Signed
The Girl with All the Gifts
Signed British first edition, 2014
The Girl with All the Gifts (2014) is a post-apocalyptic zombie novel by M. R. Carey, set in Britain after a fungal infection has destroyed most of civilization and transformed its victims into mindless, flesh-eating "hungries." Melanie is a highly intelligent ten-year-old girl held with other children at a military research facility, where they attend classes while strapped into wheelchairs and are treated as dangerous experimental subjects. Melanie gradually discovers that she and the other children are themselves infected, but unlike ordinary hungries they retain their intelligence and personalities. When the base is attacked, Melanie escapes with her beloved teacher Helen Justineau, scientist Caroline Caldwell, Sergeant Eddie Parks, and Private Gallagher into the devastated country beyond.
The infection is eventually identified as a mutated form of Ophiocordyceps, a real fungus whose relatives infect insects and manipulate their behavior. While the fungus destroys the brains of first-generation hungries, Melanie and other children born after the Breakdown are different. The fungus exists symbiotically in them, leaving their intelligence intact. Caldwell views the children as humanity's best hope for finding a cure, while Melanie increasingly comes to understand them as the beginning of a new race.
The novel developed from Carey's 2012 short story "Iphigenia in Aulis," which preceded the release of the similarly Cordyceps-based video game The Last of Us. The two works were conceived independently, with both drawing inspiration from the real behavior of parasitic Cordyceps fungi. Carey's novel was adapted into the 2016 film for which he also wrote the screenplay. Together with The Last of Us, the novel offers a new twist on the zombie apocalypse, replacing the traditional living dead with a fungal infection and asking whether the infected represent the end of humanity or the beginning of something new.
Signed and inscribed by M. R. Carey on the title page with a line from the novel, “Melanie makes a strangled sound...,” dated 13/1/14; not personalized.
Hardcover. First Edition, First Printing. Octavo black cloth boards with gilt lettering on spine. London: Orbit, 2014. ISBN: 9780356502731. #11493.
Fine in fine dust jacket.
The infection is eventually identified as a mutated form of Ophiocordyceps, a real fungus whose relatives infect insects and manipulate their behavior. While the fungus destroys the brains of first-generation hungries, Melanie and other children born after the Breakdown are different. The fungus exists symbiotically in them, leaving their intelligence intact. Caldwell views the children as humanity's best hope for finding a cure, while Melanie increasingly comes to understand them as the beginning of a new race.
The novel developed from Carey's 2012 short story "Iphigenia in Aulis," which preceded the release of the similarly Cordyceps-based video game The Last of Us. The two works were conceived independently, with both drawing inspiration from the real behavior of parasitic Cordyceps fungi. Carey's novel was adapted into the 2016 film for which he also wrote the screenplay. Together with The Last of Us, the novel offers a new twist on the zombie apocalypse, replacing the traditional living dead with a fungal infection and asking whether the infected represent the end of humanity or the beginning of something new.
Signed and inscribed by M. R. Carey on the title page with a line from the novel, “Melanie makes a strangled sound...,” dated 13/1/14; not personalized.
Hardcover. First Edition, First Printing. Octavo black cloth boards with gilt lettering on spine. London: Orbit, 2014. ISBN: 9780356502731. #11493.
Fine in fine dust jacket.