kinda fun/blithe in some ways, which is kinda odd for a zombie apocalypse story, but this is a lot more than just that. It's hard to describe, so read it.

Eira and Soren's post-apocalyptic journey was something to behold. I don't believe I've ever read such an exciting and utterly queer zombie adventure. There was some truly harrowing moments amidst the realistic portrayal of young adult trauma and survival. All the credit to Carrie Mac. They've been added to the must read list.

Thank you to Random House Children's | Crown Books for Young Readers and NetGalley for providing an eARC for a honest review.

This book has all the things: parents with antiquated ideas who misunderstand us, survivalist culture, gayness, high speed zombies.
Most of the story takes place after the zombie patient zero shows up, but we get a glimpse of the event and it happens fast. Living off their wits, strength, and necessary speed, twins Eira and Soren manage to avoid getting bitten long enough to still get a chance to--sort of--be teens. They encounter other surviving teens, a friend starts a running club, and some of the characters even get to fall in love.
With most of society removed from the picture, we get a clearer look at the reality of the individual as they are rather than as society demands they be.

Introduction
I didn't think there was much new that could be done with zombies, but this is a new set of traits! These zombies have excellent hearing - a gunshot will bring every one within a mile towards you - and they can run quickly. However, they're extremely dumb; if they lose sight of you, they'll forget they were chasing you, and they can't figure out doors, gates or fences. That makes running the best defence - you need to stay ahead of them long enough to get out of sight. And that leads straight to our plot.

Plot Summary
Eiren and Soren's father is a cross between the worst kind of fundamentalist and the worst kind of prepper. Although their distant home and survivalist training keeps them alive through the start of the zombie apocalypse - here an infection that's present in many Americans asymptomatically before suddenly exploding, driving the infected to infect others at all costs. Their father insists that they'll be safe on their remote homestead, but the twins know that it can't last forever.

Writing Style
There's a brief flashforward at the beginning, just to remind us that we're in a zombie movie. Then it's back to business as normal, with just enough time to get to know people - and hear, through news reports and whispers, how quickly the infection is moving - before the inevitable happens. The following time on the homestead I thought dragged a little, but once they move on things move very quickly.

Personal Connection
I really enjoyed reading this. It's not as heavy and serious as some zombie stories, but there's still plenty of peril and danger to keep things moving. I don't want to spoiler, but a particular societal response to everything I found really interesting and it wasn't something I'd seen before.

Conclusion
Highly recommend. It's aimed at teens but I think adults who like this style would enjoy it as well.

opportunity to read Zombie Apocalypse Running Club by Carrie Mac! This thrilling YA horror is terrifying, heartfelt and of course - filled with zombies!!! 🧟
Full of horror comedy, Carrie Mac explores real world worries in a post apocalyptic world, seamlessly balancing lighthearted sarcasm with serious conversations. Tackling topics such as religious trauma, conspiracy theories, racism, homophobia, loss and sexism while processing deconstruction as the world is turned upside down. Such a great read - especially in today’s climate.

Be kind to your mind 🧠 and please check TW before reading.

Thank you to TBR and Beyond Tours, Carrie Mac & Crown Books for the gifted copy!

A zombie outbreak allows twin teenagers the freedom to run from their stifling religious upbringing and find their places in the queer and scary world. Strong found family vibes, frank depictions of sexual expression, and gut-wrenching scenes of horror bring this YA story to a different level of sophistication. While certainly meant for more mature readers, I think many older teens will really enjoy the realness of this book.

Thank you to NetGalley and TBR&Beyond Book Tours for my copies. These opinions are my own.

3.25 stars

I love zombie books and the title and cover of this one yanked me in. This is a fun take on the zombie apocalypse, with a lot of humor and new friends, plus a ton of queer rep and love.

This is so quick and I enjoyed the main character and her brother getting away from their oppressively religious father and getting to be themselves. I always enjoy a found family element and Racer is pretty adorable. His insistence on recruiting people for the running club was sweet and really made a difference in their survival too!

I thought the story read a bit young and most things came too easily to the group. I would have liked more tense moments and for the characters to work a bit harder before the happy ending.

I voluntarily read and reviewed this book. All opinions are my own. Thank you to Crown Books for Young Readers and NetGalley for the copy.

