels special and rare. Full moon, obviously, because if I want the effect of a new moon I can just go in the bathroom and turn out the light.

 
 
6) If you had to live the rest of your life inside one book or movie, what would it be and why?
 

Oh damn. That’s a hard choice. Probably this book I read as a kid called The Paradise War. It’s a Celtic-themed fantasy where guys from London get sucked into another world where everything is more beautiful and sounds and tastes better and life feels right and makes sense and one of them becomes a king and gets his hand cut off but it comes back as a magic hand made of silver and…anyway, it wasn’t a great book, but a tantalizing world to live in.

 
 
7) It’s the zombie apocalypse. The person you love more than anyone, anywhere, ever has been bitten by one of the walking dead. It is inevitable that they will turn into a flesh-eating monster. What do you do?
 

This depends so much on the nature of this zombie apocalypse. What do we know about these zombies? Is it a disease, or magic? Is there any chance of them being cured? Do they retain any consciousness? Most likely I’d chain this person up and keep them around for at least a year or two until I was pretty sure there was nothing in there worth preserving.

 
 
Here’s a little space that’s all yours.  Do with it what you will.  Draw a picture, tell us about a current project, pet peeve, new product, the funniest thing you’ve heard*, write a haiku about unicorns, recount your Bigfoot sighting…you get the idea. It’s all yours.  Run with it.
 

I used to be able to hover. I couldn’t fly, exactly, but if I crouched down and wrapped my arms tightly around my knees and focused hard, I could hover about three inches off the ground. I have very clear memories of doing this. I lost the ability sometime around age 8, and now no one believes me. I think children are magic.

Isaac Marion –

Isaac Marion was born in north-western Washington in 1981 and has lived in and around Seattle his whole life, working a variety of strange jobs like delivering deathbeds to hospice patients and supervising parental visits for foster-kids. He is not married, has no children, and did not go to college or win any prizes. Warm Bodies is his first novel.
 
 

Kisses  & Chaos,
Alli Woods Frederick