Zombies Vs. Unicorns and who is the winner?

Zombies! Thanks to Carrie Ryan's Bougainvillea. Undoubtedly the creepiest, most spine-tingly zombie story I have read since... well, since Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth. Haters of that book shouldn't be dissuaded though. This story is lacking the angst and lurve triangles found in Forrest. Instead, we get complex, unique, sympathetic and believable characters in the midst of a zombie apocalypse. And of course a healthy dose of the zombie horror that Ryan does so very, very well.

Notable zombie mentions include:

Maureen Johnson’s wonderfully bizarre Children of the Revolution, where we see something akin to a mix between old fashioned voodoo type zombies, new age religion and celebrity culture. Yeah, I know, it sounds like too much. But trust me, Johnson makes it work.

Libba Bray’s Prom Night This is the woman who wroteA Great and Terrible Beauty? It surprised me, because although I liked (liked, not loved) the first Gemma Doyle book, this dark, post-zombie apocalyptic story is not only better written, but so much more emotional and thought provoking. This one will stay with me for a long, long time.

Not so awesome zombie entries include:

Garth Nix’s The Highest Justice I’m not really sure whether this is Team Zombie or Team Unicorn, because it has a little of both. Either way, I didn’t care for it.

Alaya Dawn Johnson’s Love Will Tear Us Apart I liked it but…. think Twillight: The Zombie Version. Granted, this is written so much better than Twillight. However, I can’t help thinking that the novel everyone loves to hate inspired this one.

Scott Westenfeld’s Inoculata struck me as an introduction to a larger story, rather than a complete short.

Cassandra Clare’s Cold Hands didn’t even belong here. Really. Zombie light. For kids. Kids who are not very discriminating readers.

On the unicorn side, the case for their dominance and supreme scariness was very nearly won by Diana Peterfreund’s The Care and Feeding of Your Baby Killer Unicorn. Silly title, no? Oh yeah, I agree. This is the first story I read from this collection. I know virtually nothing about Peterfreund’s writing (although I apparently know lots about her author-behaving-badly reputation) so I was more than a little curious to find out what kind of writer she is. This story blew me away. For a short story, there was an amazing amount of depth to it. Peterfreund created a complex and believable world in which unicorns ~ scary, evil killer unicorns exist. This was also a bit of a coming of age story, a romance story, and a little bit of religion thrown in as well. Yes, I know it seems like way too much. But it worked. I was hooked from the moment the young protagonist Wen sees a live unicorn at a circus side show… the unicorn growls… it’s handler grabs Wen’s arm and hisses to her, “You’re one of us” Oh gawd, I literally got chills at that moment and was reminded of the superbly creepy scene from Freaks when everyone is chanting, “Gooble Gobble one of us, one of us.” Long story short… I think I’m going to have to read some of Peterfreund’s work in the future.

Notable unicorn mentions:

Meg Cabot’s Princess Prettypants had the feel of a silly teen movie, but I loved it anyway. Just as light and fluffy as the title implies.

Kathleen Duey’s The Third Virgin is dark, thought provoking and almost creepy enough to be a zombie story. Only there aren’t any zombies ;)

Not so awesome unicorn stories are:

Margo Lanagan’s A Thousand Flowers is very… typical of Lanagan. (view spoiler)[ What the fuck is it with this woman and bestiality??? (hide spoiler)] I was disappointed to find this story difficult to get into. She presented a vague world, and multiple points of view. I found the whole thing to be a bit messy and the story just never got a good flow.

Naomi Novik’s Purity Test just didn’t do it for me. A little fantasy oriented a little snarky. Somehow this seemed to be lacking imagination.

Like all anthologies, this was a mixed bag. But the great ones more than made up for the so-so stories. Zombies Vs. Unicorns, as so many people have said, is such a fantastic concept. I am kicking myself for not having read this collection sooner!