I liked Eira and Soren as Main Characters and was found then hiding who they really were from their Survivalist Parents was interesting.

I love that Carrie had a character like Racer he really lightened the story and I loved his relationship with the Twins.

I loved the world Carrie built with Zombies and the need to stay alive together. I didn't mind the gore as it was an important part of the story. I was getting at least a 4 star feeling but unfortunately the addition of certain characters towards the end and then the actual ending really pulled me out of the story and so them 4 star feelings disappeared.

For all the above reasons Zombie Apocalypse Running Club receives 3 stars

I was excited when I read the teaser for this story but I had a hard time getting into it once I started reading. It was a slow start for sure. Once the group was on the move and traveling, the pace picked up, but I was very close to DNF'ing this one.

A solid queer-coming-of-age-in-the-zombie-apocalypse novel that was much darker than I expected throughout.

A fun survival YA novel that occurs more or less one year after the zombies started to spread across the world. A suspected biological weapon created by the Russians. The zombies' goal is to bite and spread more of their condition but this is also a great way of pointing out that sometimes people are more dangerous.

The wins Eira and Soren don't just want to get away from the zombies, but also from their father whose values (at any level: social, political, religious, etc) are completely opposite of theirs. They need to improve their stamina and running skills to avoid the zombies, and a friend will help them. In this apocalypse there is still time for love interest and for coming out and strengthening one's identity.

Eira's voice/ point of view is my favorite with humor and a bit of sarcasm. They are skillful with a sword and knives, which is very cool. Some of their father's lessons weren't completely useless when it came to survival.

Thank you author and publisher for the copy.

First up a big thank you to the publishers/TBR and Beyond Tours for allowing me to read this one. I was very excited about this one as it contains zombies and I love those, well, OK, during COVID I wasn't such a fan, but now I am getting back to it. Sadly, the zombie part was great. The running and survival was great. But there was just too many times COVID was mentioned. In the mere span of a few pages we read about COVID, what it was, lockdown, etc. And that is a big no. We just got through that, in some parts it is still going, I DON'T WANT to read about it. I just want to forget about it. Maybe in 50 years I don't mind it that much, but seriously, now? NO. Go away.

I like the character development and the overall journey these characters took to escape in more ways than one. I really liked seeing queer representation especially for characters who grew up with the Bible and church so much at the forefront. Even the idea of the zombie running club was pretty cool. What I think wasn’t working for me was the constant moving around and never really spending time getting to know the new place. I get they are in a zombie apocalypse there were times where the pace just felt too rushed and then times where is was too slow. If you really like zombie apocalypse stories this might be for you.

One might not expect a zombie apocalypse to have a silver lining, but for Eira Helvig, there is. A little over a year previously, a mysterious virus emerged in Russia that spread rapidly around the world, effectively turning anyone infected into zombie-like creatures. Lucky for Eira, her father is a doomsday planner, content in his ability to protect his family from just such a danger. But Eira and her twin brother are both queer; this does not fit into her father’s ideal world, and with the zombie apocalypse comes the unexpected opportunity for the two youth to leave the confines of their rigid home life and embrace their true identities.

With eerie similarities to the COVID pandemic, this novel truly captures the very real sentiments that could appear in the wake of another, more brutal disease. Eira and Soren have had to hide their identities from their hyper-conservative father in order to survive, yet they support one another as they investigate their romantic feelings for others. The danger and intensity of this hidden existence is one that readers can feel through the pages of the book, and they will push for Eira and Soren to find a way to survive not only the outside world but their immediate lives at home, as well.

The narrative jumps through time in some instances, though the progression is more or less linear after the first few chapters. This design permits readers to understand the intensity of the current situation as well as the events that led up to its arrival. With some humor, romance, danger, and heart, this book feels both accessible and real despite its speculative nature. And the possibility of a pandemic like the one described in the pages of this novel often seems disturbingly as though it is more fact than fiction. Fans of LGBTQIA+ characters, the intensity of surviving zombie hoards, and the ubiquitous quest for discovering oneself despite the many challenges found in life, will appreciate the approach and delivery of this novel. It is a good addition to library collections for mature young adult readers.

What would you do in a zombie apocalypse? Would you band together with survivors or would you go at it alone? Would you join the strongest side despite your morals?

