I loved the Choose Your Own Adventure series of books as a kid. I devised a system of numbered bookmarks that I inserted every time I had to make a choice, to make sure I ended up reading through every path. (Although the first time through I always tried to make the “right” choices.) Can You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse? is a choose-your-own-adventure story for adults, and so, armed with fond memories, I prepared to love it.
I didn’t. Maybe I wasn’t in a silly enough mood that day, or maybe my expectations were off, but I only ended up reading through one path of this story, and didn’t even feel tempted to go back and try another.
The biggest problem, I think, is that the humor failed for me. As this is incredibly subjective, it may not fail for you, but to me it felt dry and forced. It also relied heavily on a knowledge of New York City that I don’t possess.
I was hoping that as a mature version of the old series, this would allow me to make choices based on information and logic. Instead, the choice points seemed random to me, with one option no better than the next. In between choices, meanwhile, “I” did a lot of things I don’t think I would do, making me want to argue with the narrator!
This was silly. If you’re in a silly mood, this may be a good book for you. As for what it’s about, the title really says it all: Can you Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?
Rating: 2/5
Title: Can You Survive the Zombie Apocalypse?
Author: Max Brallier
ISBN: 145160775X
Published: February 2011