Review of The Burning World by Isaac Marion

A few years ago, when I first heard the premise of Isaac Marion's novel Warm Bodies--a zombie boy falls in love with a living girl--I was at least stopped by the idea enough to see that a lot of people were talking about how good this novel was. So I read it and loved it. In addition to being a unique take on the zombie apocalypse, I was even more impressed to learn that it was a bit of an unusual retelling of Shakespeare's tragic play, Romeo and Juliet. Through Warm Bodies, the reader gets to take a journey through the mind of a not-so-mindless zombie as he struggles with a past he doesn't remember and a strange desire to protect a girl named Julie that he should want to devour. Warm Bodies ended with R, the zombie protagonist who can't remember what his name was before the apocalypse, rediscovering his humanity and finding life again. Then the story ends.

Except it was only a beginning. R and Julie showed that being a zombie could be reversed. The Dead could become the Living again.

But in The Burning World, Isaac Marion's follow-up to Warm Bodies, is a much more dangerous place than we realize, and not just because of zombies. If the previous novel ended on a note of hope that things could get better in the world, this new novel demonstrates that things won't get better without a significant fight.

As the book opens on R and Julie trying to create a life together, R is trying to remember how to be a human. Though he's headed in the right direction, he hasn't quite made it yet, and he still has much to learn. The memory of who he once was is still a mystery, but it's one he doesn't care to unravel anyway because he only wants to focus on the future with Julie. Their chance at happiness is soon interrupted when a militia group called Axiom comes to take over their home in Citi Stadium. Axiom's idea of rebuilding society doesn't include the zombies that are now reforming, nor human freedom. As everything R and Julie have begun fighting for becomes threatened, the two find themselves on the run across the country with two of their friends and an unlikely ally, a man named Abram Kelvin, who wants nothing more than to disappear off the grid with his daughter, if only Axiom will let him.

Perhaps the most gripping part of this novel is the way R gradually remembers who is and how he copes with the kind of person he's discovering he was. The mystery of R's identity is reason enough to keep turning pages, but Marion also delivers fast-paced action and surprisingly deep philosophical reflection on what it means to be human.

I don't really have any criticisms of the book. I will say that I wasn't as interested in reading it as I was the first book because I didn't imagine the story could get better after Warm Bodies. I was glad to see that I was wrong.

The Warm Bodies series is a unique take on the zombie apocalypse genre that has become so popular in recent years, and so far, this one gets better with each book. I look forward to diving into the finale called The Living next.