The Zona

The Zona

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3.57 of 5 stars 3.57  ·  rating details  ·  123 ratings  ·  45 reviews
The Storms came, and with them disease and blight like mankind had never experienced. Most died, and those who didn't were quick to scramble for weapons, wealth, and control. Petty lords gave way to new societies, and from the ashes of old came the Reformed Arizona Theocracy, or simply put, the Zona. The laws are simple, all sins are punished swiftly and violently. The enf...more
Kindle Edition, 1st Edition, 115 pages
Published February 15th 2012 by Curiosity Quills (first published June 15th 2011)
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Richard
This review has been revised by its perplexed author and can now be found at Expendable Mudge Muses Aloud.

When that Hunger Games juvenilia gets bestsellerdom and movie money, this far better dystopia gets too little. Baffles me.
Christina White
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.
Kat
The Zona is the story of Lead, a Preacher in what was once Arizona - before the storms that changed the world forever. Floods, tornadoes and plagues have resulted in the US being torn apart and remade by warring factions, and in Arizona the ruling class are the Preachers.

This is an intense post-apocalyptic book with vivid imagery and rough, tough characters - which aren't exactly likeable but either had me sympathising with their battles or appalled by their lack of humanity.

It did take me a whi...more
Albert
Overall Feedback: This is what we all fear will happen if we continue to abuse the Earth. Nathan does a phenomenal job of painting the bleakest environment we could face and showing us the path we are on. He can use words to paint such a grand picture and leave you astonished at the final act.

Point of View: You spend the majority of the movie behind the lead character's eyes (funny enough we call him Lead).

Voice: I dare you to find a spot in this book that the voice of the author is not begging...more
Johanna
Picture the end of the world as we know it. Imagine our civilization vanished into thin air. Think of a world where the infrastructure and the government are gone. Chaos? Not so much.

A new order has arrived. The Church controls western territories that haven't been subject to floods, pandemics, and nuclear radiations. The Zona is one of these territories. Lead is a Preacher. He knows how to spread the word of the Lord. His mission? Kill the infidels. Kill men who don't abide by the Church's rule...more
Taryn
Feb 20, 2012 Taryn rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: fans of dystopian lit
It did not surprise me to learn that Nathan Yocum, author of The Zona, is an award-winning screenwriter. As I was reading this, his debut novel, I could not stop picturing it as a movie. (I will honestly be very surprised if it isn’t optioned, especially with the popularity of dystopias generally and the upcoming Hunger Games specifically!)

Imagine: After being devastated by rains, floods, and drought, the United States as we know it collapses. Hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, are killed...more
Megan
I received this as a free ARC from Netgalley.

Lead is a Preacher, charged with tracking down Marks for the Church and either killing them or sending them to Purgatory. His whole outlook on his job changes the day he is sent to hunt down another Preacher. When he fails to pull the trigger, his own life becomes forfeit in the eyes of the Church. This is the story of a man who questions his purpose, and through suffering and trials finds himself.

That actually sounds kind of cheesy. Most books out th...more
Shawn Griffiths
The Zona is set in a dystopic society in a post-apocalyptic Arizona. The story is about a preacher named Lead who is sent by the Church (denomination not clear) to hunt down individuals that have been deemed sinners and heathens to purge them of their wicked ways through either submission or death. The story takes a turn when Lead is sent to hunt down a former preacher who abandoned the Church.

It is not hard to believe that if society as we know it today was wiped out by war, plague, famine, nat...more
Ellie
In a post-apocalyptic world razed by natural disaster, war and pestilence, the state formally known as Arizona is governed by The Church. Preachers hunt down those who have sinned and offer two choices. Death or purgatory. Lead is one such preacher. He carries out the will of God without question until one day he is ordered to apprehend another preacher.

