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Zombie Makers: True Stories of Nature's Undead
Are zombies real? As far as we know, dead people do not come back to life and start walking around, looking for trouble. But there are things that can take over the bodies and brains of innocent creatures, turning them into senseless slaves. Meet nature's zombie makers―including a fly-enslaving fungus, a suicide worm, and a cockroach-taming wasp―and their victims.
48 pages, Library Binding
First published January 1, 2012
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September 13, 2018
oh my god.
zombies are real, and they are mostly insects. i am not leaving my house, ever. although every summer, there are these tiny little beetles that come and live in my apartment, and i am always really nice to them and set them free out the window, and if they are zombies, i hope to all the higher powers that they will see me as a servant and not a potential zombie-host.
this book is amazing. it is all about the ways in which parasites TAKE OVER the brains of their hosts. which is totally rude, but so freaking cool. some of them are standard: the entomophthora muscae fungus just uses a housefly as an incubator, and takes over the fly's tiny fly brain in order to control its movements to guide it to the most opportune place to kill the fly and EXPLODE its spores out into the atmosphere.
whooosh!
kiddie stuff.
however, paragordius tricuspidatus are way more insidious. they let crickets eat their larvae, and then they hatch inside and start munching on the cricket's insides. pretty standard stuff, for a parasite. but then, they take over the cricket's tiny little brain and make it fling itself into the water, so the little worms can hatch out and swim free like willy. and if the crickets are removed from the water by well-meaning scientists, for science, the infected crickets will just jump back in, even though they are crappy swimmers who have been brain-attacked by killer worms.
this is terrifying.
and also, ew.
i assume my brain is more complex than that of a cricket, but maybe it's not. maybe one day i will find myself flinging myself into some pond somewhere, at the mercy of worms who have been eating my insides for years and are now through with me.
but wait - there's more.
the glyptapanteles wasp.
what a dick. so, a pregnant lady-wasp poops her eggs into a caterpillar with her stinger, right? and the larvae hatch inside and eat the caterpillar up, leaving it alive because they are sadistic. and they hatch on out of there, still leaving the caterpillar alive, although all weak-like. and then they do their little thing where they make little cocoons. but. but.
the caterpillar is still alive. and some of the little larvae stayed inside the caterpillar. AND THEY ARE USING IT LIKE A TANK!! they hang out in there and release chemicals that take over the caterpillar's tiny caterpillar mind, and they guard the cocoons. and if a bugga comes near to investigate the cocoons, the caterpillar, under the control of the stay-at-home larvae, will whap the bugga whooooosh away from the cocoons. and as soon as the cocoons hatch into beautiful wasps, the larvae lose interest in the caterpillar and it dies.
holy hell.
i mean, there is more, but it is all horrifying.
let me leave you with this fact:
according to the center for disease control and prevention, nearly one-quarter of adults and adolescents in the united states are infected with t. gondii. they just don't know it.
now, they say that they don't really understand t. gondii all that well, and people who are "infected" might not be "affected" by its presence, BUT DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT DOES??? IN RATS???
basically, that.
it goes into rat-brains and turns off their fear instinct. and this is probably in you. and me. making you walk down that dark alley or pet that crocodile or watch rock of ages
i mean, just be smart. don't let a protozoan push you around.
and by that, i mean tom cruise.
come to my blog!
zombies are real, and they are mostly insects. i am not leaving my house, ever. although every summer, there are these tiny little beetles that come and live in my apartment, and i am always really nice to them and set them free out the window, and if they are zombies, i hope to all the higher powers that they will see me as a servant and not a potential zombie-host.
this book is amazing. it is all about the ways in which parasites TAKE OVER the brains of their hosts. which is totally rude, but so freaking cool. some of them are standard: the entomophthora muscae fungus just uses a housefly as an incubator, and takes over the fly's tiny fly brain in order to control its movements to guide it to the most opportune place to kill the fly and EXPLODE its spores out into the atmosphere.
whooosh!
kiddie stuff.
however, paragordius tricuspidatus are way more insidious. they let crickets eat their larvae, and then they hatch inside and start munching on the cricket's insides. pretty standard stuff, for a parasite. but then, they take over the cricket's tiny little brain and make it fling itself into the water, so the little worms can hatch out and swim free like willy. and if the crickets are removed from the water by well-meaning scientists, for science, the infected crickets will just jump back in, even though they are crappy swimmers who have been brain-attacked by killer worms.
