It all starts with a single dead person coming back to life. Within three days, the undead have taken over most of town. Despite heroic efforts and swift initiatives from the government, disaster keeps spiraling. Soon, the infection reaches the nation's borders, threatening to become a worldwide pandemic.

It spread fast - no time to understand it - let alone learn how to fight it. Once it reached you, it was too late. All you could do is run. Rumored safe zones and potential for a cure drifted across the populace, forcing tough decisions to be made. They say only the strong survive. Well, they forgot about the smart, the inventive, and the lucky.

Zabat's Comet promises a stunning astronomical display as it narrowly passes our planet. Then a solar flare nudges it hurtling toward Earth. Humanity crumbles during the countdown to doomsday. But Zabat is more than just a comet. The impact brings not swift extinction but a massive cloud of dust that appears to have a mind of its own. A sinister intelligence. A force that threatens to change what's left of humanity. Jack, Colleen, Lara, and Dan survived the violent chaos of the countdown. Now, they're about to find out that after doomsday, there are horrors even worse than death.

In a steel-and-lead-encased bunker 20 feet below the basement level of his house, a soldier waits for his final orders. On the surface, a plague ravages the planet, infecting over 90% of the populace. The bacterium burrows through the brain, destroying all signs of humanity and leaving behind little more than base, prehistoric instincts. The infected turn into hyper-aggressive predators, with an insatiable desire to kill and feed. Someday soon, the soldier will have to open the hatch to his bunker, and step out into this new wasteland, to complete his mission....

John Eric Carver and Shrek are a retired Navy SEAL war dog team, now living in the mountains outside of San Diego. Both man and dog thought their life was now settled, finding peace on the 40-acre ranch they had moved to. But life, and a mutated virus, changed all that.

The end begins with a viral outbreak unlike anything mankind has ever encountered before. The infected are subject to delirium, fever, a dramatic increase in violent behavior, and a one-hundred percent mortality rate. Death. But it doesn't end there. The victims return from death to walk the earth. When a massive military operation fails to contain the plague of the living dead it escalates into a global pandemic.

Four individuals fight to survive as the zombie apocalypse crashes over the world in a wave of terror and destruction. Color, creed, and social standing mean nothing as the virus infects millions across the planet. All four begin perilous journeys in mind and body as they face daily trials to survive: Four threads, four different parts of the world, one apocalypse!

Hordes of gnashing, chipped-tooth mouths and grabby hands...anticipating Halloween treats. This time they aren't wearing masks. This time...you are the treat. And they. Are. Hungry.

A mysterious incident in Russia, a blip buried in the news - it’s the only warning humanity receives that civilization will soon be destroyed by a single, voracious virus that creates monsters of men. A lawyer, still grieving over the death of his young wife, begins to write as a form of therapy. But he never expected that his anonymous blog and journal would ultimately record humanity’s last days. Governments scramble to stop the zombie virus, people panic, so-called Safe Havens are established, the world erupts into chaos; soon it’s every man, woman, and child for themselves.

Creatures that once lived in the shadows, hidden from humankind, have risen, spreading like a plague across the globe over the course of a single night. Their numbers growing exponentially through infection, these seemingly unkillable creatures have swallowed up whole cities and collapsed unprepared governments. Survivors call it The Purge.

In a world where a virus has spread turning most of the population into flesh-eating monsters, there are two friends partying it up in New Orleans when the infection hits. Far away from home, they are trapped and trying to make sense of all that has happened with the help of new friends and enemies along the way. Zombies aren't the only thing to fear.

Life isn’t kind to Lance York. A full-time job has eluded him for years, his wife loathes the sight of him, his bank accounts are empty, and his wealthy father-in-law revels in his failures. After he lunges in front of a car to save a sick and disoriented woman, Lance awakens in a quarantined hospital. A devastating plague is spreading worldwide, driving those infected with it insane. Their bodies begin to mutate into horrors that have haunted mankind’s nightmares for centuries. The world descends into chaos as the infected flee to the shadows, emerging at night to devour the remnants of civilization. With the help of an unlikely ally, Lance must navigate through the collapsing city of Pittsburgh, striving to escape the madness of the apocalypse that unfolds around them.

Steve Hobart is just a regular guy, his world is tipped on its side as the dead began to walk. He slowly gathers a group of other survivors and, together, they brave the horrors of a Dead world. Every choice seems to yield as many consequences as it does rewards. He struggles with decisions made as well as opportunities lost as he finds himself in the unlikely role of leader. With a group that includes an Army doctor, a five-year-old Hispanic girl, a convicted murderer, and a teen girl who seems far better equipped to deal with the situation....

Blake was never one for taking chances. He lived in a world of formulas and equations. A statistician in a controlled society where everything had become predictably mundane. That world disappeared the day the dead got up and began attacking the living. Now, the end is here. Blake finds himself fighting for his life in a world that is rapidly spiraling out of control. He struggles to keep himself alive and must risk everything to find his family.

When special operations veteran DJ Markis finds armed invaders in his home and it all goes sideways, he turns to his brothers in arms to fight back. On the run from the shadowy Company, soon he finds himself in a war for possession of a genetic engineering secret that threatens the stability of the world. But who is behind it all - and are they even human?

Zombies are real. And we made them. Are you prepared for the zombie apocalypse? The Smith family is, with the help of a few marines. When an airborne "zombie" plague is released, bringing civilization to a grinding halt, the Smith family, Steven, Stacey, Sophia, and Faith, take to the Atlantic to avoid the chaos. The plan is to find a safe haven from the anarchy of infected humanity. What they discover, instead, is a sea composed of the tears of survivors and a passion for bringing hope.

