Max Brooks

“Zombies are apocalyptic in nature. They belong to a class of monster that doesn't just hunt humans, but seeks to obliterate that entire human race.”

“Before I'm a zombie nerd, before I'm a science-fiction nerd, I am a history nerd.”

“I actually wrote my first zombie book way before I got the job on 'Saturday Night Live.'”

“If I thought there was any hope of turning 'World War Z' into a movie, I wouldn't have written it as a giant, epic, global story, because that requires a giant, epic, global budget.”

“Since 2001, people have been scared. There's been some really scary stuff that's been happening - 9/11, Iraq, Afghanistan, Katrina, anthrax letters, D.C. sniper, global warming, global financial meltdown, bird flu, swine flu, SARS. I think people really feel like the system's breaking down.”

“The living dead had taken more from us than land and loved ones. They'd robbed us of our confidence as the planet's dominant life form. We were a shaken, broken species, driven to the edge of extinction and grateful only for tomorrow with perhaps a little less suffering than today. Was this the legacy we would leave our children, a level of anxiety and self-doubt not seen since our simian ancestors cowered in the tallest trees? What kind of world would they rebuild? Would they rebuild at all? Could they continue to progress, knowing that they would be powerless to reclaim their future? And what if that future saw another rise of the living dead? Would our descendants rise to meet them in battle, or simply crumple in meek surrender and accept what they believe to be their inevitable extinction? For this alone, we had to reclaim our planet. We had to prove to ourselves that we could do it, and leave that proof as this war's greatest monument. The long, hard road back to humanity, or the regressive ennui of Earth's once-proud primates. That was the choice, and it had to be made now.”

“Zombies let us explore notions of the apocalypse - no water, food, medical care, the government imploding - while letting us sleep at night.”

“I don't mind my work being a record of the time it was written in.”

“I think the fascination with zombies is that they don't obey the rules of monsters. The first rule of monsters is that you have to go find them. You have to make a conscious choice to go to the swamp or the desert or the abandoned summer camp.”

“If I knew anything about what people wanted and was popular, I'd still be writing for 'Saturday Night Live'. I can only write what I want, and hopefully people will like it.”

“Often, a school is your best bet-perhaps not for education but certainly for protection from an undead attack.”

“When I was 16, the first book I ever actually purchased with my own money, in fact, and had read on my own time was 'Hunt for Red October' by Tom Clancy.”

“Lies are neither bad nor good. Like a fire they can either keep you warm or burn you to death, depending on how they're used.”

“When I started writing, there was nothing about zombies. It was all teen movies, which to me are scarier than zombies, but that's another story.”

“I think that most people would rather face the light of a real enemy than the darkness of their imagined fears.”

“There comes a point where emotions must give way to objective facts.”

“I wrote 'The Zombie Survival Guide' because I wanted to read it, and nobody else was writing it. All I've been doing with everything I've written is answering questions that I had.”