this is terrifying.
and also, ew.
i assume my brain is more complex than that of a cricket, but maybe it's not. maybe one day i will find myself flinging myself into some pond somewhere, at the mercy of worms who have been eating my insides for years and are now through with me.
but wait - there's more.
the glyptapanteles wasp.
what a dick. so, a pregnant lady-wasp poops her eggs into a caterpillar with her stinger, right? and the larvae hatch inside and eat the caterpillar up, leaving it alive because they are sadistic. and they hatch on out of there, still leaving the caterpillar alive, although all weak-like. and then they do their little thing where they make little cocoons. but. but.
the caterpillar is still alive. and some of the little larvae stayed inside the caterpillar. AND THEY ARE USING IT LIKE A TANK!! they hang out in there and release chemicals that take over the caterpillar's tiny caterpillar mind, and they guard the cocoons. and if a bugga comes near to investigate the cocoons, the caterpillar, under the control of the stay-at-home larvae, will whap the bugga whooooosh away from the cocoons. and as soon as the cocoons hatch into beautiful wasps, the larvae lose interest in the caterpillar and it dies.
holy hell.
i mean, there is more, but it is all horrifying.
let me leave you with this fact:
according to the center for disease control and prevention, nearly one-quarter of adults and adolescents in the united states are infected with t. gondii. they just don't know it.
now, they say that they don't really understand t. gondii all that well, and people who are "infected" might not be "affected" by its presence, BUT DO YOU KNOW WHAT IT DOES??? IN RATS???
basically, that.
it goes into rat-brains and turns off their fear instinct. and this is probably in you. and me. making you walk down that dark alley or pet that crocodile or watch rock of ages
i mean, just be smart. don't let a protozoan push you around.
and by that, i mean tom cruise.
come to my blog!
August 29, 2020
Zombie Makers: True Stories of Nature's Undead by Rebecca L. Johnson is a wickedly cool, zombie nature book for kids! The book describes the scenario and the action of what happens between the creatures involved first. Second, the science part of how the creature is controlled! Fun book. I got the Audible version and its only about a 45 minutes and it seemed to fly by! Great voice. Kids will like this book, middle grade I am guessing but some younger and some older probably would like it too, I sure did and I already knew about these things.
July 10, 2012
I can see giving this to the right kid and scaring the shit bejesus out of him so badly that he'll be in therapy until he's forty just to be able to go into nature ever again. There are funguses and viruses and creepy worms out there just waiting to parasite it up inside of a hosts body and some of these things can even hijack control of the brain and get the host to do some destructive and very out of character actions.
We don't necessarily think of a cricket as being really high on the scale of cognitive volition, they are insects and they do insect things, which from out apex of mammal-dom doesn't look all that sophisticated. (Ok, maybe it does some complex things, but did you ever think of a cricket as sitting around and wondering what it should do, being sad in the face of contemplating all it's 'free-will', or just unable to leap from one leaf to another because it can't think of what it wants to eat tonight. Yeah maybe these aren't the most sophisticated thoughts, but they are thoughts about thoughts, the basis of what we think of as our own cognitive free-will) But with the introduction of the hairworm, Paragordius Tricuspidatus the cricket's sole purpose becomes to jump in water, never mind that crickets can't swim and they instinctively avoid water. What does something like this mean for the concepts of free will? Obviously a cricket that can't swim isn't going to intentionally throw itself in water, that kind of behavior would have been easily bred out of the gene pool by evolution a long time ago. But Paragordius Tricuspidatus doesn't infect us, and make us want to drown ourselves in order for the little hairworm (well not really that little in comparison to the size of a cricket, the little (opps I almost said a dirty word, and this is a kid's book review, I'm going to be good) worm is actually three feet long!
But what about the single cell parasite Toxoplasma Gondii that lowers the fear instinct in rats to such a degree that they actually seek out and want to be around their natural predator, the house cat? Apparently 25% of all people are infected with this little zombie-maker, and it does little to humans, but isn't in conceivable that with some good old evolution T. gondii could find a use for us, all it would take is some strain of it to have a marked success at doing something that would increase it's chances of survival and we could be throwing ourselves into lion cages or something, right? Ok, that is facetious. But still it's a little chilling what a tiny microbe can do to so called free-will.
Karen wrote a review with some great visuals of some of the different zombie parasites out there just waiting to take control of unsuspecting hosts. You can read her review here if you haven't already, of just go back and read it again and be creeped out by the picture of the mice hanging out on a cat's face.
