Zombies! discussion
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Zombies in Sci-Fi/Fantasy
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Pratchett's got zombies in his Discworld novels. From http://wiki.lspace.org/wiki/Zombies:"Notable zombies in Ankh-Morpork include Mr. Slant the head of the Guild of Lawyers, Mr Bendy, the obituarist on The Times, and the Watchman Reg Shoe, formerly a dead rights activist. The zombie Baron Saturday makes an appearance in Witches Abroad."
In "Paladin of Souls", by Lois McMaster Bujold we find out that one of the characters is technically deceased. Would that count as a zombie?Also, one of Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker books mentions a guy who is spending a year dead "for tax purposes".
In NOIR by K. W. Jeter (Blade Runner-esque dystopian scifi), if you die owing money you are kept alive as a zombie until your debt is paid off. http://userpic.livejournal.com/392755...
In George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire series, the hidden antagonists are known as 'The Others', beings made of ice. They also reanimate the dead. You don't see their undead armies much in the first few books, only one big confrontation, but they are supposedly going to play a bigger part as the series draws to a close.
In Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen series, there is an entire race of beings called the T'lan Imass that are undead- they made themselves that way so they could make eternal war on their sworn enemies, the Jhagut. Unfortunately, the zombie reference only goes so far since these undead are thinking, feeling beings with no need of human flesh to keep them going. There are also other types of undead in the series, including cursed people who died but stay alive (and sentient) and undead who are ressurected for certain purpose. There are tons of different types of magic in Erikson's world, so I'm sure there are some bona-fide flesh eaters out there.
Pierce Anthony's series also includes some Zombies here and there, but since the series is very light-hearted, they don't really do anything bad and are mostly humorous. There's even a 'Zombie King' who can make anything zombified...but I don't seem to remember overwhelming brain-lust in any of his creatures.
Anyone else?