Book 3 is a Decent Turn...

DYING TO LIVE: LAST RITES by Kim Paffenroth (2011 Permuted Press / 242 pp / tp)
Lucy and Truman, 2 intelligent zombies from DYING TO LIVE: LIFE SENTENCE, open this 3rd installment of Paffenroth's undead saga aboard a small boat. They're traveling with Will and Rachel, two humans who have learned to trust them (although Rachel is a bit more apprehensive than Will). They find a dock outside of a walled-in city named New Sparta. Will and Rachel are allowed to enter so long as they hand their 2 zombie companions over to the city to be used in their undead labor force. Lucy and Truman agree to this, despite figuring there will surely be rough times ahead.
Will and Rachel quickly adapt to their new home: they're given a nice little house and each of them find jobs (Rachel on a construction site, and Will with a group of men who leave the city to keep wandering zombies at bay). They become friends with their neighbors (a couple about their age with a baby), and while Will looks forward to getting back on the water, Rachel begins to grow comfortable, enjoying all the comforts available to them in New Sparta.
Things aren't so good for Lucy and Truman. She's forced to work with a group of fellow zombies who (like Will's job) also go outside the city looking for undead threats, and Truman winds up as the new "smart zombie" attraction at a local circus. When he gets tired of the way the human handle him, he rebels, and is punished via electrocution for spectators to see.
When Rachel goes with her neighbor to the circus and sees Truman being tortured, she becomes convinced the citizens of New Sparta are more savage than the zombies and agrees with Will that they need to leave...after they try to rescue their zombie friends.
While I've been enjoying Paffenroth's unique apocalyptic series, this 3rd novel--while emotionally the richest of the series--felt more like an unusual drama than a horror novel. That's not to knock it--I'm sure fans of the series will enjoy this, despite the absence of some favorite characters from the past two books (my favorite character from the 1st novel, Milton--barely seen in the 2nd--isn't even mentioned this time). Also, the religious aspect that made the first novel so memorable is barely touched on, although Paffenroth does make up for it with his contemplations on the human (and undead) condition in a way that'd make (even) George Romero jealous.
I strongly recommend new readers read the first two novels before trying LAST RITES. There's some zombie goodness here and there, along with a few tense scenes, but fans of the zombie subgenre looking for an all-out gut-muncher might be disappointed.
I'd like to see a return (and an expansion) to the religious themes of the first novel should Paffenroth deliver a 4th, but regardless of which direction this series may take, readers can bet that whatever the author comes up with, it won't be the same old generic zombie story. And for that alone, LAST RITES is worth any zombie fan's time.