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
If you've read The Book of Dangerous Animals this book will give you even more reasons to never venture outside again, and maybe even not want to let things into your house (T. gondii is out to get you! You are possibly already infected from eating undercooked meat, eating unwashed vegetables or changing your cat's litter box). If you haven't read the other book you should just so you can realize the full extent of the dangers nature has waiting for you. And then read this childrens book when it is released this fall.
Shameless plug (I mean, reference for this review: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...)
We don't necessarily think of a cricket as being really high on the scale of cognitive volition, they are insects and they do insect things, which from out apex of mammal-dom doesn't look all that sophisticated. (Ok, maybe it does some complex things, but did you ever think of a cricket as sitting around and wondering what it should do, being sad in the face of contemplating all it's 'free-will', or just unable to leap from one leaf to another because it can't think of what it wants to eat tonight. Yeah maybe these aren't the most sophisticated thoughts, but they are thoughts about thoughts, the basis of what we think of as our own cognitive free-will) But with the introduction of the hairworm, Paragordius Tricuspidatus the cricket's sole purpose becomes to jump in water, never mind that crickets can't swim and they instinctively avoid water. What does something like this mean for the concepts of free will? Obviously a cricket that can't swim isn't going to intentionally throw itself in water, that kind of behavior would have been easily bred out of the gene pool by evolution a long time ago. But Paragordius Tricuspidatus doesn't infect us, and make us want to drown ourselves in order for the little hairworm (well not really that little in comparison to the size of a cricket, the little (opps I almost said a dirty word, and this is a kid's book review, I'm going to be good) worm is actually three feet long!
But what about the single cell parasite Toxoplasma Gondii that lowers the fear instinct in rats to such a degree that they actually seek out and want to be around their natural predator, the house cat? Apparently 25% of all people are infected with this little zombie-maker, and it does little to humans, but isn't in conceivable that with some good old evolution T. gondii could find a use for us, all it would take is some strain of it to have a marked success at doing something that would increase it's chances of survival and we could be throwing ourselves into lion cages or something, right? Ok, that is facetious. But still it's a little chilling what a tiny microbe can do to so called free-will.
Karen wrote a review with some great visuals of some of the different zombie parasites out there just waiting to take control of unsuspecting hosts. You can read her review here if you haven't already, of just go back and read it again and be creeped out by the picture of the mice hanging out on a cat's face.
http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...
If you've read The Book of Dangerous Animals this book will give you even more reasons to never venture outside again, and maybe even not want to let things into your house (T. gondii is out to get you! You are possibly already infected from eating undercooked meat, eating unwashed vegetables or changing your cat's litter box). If you haven't read the other book you should just so you can realize the full extent of the dangers nature has waiting for you. And then read this childrens book when it is released this fall.
Shameless plug (I mean, reference for this review: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...)
June 13, 2020
I have an irrational fear of zombies. It's irrational because they don't exist. After reading this I now have a rational fear of zombies. Why did I read this! Whhhhhhhhy!
June 20, 2020
I didn't really like it, but I don't think the book's rating should be dinged because the stories grossed me out! I read this for a grad school class, and while I'm all about zombies, I found out that that does not include BUG zombies!! Even READING about a zombie cockroach made my skin crawl. Me, who can watch zombies munching on people or getting their skulls split open on The Walking Dead with complete sangfroid! Anyway, this is a great book for kids who are into insects or creepy nature stories. Presents the scenarios very engagingly before explaining the science behind them. Now I just have to try to get those creepy-crawly zombies out of my head before I try to sleep tonight!
February 16, 2013
Review originally featured on Bookluvrs Haven.
I sometimes joke that I am a 6 year old boy living in an adult woman's body. And it could not be more true than when I started reading this book.
Absolutely loved it! It was icky. It was gross. It was graphic and fascinating. And it had A TON of pictures!
At about 60 pages long, this book gives you an insight into the weird and really fascinating world of real life zombie makers. From fungi, to insects, to parasitic worms, this book will leave your very own internal 6 year old self cringing and yelling "Cool!!!" at every turn of the page.
I actually read this book back to back TWICE! And brought it to work with me at the office, and showed some of the pics to a couple of the guys at work during our lunch..... Who also thought the pics were totally cool. And proceeded to google it and found more gross pictures of some of these things for us to gawk at. It was almost like being in grade 1 all over again. Pretty awesome!