In a steel-and-lead-encased bunker 20 feet below the basement level of his house, a soldier waits for his final orders. On the surface, a plague ravages the planet, infecting over 90% of the populace. The bacterium burrows through the brain, destroying all signs of humanity and leaving behind little more than base, prehistoric instincts. The infected turn into hyper-aggressive predators, with an insatiable desire to kill and feed. Someday soon, the soldier will have to open the hatch to his bunker, and step out into this new wasteland, to complete his mission....

The end begins with a viral outbreak unlike anything mankind has ever encountered before. The infected are subject to delirium, fever, a dramatic increase in violent behavior, and a one-hundred percent mortality rate. Death. But it doesn't end there. The victims return from death to walk the earth. When a massive military operation fails to contain the plague of the living dead it escalates into a global pandemic.

John is a killer, but that wasn't his day job before the Apocalypse. In a harrowing 900-mile race against time to get to his wife just as the dead begin to rise, John, a businessman trapped in New York, soon learns that the zombies are the least of his worries, as he sees firsthand the horror of what man is capable of with no rules, no consequences, and death at every turn. Teaming up with an ex-army pilot named Kyle, they escape New York only to stumble across a man who says that he has the key to a rumored underground stronghold called Avalon....

The Superpox-99 virus has wiped out nearly the entire human race. Governments have collapsed. Cities have become graveyards filled with unspeakable horror. People have resorted to scavenging from the dead, or taking from the living. The entire industrialized world has become a wasteland of abandoned cars, decaying bodies, and feral animals. To stay alive, U.S. Deputy Marshal Mason Raines must forage for food, water, and gasoline while outgunning those who seek to take advantage of the apocalyptic anarchy. Together with his giant Irish wolfhound, Bowie, he aligns with survivors of the town of Boone in a life and death struggle against a gang of violent criminals. With each deadly encounter, Mason is force to accept his place as one of the nation's few remaining lawmen. In a world now populated by escaped convicts, paranoid mutants, and government hit squads, his only hope to save the townspeople is to enforce his own brand of frontier justice.

In this fast-paced survival story set in Hawaii, electronics fail worldwide, the islands become completely isolated, and a strange starscape fills the sky. Leilani and her father embark on a nightmare odyssey from Oahu to their home on the Big Island. Leilani's epilepsy holds a clue to the disaster, if only they can survive as the islands revert to earlier ways.

Cities all around the world reported strange alien vessels descending. Some saw them as the heralds of a new age; others fired everything they had at them. All were taken as the beams lashed down and drew them into the sky. Dean was left behind, seemingly the last man on Earth. A trail of clues left by his dead wife guides Dean on a perilous journey across America and beyond to learn the truth behind the mysterious ships and save humanity from its doom.

Edgar Award nominee Victor Gischler “specializes in morbid humor, dark sarcasm, and comic noir, complete with violence and mayhem” ( Library Journal). Go-Go Girls of the Apocalypse picks up 10 years after the end of the world. Former insurance salesman Mortimer Tate leaves his secluded cabin and discovers a desolate landscape complete with cowboys, bandits, and cannibals, where the only traces of civilization are found at Joey Armageddon’s Sassy-a-Go-Go club.

Four-year degree in business.Trained in hand-to-hand combat. Works well with zombies.This is the resume of the last mailman on Earth. It is the near future, and the modern world we knew has been overrun and destroyed by reanimated corpses who hunt humans for food. Mankind has retreated to small pockets of civilization and practically surrendered to these walking dead. But one man routinely leaves behind the safety and comfort of his home in this new world in order to find the people and things we’ve long abandoned.

On the eve of the U.S. invasion of Baghdad, as the world waits for war, a miles-high energy wave cordons a vast area from southern Canada to northern Mexico. In a moment, 99 percent of the U.S. population has been wiped from the face of the earth.

The living dead are more alive than ever! Zombies have become more than an iconic monster for the 21st century: They are now a phenomenon constantly revealing as much about ourselves - and our fascination with death, resurrection, and survival - as our love for the supernatural or post-apocalyptic speculation. Our most imaginative literary minds have been devoured by these incredible creatures and produced exciting, insightful, and unflinching new works of zombie fiction.

When a fame-hungry scientist brings an impossible, living specimen of a creature long thought extinct back from the wild jungles of South America he unwittingly brings along a passenger. Something with the potential to destroy every living thing on our planet. The infestation begins, rapidly overtaking medical resources and resisting all treatment.

When Victor Tookes went to work that beautiful spring day, he never expected to see a man eaten alive in the street in front of his office. After convincing himself that they really were zombies, he makes a trip from his house in Pennsylvania to his family home in Virginia, battling zombies all the way. His three and a half year old son was bitten on the leg, but doesn't turn into a zombie. Instead, he turns into something more than human.

John is a father, but that wasn't his day job before the Zombie Apocalypse. Seven months after the events in 900 Miles, we pick up with John and Kyle who are bunkered down with their newfound community back at Avalon. Unexpectedly thrust outside the protection of Avalon's walls, they're forced back into the world of the dead on a scavenging run that should be routine. However, they quickly learn that there are forces at play making this journey anything but...

With tales from Laird Barron, Stephen King, John Langan, Peter Straub, and many others, and featuring Datlow’s comprehensive overview of the year in horror, now, more than ever, The Best Horror of the Year provides the petrifying horror fiction readers have come to expect - and enjoy.