I am very excited to be a part of the blog tour for The Undead Truth of Us, the debut novel from Britney S. Lewis. Check out my review below, and don't forget to enter the giveaway!
Book Information
Publication Date: August 9, 2022
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Source: Rockstar Book Tours
Purchase: Amazon - Kindle - B&N - iBooks - BAM! - Kobo - TBD - Bookshop.org
CHAPTER
ONE
FIVE
DAYS. FIVE . That
was how long it took for Mama to turn into a zombie.
Day one she
was stoic. She refused to move from the couch, even after I turned off
the TV in the evening. I still remembered how frigid her face looked in
the dimness of the flickering candle before I blew it out. The spaces
above her cheeks were sunken in, eyes bulged away from her face. A wiggle
under there, only slightly, but it did. I saw it move. I saw it
twist.
And her
brown skin looked frail and thin—any wrong move, and I was afraid it
would tear away in small slits, revealing the tissue beneath.
“Mama . . .”
I whispered, creeping closer to her in the darkness. One foot after the
other, the floorboards creaking with each step. I wanted to know if she
was okay, if she was even awake, but she didn’t say anything. Looked at
her again, waited. She released a deep breath, the air cracking on its
way out. Sounded like something was in there, inching its way up her
trachea.
I left it
alone. Kissed her clammy head, pulled a blanket over her, and tucked her
in, hoping she’d be fine in the morning. And she would be fine. She
always was.
Day two was
strange. It began with her golden-brown eyes. They glazed into a cynical
gray like cataracts, and the brightness that used to be in them
dissipated like smoke in the wind. When she spoke, her sentences were
short and sloth-like—every word a complete struggle—almost as if someone had
stuffed cotton beneath her tongue.
On day
three, her veins oozed a thick green sludge under her skin. They pulsed
and vibrated, not quite right. And her shoulders slouched inward, like
they were weighed down by a thousand invisible moons, causing her inner
tide to disrupt entirely.
As she
inched closer and closer to the invisible abyss, her dark cloud of
sadness stripped away the caramelized flesh from her face, leaving her
disfigured.
By the
fourth day, every breath came with a creaking croak. It was like watching
a sped-up time lapse of a fire burning out. Everything I loved about her
was gone.
We didn’t
dance.
We didn’t
sing.
She wasn’t
the bleeding sunrise anymore—she was the deep, deep, dark ocean.
And on
November 4, before daybreak, her last breath rolled up her throat and
turned her into the undead thing that I feared. It was the worst day of my
life.
I found her
on the floor in the kitchen, and my throat swelled. Her body lay in the
fetal position, her right hand below her heart, crumpled like an old
rose.
But I didn’t
get it. Zombies weren’t supposed to die so easily, yet Mama did.
When the
EMTs came, I tried to tell them, but the words wouldn’t come out. They
couldn’t see that she wasn’t only dead—she was undead.
I—I, uh, my thoughts stammered, all I could
do was stare blankly. How could they not see it? How was I the only
one?
And she . .
.she needed more time. We needed more time. I didn’t understand.
What was wrong? How did she die? Was she really dead? But they rushed
her out, and I couldn’t move from that spot in the kitchen where I’d
found her.
Couldn’t
force the air out of my lungs. Couldn’t take any more steps
forward.
I tried to
hold myself, but a sharp pain in my navel forced me to my knees. I curled
into a ball on the laminate floor, and the smell of the brewing coffee nestled
in my nostrils, reminding me of how she was just here, alive.
She was alive.
Closed my
eyes, warm cheek against the cold tile now. And she was gone. I knew she
was because of the permanent goosies on my arms. When Mama died, I think her
soul shattered into a Postimpressionist painting filled with yellows and
blues. We were the zigzagged, black lines in that painting, the birds.
And I swore I flew with her soul that day, the wind still fresh between
my fingers, but I couldn’t reach her. Didn’t matter how fast I flew, she
flew farther, and the sapphire horizon created a million miles between us. It
swallowed her. They later told me that her heart exploded in her chest. Exploded.
I didn’t know how that could be humanly possible, but when they told
me, I saw those colors again.
She was
yellow. I was blue.
She was dead
and undead, and now the earth was flooded with zombies, drowning me with
the constant reminder of Mama. Why? I didn’t know why.
But
why?
I didn’t
know why.
But I terribly,
terribly, terribly wanted to.
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