I sometimes joke that I am a 6 year old boy living in an adult woman's body. And it could not be more true than when I started reading this book.
Absolutely loved it! It was icky. It was gross. It was graphic and fascinating. And it had A TON of pictures!
At about 60 pages long, this book gives you an insight into the weird and really fascinating world of real life zombie makers. From fungi, to insects, to parasitic worms, this book will leave your very own internal 6 year old self cringing and yelling "Cool!!!" at every turn of the page.
I actually read this book back to back TWICE! And brought it to work with me at the office, and showed some of the pics to a couple of the guys at work during our lunch..... Who also thought the pics were totally cool. And proceeded to google it and found more gross pictures of some of these things for us to gawk at. It was almost like being in grade 1 all over again. Pretty awesome!
September 15, 2012
There's this podcast I like to listen to called RadioLab, which is essentially just a show for people who like kooky science but are still a little foggy on what exactly Einstein's Theory of Relativity actually means or why the sun is hot. Science for the English majors, let's call it. Often the show will come up with really original stories, like the guy who purposefully gave himself tapeworms to cure his asthma (it worked). That story came from a show about parasites and it was accompanied by these strange unnerving stories about insects and viruses and worms that could turn their hosts into . . . well . . . zombies, basically. And though I am a children's librarian, the thought never occurred to me that these stories could, combined with others of the same ilk, create the world's most awesome work of nonfiction. Fortunately for all of us, Rebecca L. Johnson has not my shortsightedness. In Zombie Makers: True Stories of Nature's Undead you will meet a whole range of horrifying creatures. It is, without a doubt, probably the grossest book for kids I've ever read. And boy howdy let me tell you I have read a LOT Of gross books in my day.
What do you think of when you think of zombies? Do you think of lurching undead ready to feast on your braaaaaains? Or do you think of something a little more insidious like the REASON those zombies don't seem to have a lot of will of their own? As it happens, zombies are real. Not in the corpse-walker sense, necessarily, but in nature there are plenty of creatures willing to make others into their mindless slaves. Meet the hairworm Paragordius Triscuspidatus, which can convince a perfectly healthy cricket to drown itself. Or Toxoplasma Gondii which, aside from being the reason you're not supposed to let pregnant women near cat poop, turns rats into suicidal kitty lovers. Page by page author Rebecca Johnson presents us with examples of evolution gone amuck. Zombie makers exist, it's true, and as their hosts we'd better learn as much as we can about them before they get to us next!
Zombies actually get a lot of play in children's literature these days. Insofar as I can tell there are two ways to play them. They can't be romantic like vampires or other members of the monster family so they must either be funny or horrifying. Funny is the route that I'd say 85% of kids' books about zombies go. Whether you're talking about Zombiekins or The Zombie Chasers or Undead Ed or any of the other books out there, funny is usually the way to go. I say that, but a lot of what kids want when they enter a library is to be scared. And if you can scare them with real stuff, and maybe even gross them out a little, you are gold, my friend. That's why this book works as well as it does.
Johnson cleverly sets up the book so that readers can compare and contrast what they know about zombies, zombie talking points let's say, with these zombie-esque diseases, parasites, and insects. I'd never really thought about Old Yeller as a zombie story, but that's what it is, isn't it? A beloved member of the family is bitten by something evil and suddenly the boy who loves it most must put it down before something worse happens. That's a zombie plot, but it's Johnson who makes you realize that rabies is just another form of zombie fun. By couching her nonfiction tale within popular zombie fiction tropes, she has an easy in with the child readership.
The writing is superb in and of itself, no doubt, but I wonder if interest in this book would be quite so high if it were not for the accompanying disquieting photographs. The book as an object is beautifully designed from start to finish, which only helps to highlight the photographs found inside.
What I really liked about the photos was that they had two different ways of freaking the average reader out. On the one hand you have the photos that go for the immediate ARGGGG! reaction. I am thinking specifically of the worm. The worm that infects human beings. That makes them want to plunge themselves into the water where it breaks out of the skin and leaves the body. Alien much? The image of someone slowly and painfully removing the worm without water is enough to make you lose your lunch. But even better are the photos that elicit a slow dawning sense of horror. The fungus O. unilateralis is a clever beastie, and its greatest trick is in forcing ants to clamp onto leafs and die (but only where the temperature is just right). There's a shot of a dead ant with a long horrible reproductive stalk emerging out of its head, spreading its spores to other innocent ants. It's a quiet photo and lacks the urgency and pain of the leg worm shot, but it's worse somehow. It has this brooding malice to it. You actually do not want to touch the page in the book for fear of somehow touching the fungus. That's how effective it is.
