The Undead That Saved Christmas Read online

  Praise for

  The Undead That Saved Christmas

  “I never knew how awesome Christmas could be! You’ll never see Christmas in the same way again – nor will you want to.”

  - Bill Nelson (WeZombie.com)

  “Perez-Tinics has amassed a thick volume of quirky, fun and undeniably different Christmas tales full of elves, gingerbread and the hungering undead. A must for zombie fans and a great way to help some forgotten kids this holiday season."

  - Eric R. Lowther, author, "Area 187; Almost Hell" and "Area 187; Almost Home" coming soon from Library of the Living Dead Press

  "The Undead That Saved Christmas has gone beyond most of the zombie

  anthologies that have come out in recent years. Not only is this for a

  great cause, but it is filled with amazing stories, poems and comics

  by highly talented writers and creators, many of whom are up and

  comers in the genre. Also, it has the added bonus of being a Christmas

  themed anthology which means you can pull it off the bookshelf and sit

  around the fireplace with your very own little zombies for many years

  to come!So grab some 'nog, roast some chestnuts and make sure the fruit cake

  has extra brains in it, for this is an anthology you won't want to

  miss!”

  -Jake Bible, Author of DEAD MECH: The World's First Drabble Novel,

  available at www.jakebible.com

  “It's not your usual zombie anthology. Aside from having the overall feel

  of being a Christmas anthology you also have the bonus of the inclusion of poems, songs, and comics as well. you are going to have PLENTY of reading to enjoy through this one with both published authors, bloggers, and a few new names on that list I guarantee this is a title you are going to enjoy.”

  - Stuart Conover (BuyZombie.com)

  The Undead That Saved Christmas

  Edited and compiled by

  Lyle Perez-Tinics

  www.UndeadintheHead.com

  Merry Christmas!

  The stories depicted in this anthology are fictitious and any similarities to actual events, locations or people, living or dead or worse, UNDEAD, are entirely coincidental.

  The Undead That Saved Christmas

  Copyright © by Lyle Perez-Tinics

  All rights reserved.

  This work may not be reproduced in any way without written permission from the editor, except for brief quotations in reviews.

  Cover art by David Naughton-Shires

  www.TheImageDesigns.com

  ISBN 10: 1-453832-66-1

  ISBN 13: 978-1-453832-66-0

  This book is dedicated to all the foster kids at

  Hugs Foster Family Agency

  www.HugsFFA.org

  Acknowledgments

  N et proceeds from this book will be donated to Hugs Foster Family Agency. No author or illustrator has been compensated for their time and efforts. Our payment is to help provide their foster children with a wonderful Christmas.

  Table of Contents

  How the Undead Saved Christmas

  By Lyle Perez-Tinics

  Introduction

  By S.G. Browne

  Short Stories

  Night of the Frozen Elf

  By Richard S. Crawford

  Merry Christmas, Sarah!

  By Rhonda E. Kachur

  The Gingerbreads

  By Lyle Perez-Tinics

  The Magic of Christmas

  By Rebecca Besser

  Yes, Rindy, There is a Santa Claus

  By TW Brown

  Living Dead Babes in Toyland

  By Robert Freese

  A Christmas Wish

  By Tony and Heather Faville

  Rudolph the Undead Reindeer

  By Jason Tudor

  Santa’s Helpers

  By Scott Morris

  Santa Claws is Coming to Town

  By Calvin A. L. Miller II

  Brains Like Figgy Pudding

  By Sean Hoade

  The Santa Epidemic

  By Mandy Tinics

  The Legend of Zombie Claus

  By Joe Filippone

  And to All a Good Fright

  By Stacey Graham

  Refuse to Donate

  By Angelica Raene

  GingerBrains

  By Edward J. Russell

  Poems and Carols

  Undead to the World

  By Angie Mansfield

  Oh Tanenbrain, Oh Tanenbrain

  By Rusty Fischer

  The Worst Noel

  By J Gilliam Martin

  The Night of the Living Dead…Before Christmas

  By Kevin Preece ‘The Zombieking’

