4 stars

So I went into this book expecting it to basically be a high school book with zombies in it, but it turned out to be much more.Yes, it takes place in high school and there are zombies, or differently biotic, but this book really delves deeper than that. It goes into the political and philosophical conflicts surrounding discrimination. Waters perfectly reflects real world discrimination and applies it to the paranormal theme of zombies. It was amazing. With such concepts as passing, redefining derogatory terms, violent opposition, capitalizing on a movement, and couples from different groups, Waters raises some really interesting points on how we think of the people around us.While the plot was simple and a bit slow, I really enjoyed how Waters pulled from various groups such as the Civil Rights Movement, perfectly personifying the philosophical differences in Martin Luther King Jr versus Malcolm X. The characters were well-developed and even the zombies were three-dimensional and easy to like. I really was not expecting to like this book as much as I did, but the discussions of discrimination were actually very intelligent and interesting to read. A very “smart” book with enough plot to keep it interesting.