Society collapses when the tail end of an aberrant comet emits radiation that infects the living and refreshes the dead.Read this when I was 17 after I picked it up while facing a long flight layover in a Dallas airport. I remember being torn between boredom and paying an overpriced amount for this novel at the airport book store. In the end, my need to satisfy my appetite for zombie apocalypse won over.I knew it would be a good buy, though, primarily because I was already familiar with the short story version of Wet Work by Philip Nutman when he wrote for Skipp and Spector’s "The Book of the Dead" anthology (an AMAZING zombie anthology and one of the first of it's kind).So, the title and author's name alone had immediately caught my eye.Upon realising that Nutman had expanded it into a full sized novel, it wasn't long before I became easily convinced to go ahead and splurge. Was definitely worth it because i've read the novel a few times over since then.It is certainly a quick and easy read and worth tracking down for sure, which i have had to myself since my dog ate my original '93 copy.The story wasn't perfect and doesn't stick to normal zombie apocalypse protocal, but it was memorable and original.So, take this particular zombie story lightly; it takes place in the course of presidency under George H. W. Bush, involves government cover-ups, black ops, there are thinking zombies, some dark comedy, some corny phrases and a shoddily written sex scene that I read with a grain of salt. But, if you can be forgiving, you just may enjoy the creativeness and perspectives in this zombie tale.Keep in mind I give five stars for being innovative at the time of it's debut as much as I do for the nostalgia of when I first read it.If you like zombie adventure, covert operations, plot twists and zombies that retain function and intelligence, check this out.
Thoroughly enjoyed this zombie apocalypse tale. Hadn't previously heard of the book or the author. Good, fast paced story with many twists and surprising events such as you grow accustomed to characters only to...yeah, you get the drift. Good amount of gore and blood and guts for the gore hounds but it's also a mixture of genres somewhat, living dead, crime thriller, slight political thriller and, well, also has a Commando (Arnie movie) slash kung full style showdown haha. Also marked as a book with a down beat ending which makes a refreshing change every so often :)
Do You like book Wet Work (1993)?
One of the better zombie stories out there. It's a shame that Nutman didn't publish more work-he was quite the voice in the realm of splatterpunk. This book definitely isn't for the faint....I am used to detailed accounts of violence in my books and this one had me cringing a few times. My only complaint is the amount of characters in the story...Nutman was ambitious to create as large a world as he did, but after a while it became hard to keep track of who was who in some situations. But besides that this was a fun zombie gorefest. R.I.P. Phil
—Ian Muller
In 1993, Philip Nutman took his short story which had appeared in Skipp and Spector’s Book of the Dead anthology and expanded it into this novel. I haven’t read the short story, and frankly, I can’t imagine it from this novel, as the finished product is “epic” in the sense of The Stand (a comparison references on the cover): a whole buncha people, each trying to survive in a world in which the radiation from a comet’s tail sickens the living and revives the dead.Despite coming before the current glut of zombified media, Wet Work fits right into the present-day milieu: Romeroesque living dead attack the living, and those thus killed reanimate to continue the cycle. Some people retain their intelligence once undead, but even that’s temporary. Society immediately crumbles, and everything goes to hell.Unfortunately, at 262 in paperback, the novel’s just too short for its epic attempts. Instead of many full plotlines which eventually converge or illuminate each other, we have abortive subplots that become little more than vignettes that distract from the two main narrative threads. It’s a disjointed experience that needs either more length or fewer plot threads.
—Nathan Shumate
Dominic Corvino, covert assassin, and Nick Packard, a would-be alcoholic rookie cop, are two of the main characters in this Zombie epic, but neither of them are particularly appealing. You want to root for both of them, but only by default. Regardless, the slip from normality to ‘Hell on Earth’ is well done, with the right amount of disbelief and incredulity from the characters. The fact the some of the dead retain their memories from their past allows the change to be even odder, and harder for our characters to comprehend. There are some great depictions of Zombie gore, and other original touches regarding the New World Order, so despite some obvious short-comings the novel was worth the read.
—Nelio Gomes
