Dread Nation by Justina Ireland (Dread Nation book 1)

“Jane McKeene was born two days before the dead began to walk the battlefields of Gettysburg and Chancellorsville—derailing the War Between the States and changing America forever. In this new nation, safety for all depends on the work of a few, and laws like the Native and Negro Reeducation Act require certain children attend combat schools to learn to put down the dead. But there are also opportunities—and Jane is studying to become an Attendant, trained in both weaponry and etiquette to protect the well-to-do. It’s a chance for a better life for Negro girls like Jane. After all, not even being the daughter of a wealthy white Southern woman could save her from society’s expectations.

But that’s not a life Jane wants. Almost finished with her education at Miss Preston’s School of Combat in Baltimore, Jane is set on returning to her Kentucky home and doesn’t pay much mind to the politics of the eastern cities, with their talk of returning America to the glory of its days before the dead rose. But when families around Baltimore County begin to go missing, Jane is caught in the middle of a conspiracy, one that finds her in a desperate fight for her life against some powerful enemies. And the restless dead, it would seem, are the least of her problems.” - taken from Goodreads.com

You know you have found an absolutely great book when the first paragraph begins “The day I came squealing and squalling into the world was the first time someone tried to kill me. I guess it should have been obvious to everyone right then that I wasn't going to have a normal life.” Jane McKeene is the mixed-race daughter of a wealthy but quite liberal female white plantation owner in Kentucky. After the war between the states was derailed and the shamblers, aka zombies, started roaming the United States. The war shifted focus to one in which some people tried to get Society to go back to the way it was prior to the war were others we're trying to forge a new country.

How can a zombie book with a wickedly good twist on the American Civil War with a mystery thrown in be side-splitting hilarious? Jane's voice is outstanding as she relates not only her current situation but takes the reader through her backstory before she came to Miss Preston's. The first part of the book begins each chapter with an outtake from a letter Jane has written to her mother white the second half of the book has outtakes of letters that Jane's mother wrote to her. Each chapter's title begins with the words “In which I …”

Dread Nation is one of the best books I've read this year. With all the shot shocking revelations and twists and turns that come at the end, readers will be anxiously awaiting the next book in Jane's adventure.

Book two is expected sometime in 2019. Not soon enough for me.

Visit Justina Ireland’s website.