Z.E.O.: A Zombie's Guide to Getting (A)Head in Business Book

Scott Kenemore, Z. E. O.: A Zombie's Guide to Getting A(Head) in Business (Skyhorse Publishing, 2009)

Being the cheesy-zombie fan I am (my computer's wallpaper is a picture titled "Vegan Zombie", with a shambling undead moaning "graaaaaaains..."), I fully expected this book to be all that and a barrel of monkeys. What I didn't expect was that it would also be the best business book I've read in many a year. I do not mean that in any sort of flip manner; couched inside the silly zombie puns and ultimately unworkable plan for taking over the world (or your company) in the space of a year is a whole lot of good, solid advice drawn from Sun Tzu, Machiavelli, and the like, and a critique of other pop-psychology business writers that actually makes sense. (His digression on Chris Anderson's bestseller The Long Tail is both hilarious and spot-on.) If you think about it, Kenemore's thesis makes perfect sense; the zombie, as depicted in popular culture since the days of Romero, is a creature that has a single goal, and will stop at nothing to achieve that goal. How better to get yourself noticed in the business world? This would be the perfect time to go off on an analysis about Romero's parallel between the zombie and consumer culture, and conclude that Kenemore is actually playing right into Romero's hands. Please just imagine you've read six or seven paragraphs of that nonsense. (They were exceptionally convincing, don't you think?) Of course Kenemore's playing into Romero's hands; he's saying that since you've got to be a wage slave, the kind of person Romero has been railing against in his movies since 1968, you may as well do it the right way. Imagine Dennis Hopper in Land of the Dead if he'd been zombified instead of blown up, and you've got a good idea of what Kenemore's on about here. If you're stuck in the world of corporate culture, you could do a lot worse than keeping a copy of this on your desk. *** ½