Obvious synopsis of my novel. I am 45'000 words into it and have reached the ambush of the Scabbers.
What do people think?
Dead Country Synopsis.
A week is all it takes for the world to end. A week for law to fail and for anarchy to rise, for Governments to fall and civilisation crumble. A week for everything to change as in seven days the world dies. It begins innocently as most things do with a scientist discovering the cure to all cancer. Unfortunately, someone interferes with the vaccine just in time for its first test and although the scientist discovers this he makes the fateful decision to test it on himself. At first the authorities call the infection an extreme bout of rabies, but then the dead begin to rise and soon County Durham is engulfed in chaos.
Abeke Sandiee who is an Escort from Africa finds herself caught in the middle of this chaos when she accompanies a client to a Caribbean Resort set in the moorlands of the Pennines. Here she meets a School cleaner called Michael Tarver. A boy named Greg Tanner, who like most teenagers is a pain, and Lucy Thornton who is the Hotel Receptionist. Thrown together they must rely on each other to survive the Zombies and reach the Catterick Garrison Army Base in Yorkshire. Battling hordes of the Walking Dead, they reach the base only to discover that things do not happen as they do in the films or books. Swallowed by the refugees they become just another statistic as the world dies.
Meanwhile the Zombie Apocalypse is recorded through the eyes and journals of the Military, Bloggers and a man who published perhaps the last book ever about the coming cataclysm.
Fifteen years later and Britain is a no go area. The Government has fled to France while America has opted to place mines around the entire coast. Humanity, like a cockroach, has managed to survive, banding together to live in Forts or Compounds where they live out their lives in some semblance of normality. Michelle Williams is a habitant of Compound 5 and is dealing with the loss of her daughter to the Zombie threat. When news arrives of the mysterious radio silence of Compound 6 she opts to travel with three others to solve the mystery. Her companions on the journey are the rather pessimistic Amanda Smith, her brother, and Alan Dale. They reach the Compound and discover it in ruins and its members either dead or now un-dead.
They also discover an ambush set by a group of scavengers called Scabbers because they pick the wounds of humanity. While James and Alan are killed outright, the women are kept to become sex slaves for the main gang in Gateshead. To Michelle’s surprise, she discovers a little girl in amongst the gang, learning that in the collapse of law many do not consider some things as taboo any longer. Horrified, she manages to formulate a plan that ensures their escape. Taking the little girl with them as they flee as more surprises await when they come across a Coach and a group consisting of an abused housewife and her children, a pregnant woman and a man with a hidden past led by former Policeman Shaun Gallagher. They have been frozen in time due to a forgotten Military experiment gone wrong.
Taking them back to Compound 5 their peace is short lived when a large group of Scabbers attack the Compound demanding the return of the little girl. Michelle who has begun to replace her dead daughter with this one is at first reluctant, but learning that this group of Scabbers have the water they need she is forced to relent. Once they have the much needed supplies however she decides to get the girl back. With the help of Shaun Gallagher she follows them back to their base and sneaks inside. A battle ensues between living and the Walking Dead where she is mortally wounded-though not before saving the girl. As she dies Michelle uses the explosives taken from the Compound Armoury to blow up the building and the Zombies she had let in. The last thing she sees before the end is her daughter, smiling.