Children's librarians often try to lure kids into reading nonfiction by doing what we call booktalks. If you're a good booktalker you can get your audience to fight over even the dullest looking book. Some books, however, sell themselves. Hold up this book and there's not a child alive who won't be instantly fascinated. Describe even one of the stories inside and you might have at last found the book they want even more than the latest edition of Guinness World Records. Informative even as it makes you want to go hide in a clean, sanitized hole somewhere, Johnson has created a clever little book that is bound to keep adult and child readers who find it, enthralled. Ick. Bleach. Awesome.
For ages 9 and up.
What do you think of when you think of zombies? Do you think of lurching undead ready to feast on your braaaaaains? Or do you think of something a little more insidious like the REASON those zombies don't seem to have a lot of will of their own? As it happens, zombies are real. Not in the corpse-walker sense, necessarily, but in nature there are plenty of creatures willing to make others into their mindless slaves. Meet the hairworm Paragordius Triscuspidatus, which can convince a perfectly healthy cricket to drown itself. Or Toxoplasma Gondii which, aside from being the reason you're not supposed to let pregnant women near cat poop, turns rats into suicidal kitty lovers. Page by page author Rebecca Johnson presents us with examples of evolution gone amuck. Zombie makers exist, it's true, and as their hosts we'd better learn as much as we can about them before they get to us next!
Zombies actually get a lot of play in children's literature these days. Insofar as I can tell there are two ways to play them. They can't be romantic like vampires or other members of the monster family so they must either be funny or horrifying. Funny is the route that I'd say 85% of kids' books about zombies go. Whether you're talking about Zombiekins or The Zombie Chasers or Undead Ed or any of the other books out there, funny is usually the way to go. I say that, but a lot of what kids want when they enter a library is to be scared. And if you can scare them with real stuff, and maybe even gross them out a little, you are gold, my friend. That's why this book works as well as it does.
Johnson cleverly sets up the book so that readers can compare and contrast what they know about zombies, zombie talking points let's say, with these zombie-esque diseases, parasites, and insects. I'd never really thought about Old Yeller as a zombie story, but that's what it is, isn't it? A beloved member of the family is bitten by something evil and suddenly the boy who loves it most must put it down before something worse happens. That's a zombie plot, but it's Johnson who makes you realize that rabies is just another form of zombie fun. By couching her nonfiction tale within popular zombie fiction tropes, she has an easy in with the child readership.
The writing is superb in and of itself, no doubt, but I wonder if interest in this book would be quite so high if it were not for the accompanying disquieting photographs. The book as an object is beautifully designed from start to finish, which only helps to highlight the photographs found inside.
What I really liked about the photos was that they had two different ways of freaking the average reader out. On the one hand you have the photos that go for the immediate ARGGGG! reaction. I am thinking specifically of the worm. The worm that infects human beings. That makes them want to plunge themselves into the water where it breaks out of the skin and leaves the body. Alien much? The image of someone slowly and painfully removing the worm without water is enough to make you lose your lunch. But even better are the photos that elicit a slow dawning sense of horror. The fungus O. unilateralis is a clever beastie, and its greatest trick is in forcing ants to clamp onto leafs and die (but only where the temperature is just right). There's a shot of a dead ant with a long horrible reproductive stalk emerging out of its head, spreading its spores to other innocent ants. It's a quiet photo and lacks the urgency and pain of the leg worm shot, but it's worse somehow. It has this brooding malice to it. You actually do not want to touch the page in the book for fear of somehow touching the fungus. That's how effective it is.
Children's librarians often try to lure kids into reading nonfiction by doing what we call booktalks. If you're a good booktalker you can get your audience to fight over even the dullest looking book. Some books, however, sell themselves. Hold up this book and there's not a child alive who won't be instantly fascinated. Describe even one of the stories inside and you might have at last found the book they want even more than the latest edition of Guinness World Records. Informative even as it makes you want to go hide in a clean, sanitized hole somewhere, Johnson has created a clever little book that is bound to keep adult and child readers who find it, enthralled. Ick. Bleach. Awesome.
For ages 9 and up.
July 11, 2013
More reviews at Mrs. ReaderPants.
