'Cybernetically enhanced zombie-aliens want to devour the universe and only a crack team of murderous misfits can stop them, in this non-stop action-adventure from InvaderWhen decorated military pilot Shawna Bright is convicted of a heinous crime and incarcerated, she is determined to prove her innocence. However, flying the getaway ship during a prison break wrecks that hope. Forced to land on the terrifying Xeno-ridden planet, PK-L7, Shawna must survive both ravenous alien-zombies and a crew of dangerous criminals. When they discover Xenos with cybernetic implants, Shawna uncovers a deadly plan to wreak havoc across the universe. She must do everything in her power to stop it… even if she goes down in history as one of the bad guys.'
Despite having not played any of the Zombicide games I've come to really love the franchise due completely to the work of the novels. Aconyte Books have produced some fantastic books in these settings, and whilst the regular Zombicide books, and the Black Plague series all follow the same group of survivors and their stories, the Zombicide Invader series gives us something almost completely new each time. This time readers are treated to a daring prison escape from some of the worst of the worst in the galaxy; an escape that leads our colourful cast of characters to an even bigger nightmare.
Death System begins in prison, in one of the worst maximum security prisons in the galaxy. Here we meet a number of the most high profile prisoners, such as Bak-Irp, the bounty hunter turned killer, Nero Lupaster IV, the super rich head of a criminal guild, Shawna Bright, the military pilot who shot down and killed her own unit, and Dr Lemora Pick, a scientist who created a weapon that killed a planet. Nero, who still has a lot of very powerful friends, has been carefully paying off one of the guards, getting him on side, and arranges for a very special package to be snuck into the prison and given to Lemora, another of his people. A package containing a deadly, infectious mould.
During a prisoner transfer that sees a few dozen of the prisons worst placed onto an old and beaten-up ship, Lemora uses the mould in a small explosive she's made, detonating it in the cabin. The mould begins to infect the non-humans on board, transforming them into ravenous zombies. It's in this chaos that Nero and his group stage their escape; an escape in which Shawna finds herself having to fight to survive. However, when the ship lands on a planet filled with more of the deadly zombie creatures the survivors will have to work together to try and make it out alive.
One of the fun things about Death System is that very early on there's almost no one you want to root for. Shawna is made to be sympathetic from the start, as Sidor makes it clear that she believes that she was framed for her crimes, and that she did not murder her team, but other than that there's no one in our group of survivors that deserve to get out alive. This group are some of the worst of the worst characters, mass murderers, psychopaths, and worse, yet as the story progresses you start to like the characters more and more, to the point where you start to feel bad when these very terrible people begin to die.
There are a lot of stories out there that try to make criminals sympathetic, and most of the time I find that they tend to fail. These stories often come across as romanticising crime and brutality, with the creators having to try to make despicable characters into victims of circumstance rather than out and out bad people in order to make them sympathetic. Sidor doesn't try this though, most of the characters are unrepentant, they don't have tragic backstories that justify their heinous acts, and most of them don't even care that they've done bad. Despite this, their personalities are what make them so likable. Lemora is uncaring, she has killed countless people and thought nothing of it, yet I couldn't help but come to like her because of her relationships with the other survivors and they small ways in which she was made quite charming.
Because of the work that Sidor puts into making these characters likable when the killing starts you do actually care when they die, and there are moments that had me letting out audible groans as someone who I was enjoying in a scene just a moment ago is brutally ripped to pieces by the hordes of undead storming the facility our characters are holding up in.
I can't really talk too much more about the story without spoiling too much, as there are so many twists and turns in the book that I wouldn't want to spoil anything for anyone, but if you like sci-fi horror, and have enjoyed the other books in the series this will definitely appeal to you. I had a great time reading it, and by the time the end came I was annoyed that it was over and wanted more. S.A. Sidor has written some of my favourite books with Aconyte, and this absolutely enters that category. Absolutely great fun.
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