The Zombie Apocalypse Running Club explores the answers to those questions. Like a lot of zombie media, we see a group of survivors thrown together while the world turns itself inside out after a zombie outbreak.

The book opens with Soren and Eira attending a Ren Fair with their ultra-conservative parents. The queer twins escape when the zombie virus makes its way to the Yakima Valley in WA State and they ultimately escape. Almost a year later, they find the safety of their parent's 175 acres isn't enough. They want to see what the world offers, even if the world is falling apart. They escape under false pretenses and go into town only to find one survivor: a man named Racer, an athlete in the Special Olympics with Down's Syndrome. Racer recruits them into his running club but soon their club takes them further away from home when Liv, the twins' little sister arrives with bad news: their family farm was taken over by zombies. With a plan of finding Racer's brother Eddie who hasn't returned to town in weeks, they set off into the unknown. Along the way, they meet new friends and danger both alive and dead.

The plot isn't the most unique but it's the characters you grow to love. Racer's Down Syndrome is done with care and I love the way he's treated; he's a great friend and trainer for the twins. The characters, for all their strength and weaknesses, are decently fleshed out.
When you sympathize with the characters, it makes the horror of the zombie-infested world that much more terrifying.

Great writing and fast pacing elevates this book among other YA zombie thrillers. I give this one a solid rating of five stars.

Zombie Apocalypse Running Club, or ZARC for short, has all the hallmarks of any other zombie story: gory, reanimated corpses intent on killing the few remaining humans, the struggle to survive and find edible food, and the conflict between factions of survivors, some of whom are kind and some of whom are cruel. The twist here is the focus on LGBTQ+ characters.

Eira and Soren are home-schooled queer twins who were raised by an ultra-conservative, religious, homesteading father in the Pacific Northwest. They were planning on running away from home before the zombie apocalypse hit, but they didn’t want to abandon their younger sister, Liv. Eventually, Eira and Soren decide to strike out on their own, zombies or no zombies.

As they search for safety, the twins reconnect with family and old friends against all odds and make new ones, but the world is more dangerous than they could have anticipated, even for teens who are skilled survivalists.

Overall, I enjoyed the book. Although the plot was a little predictable, and the ending seemed rushed, I appreciated the representation of diverse characters, especially a cooler than cool transgender cowboy named Cosmo and Racer, a champion Special Olympics runner who coins ZARC and is the best running coach in the apocalypse.

Thank you Netgalley and Random House Children’s for providing me with the ARC.

Zombie Apocalypse Running Club by Carrie Mac isn't your typical zombie apocalypse story. Sure, there are flesh-hungry monsters, but the real heart of the novel lies in its relatable characters and the conflicts that feel all too real, even without the threat of the undead.

Zombie Apocalypse Running Club uses the fantastical premise of a zombie apocalypse to explore the very real struggles of teenagers. The characters are funny, flawed, and easy to connect with. Ultimately, it's a story about facing your fears, embracing life's unexpected opportunities, and finding the courage to be yourself – even in the face of a zombie apocalypse.

This book is a great choice for anyone who enjoys a good coming-of-age story with a twist, or for anyone who needs a reminder that sometimes, the biggest challenges we face aren't the undead, but ourselves.

The cover and blurb/summary for this book are very deceiving. With bright colors and a quirky title, you'd think this would be full of humor or at least some kind of odd mix of humor and real deep life/death stuff. However, that's not what I found in the opening chapters of this story. The heavy religious theme put me off entirely, yet I kept going hoping we'd get past it at some point. The twins were interesting, but they did not act like twins or like siblings at all. The zombies came and I felt nada. I don't know if there's a point where it changes into a more lighthearted, fun, exciting story because I DNF'd at page 50.

Thanks, but it was just not my type of book.

[Netgalley ARC]

This book was great! It was equal parts funny, scary, and sweet, all mixed together. It was so interesting, I loved the plot and story, I thought it was very creative and well executed. I really enjoyed seeing the main character and one of the other characters be able to grow together and form a relationship even through a really rough and scary time, and I especially loved the ending!

This was definitely a unique book. I was definitely hoping to like it more than I did, but it is just not a crossover novel. I did enjoy the characters who are necessary and relevant in the YA world, and the addition of zombies is a bonus.