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Part of what made this book boggling for me was the fact that it has 23 characters, not counting the minor characters, but including the Interviewer. Besides the interviewer, who appears in every chapter (the book is completely based on interviews) the character to appear the most is Todd Wainio, an American soldier from Chicago, appearing a whopping four times out of the 330 pages of the book.
That said, this book is rather terrible for focusing on a single character, but amazing for the variety - this detailed the whole world (or most of it: North Korea was more of a lone wolf) fighting their own versions of the "Zombie War" and eventually uniting. Considering that I can't focus on more than one person for the character analysis, I'll focus on the most repetitive [concrete] character: Todd Wainio.
TODD WAINIO: Todd was part of the infantry, and a survivor of one of the first battles of the Great Panic, the first wave of zombies that had everyone scared. Todd was explaining the supposed readiness of the army, just until they realized that the conventional high-tech weaponry won't cut it for the zombies: "Dude, we had everything: tanks, Bradleys, Humvees armed with everything from fifty cals to these Vasilek heavy mortars. At least those might have been useful. We had Avenger Humvee mounted Stinger surface-to-air missile sets, we had this AVLB portable bridge layer system, perfect for the three-inch deep creek that ran by the freeway [...] I saw a SAW gunner, a light machine gun that you're supposed to fire in short, controlled bursts about as long as it takes to say 'Die [expletive omitted] die.' The initial burst was too low. I caught one square in the chest. I watched him fly backward, hit the asphalt, then get right back up again as if nothing had happened. Dude...when they get back up..." (Brooks 94-100) Todd, at the Battle of Yonkers, said that the army was the last line of defense, but they were hopelessly outmatched and not fitted correctly. The zombies would get right back up.
The previous paragraph describes how Todd feels about the conflict, which is external. Todd, at first is desperate, realizing that the zombies will overrun them if they don't fight hard. They ran, giving up. The last few paragraphs said "Yonkers was supposed to be the day we restored confidence to the American people, instead we practically told them to kiss their [butt] goodbye." (Brooks 104)
Todd changed by the end of the book by describing his more recent feelings (again, this is mostly an interview book) and how he felt different than how he did as a soldier at Yonkers. "That was us, standing on the Jersey riverbank, watching the dawn over New York. We'd just got the word, it was VA Day (Victory of America, celebrating the purge of the zombies) There was no cheering, no celebration. It just didn't seem real. Peace? What the hell did that mean? I'd been afraid for so long, fighting and killing, and waiting to die, that I guess I just accepted it as normal for the rest of my life. I thought it was a dream, sometimes it feels like one, remembering that day, that sunrise over the Hero City." (Brooks 342) These are the last words of the book. Todd lived a soldier, and changed by snapping out of the fear that had become so normal for the survivors of the Zombie War.
One of the most important things I should mention, as it is detailed throughout several of the characters that fought the zombies, including Todd, was that World War Z was favoring of old-world war values over that of the modern times: nowadays, you can win wars by 'starving' the enemy of necessities, or by striking them with fear. Zombies cannot feel fear nor do they starve nor weaken with time. Todd even explained how he and his army adopted an older melee scythe-like weapon called a Lobo that was more effective against the zombies than traditional guns. Additionally, an older, wooden gun (because wood took less time to manufacture) was more effective than the previous guns.
One of the most important things I should mention, as it is detailed throughout several of the characters that fought the zombies, including Todd, was that World War Z was favoring of old-world war values over that of the modern times: nowadays, you can win wars by 'starving' the enemy of necessities, or by striking them with fear. Zombies cannot feel fear nor do they starve nor weaken with time. Todd even explained how he and his army adopted an older melee scythe-like weapon called a Lobo that was more effective against the zombies than traditional guns. Additionally, an older, wooden gun (because wood took less time to manufacture) was more effective than the previous guns.
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