REVIEW: Interesting with plenty of the "ewww" factor, Zombie Makers will be a hit with reluctant readers, science geeks, or those who just love to be grossed out. Each chapter includes pages packed with full-color close-ups (using photomicroscopy) of insects, fungi, worms, viruses, and other parasites that prey on their unfortunate hosts.
For me, the chapter on parasitic worms (chapter 2) is particularly disgusting and make me really want to avoid drinking any water in Africa, where 3-foot long guinea worms wait for some poor soul to drink water containing water fleas, which host the guinea worms. The photo on p. 20 shows a human leg with a partially extracted guinea worm hanging out of it. The worms are considered "zombie-making" because the sore the worm creates in its victim's leg makes the victim want to jump into a lake or river, where the female guinea worm will exit the host's body and release millions of her larvae into the water. The larvae are eaten by the water fleas, and the cycle continues. Aye carumba, these things are creative!
Other zombie-making parasites include two different wasps that inject their eggs into live bugs and caterpillars, rabies virus multiplying inside the saliva of mammals, a suicide worm that makes crickets jump into water and drown, and a parasite passed between cats and rats that can be passed to humans. Each different parasite's section contains the "science behind the story", a short paragraph or two that explain scientific studies on the parasite including how scientists discovered it and what we can do to prevent human infection.
Zombie Makers includes an introduction tying the bugs to the zombies of modern movies and books as well as an Afterword that discusses the evolution of parasites and how they have adapted to ensure the survival of offspring. Each of the five chapters begins with a "Zombie Trait" such as "Stares vacantly ahead! Moves slowly and mechanically. Behaves oddly," (chapter 1), which further relates the book's subject matter to modern depictions of zombies. There is a Table of Contents, Author's Note, Glossary, Source Notes, Bibliography, More to Explore, an Index, and Photo Acknowledgments.
Of note, the More to Explore section includes links and descriptions to websites and videos. I included one of the videos killer fungi below. It's only three minutes, but it is a must-see. Show this video to students, and this book will be checked out constantly.
As an aside, while I was writing this review, a fly landed on my bare foot. I nearly jumped out of my skin!
THE BOTTOM LINE: Amazing, disgusting, and utterly fascinating, Zombie Makers is a MUST in any library. Sensitive readers who are easily grossed-out might not be the best audience for this book, but many will absolutely devour it.
STATUS IN MY LIBRARY: On order. I cannot wait to talk this one up with my students!
READALIKES: Belly-Busting Worm Invasions!: Parasites That Love Your Insides! (Tilden)
Presentation & layout: 5/5--plenty of white space, every photo includes a short caption, lots of boxes to draw the eye to certain information, headings and subheadings stand out in a much larger, dark red font.
Quality of information: 5/5--Except for the rabies virus, I had not previously heard of any of these parasites. Scientific information is presented in a conversational tone, which will really help to draw in reluctant readers. It's hard not to keep reading this one.
Photos/illustrations: 5/5--LOTS of large, full-color photos! Every single page has at least one large photo, and many have multiple photos. Captions effectively describe each photo and will draw even the most casual reader to the main text on the page.
Documentation of sources: 5/5--More than one full page of bibliographic sources, plus a fantastic "More to Explore" section referencing short videos and other books for further reading. I plan to use the books in this section when I order books for my library.
Front and back matter: 5/5--Includes TOC, introduction, afterword, glossary, author's note, source notes, photo acknowledgments, and index. I would like to have seen a map of where these parasites are found included in each section. Want to avoid these things as much as possible!!!!
Engrossing: 5/5--Oh yeah, I could not stop turning the pages. I even went back to previous sections after I finished just to look at them again.
Writing: 5/5--Conversational tone is easy to understand and draws readers in. This is addicting reading!
Appeal to teens: 5/5--Once I talk this book up with a few classes (and show the video below), I doubt I will see this book for the rest of the school year. Seriously cool stuff here!
Appropriate length: 5/5--Interesting, colorful, and superbly done.
THE BOTTOM LINE: A must for middle school libraries. Upper-elementary is also a possibility for students who won't get freaked out by the concept.
STATUS IN MY LIBRARY: On order.
READALIKES: Belly-Busting Worm Invasions!: Parasites That Love Your Insides! (Tilden)
CONTENT:
Language: none
Sexuality: none
Violence: mild; parasite concept may frighten sensitive readers
Drugs/Alcohol: none
Other: high gross-out factor
September 15, 2020
Really short.
