94 Books Like Zombie

This book blew my mind when I first read it. In my opinion, it is one of the most visceral, scary, and under-rated serial killer novels of all time. Published in 1986 in the midst of America’s much-hyped real and fictional serial killer ‘epidemic,’ Killer on the Road stands out as a first-person serial-killer narrative, as well as putting forward a new kind of character (for the 1980s) – the homosexual serial murderer. In this novel, Ellroy delves into the phenomenon of motiveless serial murder from the perspective of the killer on a subversive journey through a hellish suburban America. From the prologue to the epilogue the reader is presented an interior world-view saturated with violence and nightmarish insights into the psychopathology of a disturbed killer. 

As an ex-pat Oklahoma who writes crime fiction, I’ve long been enamored of my homeboy, the great noir-ist Jim Thomson, whose best novel this is. Like most of Thompson’s work, this is set in Texas, not Oklahoma, but as in all my choices, the world he evokes is indistinguishable, the one from the other.

Lou Ford, the main character, is the kind of guy who makes you want to sleep with both eyes open. A psychotic, small-town Deputy Sheriff, Ford openly mocks the idea of justice; he is a purely malign force, a glad-handing menace who rules his petty fiefdom with the wisdom of Josef Goebbels and the kind-heartedness of Charles Manson. Ford’s first-person narration reads like it’s been scrawled in Magic Marker on the walls of a men’s room in hell. No one did nihilism better than Jim Thomson.

This was one of the hardest books to "get into," but a friend of mine told me to stick with it because the rewards of getting through the first quarter would be so great. I'm glad I did. It is an astounding piece of work, quite different from anything I've ever read before or since, and remains one of my top five books.

The tangents the book takes, and the blasé attributes of the leading character are superbly crafted. It was suggested it was "unfilmable," and there's one scene in particular I thought they'd never get away with, but if you look at the movie version carefully, it's in there. 

This isn’t fantasy or supernatural, but the book really delves into the strangeness of people.

It starts as something mundane and ordinary until you scratch the surface. Full twists that genuinely caught me completely unaware, this book is a horror masterpiece that isn’t technically a horror.

And it has one scene that made me feel physically ill—that is amazing writing.

What if the end of the world was the best day of your life? This intriguing premise drew me in, but it was the characters that kept me hooked through all seven books of this series.

Focused on a small town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula after an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) devastates America, the series is packed with characters who feel like real people, with relatable struggles and flaws. I was rooting for them as they fought to hold their town together against an onslaught of threats.

From the first sentence, “There’s a bullet in my chest…,” you know this story is going to be exciting. Set in the U.P. on the banks of Lake Superior, Paradise is a town with plenty of work for a newly-licensed private investigator. Hamilton’s protagonist is an ex-cop who barely escaped death, is dealing with PTSD, and just wants to live a quiet life chopping wood, having a beer at the pub, and on occasion getting a non-violent case to work. 

This author knows how to ramp up the action and keep the reader turning pages. He makes a well-worn mystery twist (a convicted murderer serving a life sentence appears to be killing people on the outside), seem brand-new and completely original.

This is a true story that pulls you into a strange, painful reality. What is it like to be the father of one of America’s most notorious serial killers? Jeffrey Dahmer murdered 17 males. He lured them to his home, gave his victims drugs and alcohol, and strangled them to death. After he killed, Dahmer had sex with the corpses, dismembered them, and threw the remains away. Sometimes he kept souvenirs, skulls, or took photos. This gruesome story by Jeffrey’s father, Lionel, exposes Dad’s shock as he unravels the truth. It talks about the horror, grief, desperation, and struggle to embrace the reality of the child he still loves. Would you be able to forgive if it was your child?

When my friend recommended Bootstrapper, I wanted to read it because the author’s life paralleled the struggles my daughter experienced with the mean divorce from her husband. Divorce can bring you to your knees or build your strength and character. Divorce developed strength in my daughter and in Mardi. Mardi found a way to save her farm, deal with her young sons and begin a new chapter in her life filled with love and meaning. I recommend this feel-good story to inspire hope when one is completely lost.

The conventional wisdom is that middle-grade girls read books a lot more than boys do. Maybe so... but if there’s any book that could encourage more boys to read, you couldn’t do much better than this goofball adventure story. In 1895, Stan, a clueless but earnest eleven-year-old, is sent to a mining camp in northern Michigan with his “sweet Mama,” his snarky cousin Geri, and his no-nonsense grandma. Between the unfamiliar milieu and his wildly overactive imagination, Stan undergoes an endless string of indignities that convince him he’s the victim of every evil under the sun, even as he searches for his long-lost father and struggles to become the man he aspires to be. Hilarious, engaging, and full of heart, this is one for everybody (including girls!). And don’t miss the sequel, I Almost Died. Again.

After I moved to the Upper Peninsula, I kept hearing about an event referred to as the Italian Hall Disaster in Calumet, Michigan, when over 70 people were killed, most of them children, in 1913.

This book features that event as part of its plot, but it really drew me in because I felt so sympathetic to its main character, Annie Clements. She cares about people, and she cares about justice, and I admired her from the start. I wanted her to succeed even as I sensed she probably would not. She’s one of the few characters I actually grieved for when I finished the book.