  We Wish you Reanimation & O Rotting Corpse

  By Stacey Graham

  Jingle Bells, Something Smells

  By Beth Bartlett

  Zombies Having a Wonderful Christmas Time

  By Lyle Perez-Tinics

  Comics

  Ted Dead, Just Your Everyday Zombie…

  By Calvin A. L. Miller II

  Illustrated by Calvin A. L. Miller II

  Christmas For Creeps

  By Lyndal Ferguson

  Illustrated by Lyndal Ferguson

  A Puppy For Christmas

  By Mike Schneider

  Illustrated by Brian Germain

  Snow Day of the Dead

  By Mike Schneider

  Illustrated by Anders Skoglund

  A Very Undead Christmas

  By Nate Call

  Illustrated by Nate Call

  How the Undead Saved Christmas

  By Lyle Perez-Tinics

  When I first thought about doing this anthology I had no idea what I was getting myself into. I knew that I wanted my first book to mean something, but at the time I didn’t know what. I remember I was sitting at my work desk when it hit me; I wanted to put together a charity anthology. I have been a part of other charity anthologies such as The Undead Nation anthology which is raising money for breast cancer. But now I was faced with the problem of choosing the right charity.

  Have you ever asked someone the question, what would you do if you won the lottery? Well, my wife, Mandy, and I asked each other that one day. The first thing that came out of our mouths was to start a foundation to help children in need. There are many children in the United States who need love, care and attention. If we had millions of dollars that would be the first thing we’d do with the money.

  For some reason, when I thought about compiling an anthology, our little lottery conservation flew into my head. Then the charity came to me, I wanted to help foster children. I’ve never been a foster child myself; but in school a lot of my friends lived in foster homes. Now the next dilemma came up, what foster agency will I help?

  In December of 2009 I was, again, at my desk at work when an e-mail caught my attention. The letter was asking for toy donations for foster kids at Hugs Foster Family Agency. The e-mail came with an attachment that was a Christmas wish list. I looked over the document and there were over one-hundred children on that wish list. I knew I wanted to help those children that year. So I did, I donated.

  I was already familiar with Hugs and happy to know that my donation made a child very happy, so it was only fitting that I choose them as the charity. Now I needed a theme, this was easy. Everyone who is familiar with my writing will know that I love zombies. I run a website that is dedicated to zombie books and the authors. So a zombie-themed anthology was right up my alley.

  Everything else seemed to fall into place. I was thinking about the anthology and realized I’ve always wanted to do something that involved Christmas. Sin
ce I donated to Hugs at Christmas time and I was compiling an anthology to help the foster kids, I decided to put them together. The next step was to come up with a title. I knew the proceeds from the book were going toward purchasing Christmas presents for the foster children. Then it hit me, The Undead That Saved Christmas.

  After I got a title and knew the theme it was time to start spreading the word about my anthology. I used the connections I have made from my website and started spreading the word. Within a week I had many people asking me how they could help. One of these wonderful people was David Naughton-Shires, he is the artist who did the book’s art cover. He came up with the art idea and basically had it done within a few days. He has been a really, really big help.

  So, now I had a cover to show around. I created a Facebook fan page and very quickly word started spreading about my charity zombie Christmas-themed anthology. The number of fans quickly grew and as of right now there are 907 fans. It truly warms my heart that so many people support the anthology and most importantly support the cause.

  Since this is the first book that will have my name on the cover I wanted it to be one of a kind. After David finished the cover I was bombarded by e-mails from artists who wanted to do the book cover. I turned them away because I only needed one book cover. Then I thought about it, something that has not been done in any other anthology that I’ve seen. An art cover for each individual short story. Once the idea was stuck in my head, I emailed the artists and ran the idea past them. Soon after Christmas art was flying everywhere. All of the art did find its way into the anthology.

  With the deadline passing and the submissions stopping, the fun began. I had to make decisions. The stories, poems & carols and comics you find in this book are the result of my decisions. I read all of the submissions and these 16 stories were selected by me. They were the best of the best. You will also find 7 poems and 5 comics. Big thanks to Mike Schneider for suggesting I take in comics as well.

  Before I start putting together the stories and formatting this anthology I want to thank everyone who has made it possible. I want to thank all of the artists who contributed art cover and the random clip art which will be splattered across the book. I want to thank all of the authors who contributed a story. Mark Polarek, the representative from Hugs who I have been in contact with has been extremely supportive. I want to thank my wife (Mandy) and my little daughter (Kallalaya). Both of them keep my spirits up. Most importantly I want to thank the readers for picking up a copy of this book to help support the Hugs Foster Family Agency. Together we can give these kids a very Merry Undead Christmas.