The Zona is a short but thought provoking story. At the start, Lead has been bound to a rock in the heat of the barren Zona desert. We don't kno...more
Candace Wynell McHann
So the world ends. Arizona gets renamed to “The Zona” which is ruled by theocracy simply known as “The Church.” Wait, wait! There’s more!
“The Storms came, and with them disease and blight like mankind had never experienced. Most died, and those who didn't were quick to scramble for weapons, wealth, and control. Petty lords gave way to new societies, and from the ashes of old came the Reformed Arizona Theocracy, or simply put, the Zona. The laws are simple, all sins are punished swiftly and viol...more
Matthew Hunter
Theological inquiry in a post-apocalyptic setting - that's Nathan Yocum's "The Zona." Wasn't it Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, or someone of their deluded ilk who claimed that 9/11, Hurricane Katrina and the Haiti earthquake were God's punishment for loose sexual behavior? The theocrats in "The Zona" would have felt right at home in Robertson's judgmental theological world. "Hey, it could just be the hamburger I ate earlier repeating on me, but I think God wants me to destroy Las Vegas - the spaw...more
David Brown
There has been an environmental disaster. Sea level has risen dramatically. Everything from before is remember as the Broken Times and the survivors of the human race have split between people just wanting to scrape what living they can and those who have born a super-fundamentalist religion, one imposed forcefully and rigorously on everyone.

The Zona is creative and vivid. The language is just the way I like it, overwrought. But within the dystopian waste of a burning hot Arizona the overcooked...more
Nina Post
Vividly desolate, brutal, riveting, and f*cked up. I really liked this book. It was very firmly set in a particular southwest setting, and Yocum did a great job worldbuilding this bleak post-apocalyptic landscape. I stayed up late a couple of nights in a row reading this. You can get a good idea of the tone from these excerpts:

"My soul is rolled up so there ain't a way out of it. If I had another fifty years of saving men I couldn't break even with the destruction I've wrought."

"You're like me,...more
Faye
A very atmospheric novel set in the years after mankind has almost been wiped out by natural disasters piled on one after another. You can almost feel the scorching heat and spit out the dust from your parched mouth. A very descriptive evocative book makes you wonder whether it's worth keeping going and give up. The Zona of the title is a religious state set in what was once Arizona. Wandering men called Preachers dispense justice on behalf of their so called Church.... Then one day a man Lead f...more
Eighty Six
Strong feel of the Old West/gunfighter with good descriptions of the desert, famine, thirst, and desperation. The religious themes were thought-provoking. The archaic thee/thou biblical speech was consistent and therefore not out-of-place. The religion was not one-sided, making the reader reconsider his own beliefs and not be sure about the beliefs of the author.

A gritty, good read. Not only a good story, but a parable about sin, redemption, cleansing, morality and justice.

Some typographical err...more
Karen
This was a darker book than I was prepared to read. The premise is great ***spoilers*** the earth has been devasted by tsunamis and climate change and mankind is not reacting well. I understand why the author went the route of mankind going selfish survivalist, but having the "church" take over as the new military power and then subverting it was so very dark. I kept waiting for the positive light to come on, and while I'm glad that Lead quits being a "preacher" when he can't stand killing anymo...more
Cheryl
The Zona by Nathan Yocum is a striking, fierce, powerhouse of a book. Post-apocalyptic Arizona ("the Zona") is a beautifully described setting: bleak, depressing, oppressive and stark; the people who populate the Zona, likewise, are downtrodden, living a hardscrabble life. They call their era the "Broken Times," and that is the strong impression that the reader is left with -- the world is broken, and savage, and short on hope. As one of the characters says, "Peaceful men don’t live anymore. Goo...more
Saretta
2.5/5

Ambientazione post-apocalittica, Arizona. Del vecchio mondo non resta più nulla se non cadaveri di auto e sacchetti di plastica (ma proprio una marea di sacchetti, sono ovunque), il nuovo mondo è governato dalla follia religiosa in cui i predicatori convertono sostanzialmente uccidendo il peccatore ma sono a loro volta giudicati dal corpo dei Crociati, ancora più cattivo e spietato.
Il romanzo segue il predicatore Lead e il suo incontro con Terence che gli farà mettere in dubbio tutti i valo...more
I.D. Martin
‘Dark and gritty’ is the phrase that crops up repeatedly in discussions and reviews of this story. It is that in every way. It takes a while to engage with the characters as they are as bleak as the dystopian hell they struggle to survive in. My initial reaction was to compare it to King’s The Stand and I believe it’s certainly in that vein and of that quality. It is also a number of other things. The structure resembles a parable where the progression of the protagonist is a series of lessons b...more
David Forsyth
Spaghetti Western meets the Biblical Apocalypse. The Zona presents a stark, chilling and engrossing look at how modern American society could devolve into warped theocracy, if the planet turned against our civilization. Nathan Yocum weaves a unique blend of Old West adventure and apocalyptic judgement in this intriguing look at Arizona after the end of the world as we know it. This is a very good start for a talented new author and I eagerly look forward to the sequel.