July 5, 2012
Zombies aren't real...as far as we know...but there are things in nature that can take over innocent creatures' bodies & brians. This non-fiction book looks at these "zombie making" parasites in excellent depth. In each chapter, the author shares about several different species, ending with the "science behind the story". Includes lots of photographs and detailed biblography, websites, and book lists for further reading.
March 8, 2013
Yikes! I'm glad I didn't read this book after lunch, or I might have lost it. As it was, I pretty much lost my appetite for lunch and have crossed several travel destinations off my list and am feeling leery about water...
Eye-catching from it's title through its design and containing lots of full-color photographs of the parasites and their host victims in action, this one will be irresistible.
Eye-catching from it's title through its design and containing lots of full-color photographs of the parasites and their host victims in action, this one will be irresistible.
October 29, 2013
Oh my goodness. Soooo creeeeeepy! Do not read this book if you are slightly squeamish. Do read this book if you want to be weirded out by the unfathomable variety of life on our planet that we are only beginning to comprehend.
January 5, 2013
fantastic - all my students will love this book
October 5, 2012
REALLY well-researched, REALLY ooky stories. Mostly invertebrates, but the guinea worm in the human leg is a picture I won't be able to forget any time soon. Will be read to pieces.
January 26, 2021
The whole idea of zombies is pretty sinister. They are dead people who have purportedly come back to life. Their minds are gone. Their bodies are decaying. They spend a lot of time shuffling around with their arms outstretched.
Aided by vivid colour photographs, Rebecca L. Johnson’s book presents a collection of fungi, worms, viruses, and wasps that occupy bodies and take over the brains of their victims.
A person usually becomes “zombified” after being bitten by a zombie or touching its blood. It’s not always clear what passes from zombie to victim to make this happen. Some sort of infection. Maybe a virus, perhaps an alien life-form.
These zombie makers are not for the faint of heart. The author introduces worms that cause crickets to take their own lives and wasps that turn cockroaches into repositories for their larvae. That something is a fungus scientists call entomophthora muscae (ent-uh-MAHf-thor-uh MuSk-eye), or e. muscae for short. e. muscae is a parasite. Parasites invade the bodies of other living things.
Those living things become the parasites’ hosts. flies are the hosts of the e. muscae fungus. When the fungus invades, it turns normal flies into zombies.
Each chapter introduces an organism, explains its life cycle, describes how it attacks its host, and ends with a section called “The Science behind the Story.”
In a literary environment inhabited by so many books about zombies, it is good to see one that grasps the interests of readers with solid scientific research.
Aided by vivid colour photographs, Rebecca L. Johnson’s book presents a collection of fungi, worms, viruses, and wasps that occupy bodies and take over the brains of their victims.
A person usually becomes “zombified” after being bitten by a zombie or touching its blood. It’s not always clear what passes from zombie to victim to make this happen. Some sort of infection. Maybe a virus, perhaps an alien life-form.
These zombie makers are not for the faint of heart. The author introduces worms that cause crickets to take their own lives and wasps that turn cockroaches into repositories for their larvae. That something is a fungus scientists call entomophthora muscae (ent-uh-MAHf-thor-uh MuSk-eye), or e. muscae for short. e. muscae is a parasite. Parasites invade the bodies of other living things.
Those living things become the parasites’ hosts. flies are the hosts of the e. muscae fungus. When the fungus invades, it turns normal flies into zombies.
Each chapter introduces an organism, explains its life cycle, describes how it attacks its host, and ends with a section called “The Science behind the Story.”
In a literary environment inhabited by so many books about zombies, it is good to see one that grasps the interests of readers with solid scientific research.
August 2, 2021
nothing i didnt already now BUT i am totally grateful for the wonderous reminder of how fucking creepy life is. parasites, worms and microbes. creepy, specifically designed and much smaller than us. i think its hysterical that someone wrote a legit science zombie book for kids, way to get them started early. i learned about the books main characters in 3-400 level microbiology courses as an undergraduate and have been significantly paranoid ever since, dont read this if youre squeamish or a germaphobe, this book isnt the book youre looking for.
August 13, 2021
Are zombies real? As far as we know, dead people do not come back to life and start walking around, looking for trouble. But there are things that can take over the bodies and brains of innocent creatures, turning them into senseless slaves. Meet nature's zombie makers—including a fly-enslaving fungus, a suicide worm, and a cockroach-taming wasp—and their victims.