  Your anthologist

  Lyle Perez-Tinics

  8/25/2010

  Introduction

  By S.G. Browne, author of Breathers: A Zombie’s Lament

  ‘Twas the night before Christmas, and all through the mall,

  All the zombies were munching on some guy named Paul…

  When I think about zombies, the first thing that comes to mind isn’t St. Nicholas with a bundle of toys or stockings hung by the chimney with care. And I don’t equate reanimated corpses with chestnuts roasting on an open fire or Jack Frost nipping at your nose. If Jack Frost were a zombie, my guess is he’d be taking more than just a nip. And chances are he wouldn’t stop at your nose.

  Zombies and Christmas.

  I never really thought about combining the two before. They’re not exactly complementary. Like rice and beans. Or peanut butter and jelly. Or two angles that add up to ninety degrees.

  Salt and pepper. Peas and carrots. Mulder and Scully.

  Some things are just meant to go together. There are even colors that are complementary.

  Purple and yellow. Orange and blue. Red and green.

  Which brings us back to Christmas.

  You could make the argument that zombies and the holidays go together like, well, like red and green. You’ve got red symbolizing the copious amounts of blood running down the various appendages and green representing the decomposing flesh falling off the bones. Not exactly the Christmas I remember, but sometimes you just have to let go of those childhood memories and make room for new traditions.

  Growing up, I was like any American kid who couldn’t wait for Christmas to come. Making out my list for Santa, leaving him milk and cookies, meeting the Big Guy at the mall and freezing up and asking for a football instead of a Red Ryder carbine-action two-hundred-shot range model air rifle.

  I watch a lot of Christmas movies.

  Which makes me wonder what A Christmas Story would have been like had Scut Farkus and Grover Dill been zombies that Ralphie had to kill with his Red Ryder air rifle in order to reach his dénouement. Or if Tiny Tim was actually infected with the zombie virus and ended up eating Ebenezer Scrooge for his Christmas dinner. Or if George Bailey had to contend with his nemesis, Mr. Potter – who was not only a warped, frustrated old man but a reanimated corpse, as well.

  It’s a Wonderful Life…with Zombies.

  And I’ve lost my train of thought. Where were we? Right, childhood wonderment.

  So there I would be, all amped up with sugar and anticipation on Christmas Eve, trying to fall asleep while wondering if reindeer really knew how to fly, then waking up on Christmas morning and trying to figure out how Santa managed to get so much accomplished in one night when I could barely finish my homework.

  Fast forward to now, when Christmas seems less about the magic of my youth and more about the culture of shopping malls, which fits in nicely with our holiday mash-up theme, since zombies are drawn to malls like children to ice cream trucks.

  When I started this introduction off with a zombie version of the opening lines to Clement C. Moore’s The Night Before Christmas, I just figured, what would be a better setting than a shopping mall? It was also a bit of a nod to both Dawn of the Dead films. But when you think about it, zombies are the perfect fit for the ravenous consumer frenzy that has become Christmas, at least in the United States. Hordes of single-minded shoppers descending upon the malls, relentless in their obsessive pursuit, consuming everything in their path.

  As for the anonymous Paul mentioned in the opening, maybe the zombies aren’t munching on some random victim whose name happens to rhyme with mall, but instead they’re chowing down on Saint Paul, the mouthpiece for Christianity and arguably the most successful PR guy of all time. That would make for some nice religious symbolism:

  Zombies as the consumer culture devouring the spiritual message of Christmas.

  There are even those who believe that Jesus returned to the Earth not as the savior of mankind but as a flesh eating zombie. I think that’s pushing it a little bit, though there is the whole resurrection angle that plays right into those beliefs. But that’s really more Easter than Christmas.

  So whether it’s Jack Frost biting off your face or a shuffling corpse decking the halls or Jesus returning from the dead to eat your flesh for a change, what really matters is the spirit of the season. What the message of Christmas means and how to include zombies in the holiday cheer.

  After all, the saying is Peace on Earth, good will toward men. It doesn’t differentiate between living men and reanimated corpses. Sure, you could make the case that a zombie isn’t really a human, but then you’re getting into a whole bunch of civil rights issues and haven’t we been there before? I mean really, it’s all just semantics.

  Breathing. Moaning.

  Cellular growth. Decomposition.

  Carnivore. Cannibal.

  You say potato…

  In the end, the Christmas spirit shouldn’t be reserved for just the living. It should encompass all mankind, even those who are no longer technically among the living.

  With apologies to Clement C. Moore:

  And I heard him exclaim, as he flew away on his sled,

  “Happy Christmas to all, be you alive or undead.”

  S.G. Browne

  San Francisco, CA

  August 4, 2010

  Story Art Cover


  By Jess Smart Smiley