The Living Dead

The Living Dead is a 2020 horror novel written by George A. Romero and Daniel Kraus. The book was unfinished at Romero's death in 2017 and Kraus was hired to complete it using Romero's notes and incorporating an old short story by Romero. Synopsis The book is divided into three acts; "The Birth of Death", "The Life of Death", and "The Death of Death". The acts each cover a period of time from the first known undead attack and forward to the next eleven years. Each act consists of chapters of certain characters' stories, both living and dead. The story begins in a Washington D.C. government building, where statistician Etta Hoffman finds an anomaly: the recording of a death and birth of a patient in San Diego on 10/23.From the same patient in San Diego this then leads to the story of Luis Acocella and Charlie Ratajkowski, in the San Diego medical examiner's office, who are working on an autopsy of a John Doe who suddenly comes back from the dead. During the "birth of death", Luis contacts his superior JT at an event in Las Vegas and learns that the dead ("They") are rising across the country. The ensuing chaos leads to JT committing suicide while on the phone with Luis and Charlie, the phone is then picked up by a mysterious guest at the Vegas convention named Richard Lindhof, whose callous reaction concerns and scares Luis and Charlie.