Heather's Notes
So this book was shorter than I thought it would be. Still the information in it was interesting if a bit morbid. I should probably be glad it wasn't any longer.
Heather's Notes
So this book was shorter than I thought it would be. Still the information in it was interesting if a bit morbid. I should probably be glad it wasn't any longer.
August 11, 2017
Not for the faint-hearted, this book features insects, parasites, and worms that cause their hosts to become zombies. The photography is excellent but there is one photo of a roundworm in a human leg that might cause nightmares so proceed with caution. I found this on a list of "books best for nine-year olds" but I am not sure I would buy this as a present for any child in fear of traumatizing them. As a non-fiction book, it is fascinating and easy to read.
June 6, 2021
That was fascinatingly creepy! And, of course, the last zombie maker parasite actually infects about one in four humans. Lovely. I doubt I have it, though, based on its description. ;)
I think this is a fantastic non-fiction book. It’s a bit long for a one session read aloud, but could be part of reading and science to get it all done in one day. I think a group of students would really be into this one.
I think this is a fantastic non-fiction book. It’s a bit long for a one session read aloud, but could be part of reading and science to get it all done in one day. I think a group of students would really be into this one.
November 6, 2020
Nothing comes out of nothing, there is always some background for everything to emerge.
We all know popular zombies from modern movies or series in TV and books, yet we consider it to be common sense that they aren't real. Now along comes this book to tell me they are very real and considering the capabilities of some of these parasites I wouldn't be surprised at all that they can control humans just as well, they'd just need to multiply with bigger force when already inside us.
Either way, the things you learn from this book really make you look at the life around you with new eyes. Beware! And be glad you ain't one of those poor usual victims...
We all know popular zombies from modern movies or series in TV and books, yet we consider it to be common sense that they aren't real. Now along comes this book to tell me they are very real and considering the capabilities of some of these parasites I wouldn't be surprised at all that they can control humans just as well, they'd just need to multiply with bigger force when already inside us.
Either way, the things you learn from this book really make you look at the life around you with new eyes. Beware! And be glad you ain't one of those poor usual victims...
February 13, 2021
Really short. This is a nonfiction book on zombie creatures so expected. Just nothing that separates this book from any other. The intro was quite nice, I thoroughly enjoyed how they worded it. I was already aware that some of these creatures exist but, to the unknowing person I assume this book would be nice and quick to inform you on these zombie like creatures.
April 23, 2020
Genre: Informational Nonfiction
Grade Level: Middle Grades
This book was...not exactly my cup of tea, however, I think it was filled with a lot of interesting facts and knowledge! Since I have had mostly "girly" books on my bookshelf, I felt as though this book would help shake things up a bit in my reading habits. I did learn a lot about bugs...especially a fungus that gets inside flys after they are dead.
Grade Level: Middle Grades
This book was...not exactly my cup of tea, however, I think it was filled with a lot of interesting facts and knowledge! Since I have had mostly "girly" books on my bookshelf, I felt as though this book would help shake things up a bit in my reading habits. I did learn a lot about bugs...especially a fungus that gets inside flys after they are dead.
June 6, 2020
This was a student favorite when I was teaching 4th and 5th grade. Those kids could not get enough of this book! I would often read aloud and then they would reread sections during silent reading time. Often a group of them would gather around this book on the classroom rug and read together.
September 28, 2020
This is scary! I’m not sure I love nature, specially insects any more.
Perfect book for Halloween, I’m going to dress up as wasp next time... really really creepy.
Definitely not a book for little kids.
Perfect book for Halloween, I’m going to dress up as wasp next time... really really creepy.
Definitely not a book for little kids.
July 9, 2023
Wish it was longer 😅
Good, borrowed it not knowing it was moreso aimed towards younger readers. But it was a nice book jist wish it was longer. Wish there was more details about many of the parasites. Especially the effect of T. Gondii on people.
Good, borrowed it not knowing it was moreso aimed towards younger readers. But it was a nice book jist wish it was longer. Wish there was more details about many of the parasites. Especially the effect of T. Gondii on people.
July 2, 2020
For Juvenile audience but this old guy enjoyed the book; found it interesting and informative. Was not aware of nature's Zombie makers.
July 16, 2020
Scary stuff
February 7, 2021
These stories have opened my eyes.
June 13, 2021
Loved the info but the audiobook was a little choppy.
December 27, 2023
Real zombie. Pest that take over their host. Little information on how they take over and what they do when they do. Which most of the time it is to reproduce
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