I especially enjoyed the in...more
Mary
This is a tiny PA slice of life from one small corner of the world....Arizona now called Zona...several years after storms and floods and God knows what else have ended life as we know it. This isn’t a story of the apocalypse itself but what remains of this one part of the world after the waters and storms have somewhat receded. The author doesn't go much into what caused the apocalypse other than to hint that it was brought on by climate change. No matter, in any event, it's now an ugly world....more
Sheila
This is an interesting, post apocalyptic story, set in a violent, destroyed future American southwest (Arizona, Utah, etc), which follows a "Preacher" named Lead and warring groups of religious extremists who are trying to control the future, apocalyptic world via their own violent versions of religion.

Gritty and graphic, I would recommend this book to anyone who is a fan of the post apocalyptic genre. And the book ends with the possibility of a sequel, which I would be very interested in readi...more
Ann Bowen
It's rather a jumpy read. The protagonist Lead is not a likable guy, but the tortures and injuries he suffers makes him a bit more reasonable. I can't tell how far in the future this is made, but if I recall my Bible, the lord said he'd never use water again as a punishment and this book is set on the premise that a huge tsunami buried the west coast and set the wheels a turning.
Ryan
I enjoyed this book, it was well written post apocalyptic thriller. This story is overtly religious in content, but that is a good aspect to the story. Preachers are given assignments, which entail finding and killing who the church wants him too. The protagonist Lead is given an assignment that will change the rest of his life. Gritty and bloody The Zona pulls no punches and is an entertaining read.
Catherine Gordon
Futuristic tale of a depressing future with natural disasters destroying the earth initially and then people finishing the job. Grim and unrelenting the main characters are sympathetic and it is well written but I found the premise of the story so unpleasant that I never fully engaged which is no reflection on the author.
Jason
I tried...but couldn't finish it. The characters were so bland I couldn't remember who was who from one chapter to the next. Worst of all was the dialogue. Horrible read. Story seemed like it might be going somewhere and concept was intriguing but none of that matters when the characters don't stand out in any way and their dialogue is so convoluted and contrary to how you would expect a post-apocalyptic people to talk. Why would the end of the world and the downfall of civilization (and with it...more
Stephanie
Throughout the book, each page held a certain charm. Each word drew you in. The author's beautifully written novel contained characters you felt emotions for. This book creates a realistic world you never wanted to leave. In the pages you find the beauty of destruction. I enjoyed this book a terrific amount.
Alisha
It was a little strange, and I was pretty bored with it for the first 25% or so. Then it started to get better, although stayed a little on the odd side. I guess I just saw everything that happened as pretty unrealistic. It was hard for me to believe this world, as the religion being so evil was a little overboard. Towards the end it started to get a bit more interesting, but it never managed to pull me in.
SandHouse
This book had a slow start and I wasn't sure if I would finish reading it. But once it got going it was a really good story. Sad and good.

Problem though: There are an abundance of typos in this book. Towards the end it was one or two on every other page. At one point I realize that three pages in a row had had one.
Kevin
I wanted to give it two stars because the editing was miserable. The trouble was that the concept was fascinating. Ignore the poor editing and enjoy yourself.
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The Zona (Kindle Edition)
The Zona (Paperback)
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Nathan L. Yocum is an author, teacher, and entrepreneur living on the Big Island of Hawai'i. His first novel, The Zona, is available through Curiosity Quills.

He is also the editor-in-chief of SpecLit Masters Magazine. Available on amazon, nook, and smashwords.
More about Nathan Yocum...
Automatic Woman Strong Brain Writers on the Wrong Side of the Road LampLight: a Horror Quarterly SpecLit Masters 1: H.P. Lovecraft

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