Never-DEAD is an American horror multimedia franchise, centered on a short TV program Never-DEAD (2015) created by Ann Greyson, that includes cinematic book trailers, and collectible, story-driven images. The 2019 novel adaptation is a stand-alone zombie story with past tense writing, humor and purposefully placed cliches, with short (five-or-six-page) chapters. Hannah Winter’s first-person viewpoint narrative voice engages reader’s senses with descriptions easy to visualize and makes them feel like she’s addressing them personally. The third-person perspective for the second-tier, larger-than-life characters such as Ken Langtry, Chloe Park, Dan Saunders, and Vivian Wheeler, who have their own personal drama, creates a realistic atmosphere of anxiety and adaptability in an unrealistic situation.

December 21, 2012 is approaching just as a rabid raccoon viciously attacks a honeymooning couple camping in Chiapas, Mexico near the city of Palenque, a place with a Maya historical site of stone carvings. The woman dies, but the man suffers a bite wound just before he kills the raccoon with a tire iron. He becomes the first carrier of a virus that he spreads to people with merely a few bites. They die and come back as flesh-eating zombies just like him. And, of course, to stop a zombie you must disable the brain, shooting it in the head tends to work best. With this world-changing virus that brings the dead to life, people question the validity to the circulating doomsday prophecy attached to the end of the Mayan calendar.

The plot centers on this communicable disease and the life of 26-year-old Hannah Winter. At five-five, slim, with shoulder-length brown hair and eyes, she’s occasionally pessimistic, but a down-to-earth, cutting-edge computer scientist who works as the head of information technology at Biogenetics & Disease Control. This medical research company beneath the city of Dulce, New Mexico is the focal point for an antidote to the virus where Julie Mehta, a virologist in charge of their state-of-the-art laboratory, takes on the task of developing a vaccine protective against it. What drives Hannah and Julie is hope, which is at the core of this epidemic. For Hannah, it’s expecting Jenna to arrive in New Mexico and for Julie it’s to find a solution to this deadly pathogen facing humanity before every living thing on the planet dies from it.

In a telephone conversation, Hannah persuades her nineteen-year-old sister Jenna to travel from San Antonio, Texas to be with her in New Mexico because it’s the safest place. At five-seven, slender, with green eyes, long light-brown hair, and creamy white skin, Jenna Winter seems to be just another pretty face for magazine covers or movies. Her plan to leave St. Mary’s University and stay in her father’s Albuquerque home while she does nothing but plan a career in modeling and designing clothes, all goes south when she finds herself in a thrill ride toward the (almost) end of the world. Her life is an emotional roller coaster of many setbacks on every leg of her journey to New Mexico. Quite often, she barely gets out of her latest scrape with the leg-dragging, moaning zombies she’s utterly afraid of and that tax her patience with the smell of decaying flesh they leave in the air. She’s not automatically brave, cries a lot and often smokes cigarettes to cope with the stress. Though she wants to quit smoking, the pandemic fuels her addiction. When she sees a thirty-eight revolver lying on a table in a RV, she reluctantly picks it up then teaches herself how to use it. After shooting some zombies dead, she regrets doing it, feeling that she’s doing things outside of her norm to survive. Still, Jenna grows from weakness to something approaching courage, while still holding on to her vulnerability.

Though the novel does not maintain overly Christian thematic interest, you will find Christian context in the novel when it comes to Jenna Winter. She drops out of St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas which has a Roman Catholic religious affiliation. She’s from a Catholic family. And she stays many weeks in the St. Ambrose Catholic Church in Abilene, Texas where she develops a close relationship with Monsignor Anthony Lucca, who provides a balancing philosophy about how to treat and deal with the undead and consoles her about her father Henry Winter’s death in a zombie causing plane crash in the Gila National Forest in Catron County, New Mexico. And since the start of the epidemic, Jenna prays more, often thanking God for her survival.

Using two sisters to hold Never-DEAD together convincingly portrays a time and place of human struggle, complete with action, gore, guns, religion, science, dramatic life-or-death scenarios, movie, and pop music references, cars and eye-grabbing, beautiful strong female leads wrestling against the stigma of the genre, because if all that doesn't grab-you-quick, nothing will. Ultimately, it’s the creepy zombies that scare us in a way we aren’t accustomed to, bringing many of us to the genre for that reason. After turning the final page of Never-DEAD you can expect to want more of this story that has lots of zombie-killin’ action and a Hollywood-style happy ending like a Walt Disney movie.





Never-DEAD (Official Book Trailer) c. 1/21

Never-DEAD (Book Trailer: Biogenetics & Disease Control) c. 12/22
Never-DEAD (Book Trailer: Outbreak - El Paso) c. 6/24

Never-DEAD (Book Trailer: Jenna Winter’s Plan) c. 5/22
Never-DEAD (Book Trailer: Hannah Winter’s POV) c. 9/21

In The News

Celebrating the 3rd Anniversary of Never-DEAD Promote Horror, Omar Usman - December 5, 2022

Ad: Never-DEAD Horror Writers Association newsletter, {December Issue Number 269, Volume 32} Kathryn Ptacek - November 30, 2022

Vote now! Q1 Action/Adventure Contest Purple Shelf Club, Alexis Miller - March 26, 2022

23 Votes for Never-DEAD (Book Trailer: Hannah Winter's POV) in the ASUS ProArtist AWARDS 2022 ASUS ProArtist AWARDS March 20, 2022

Novel to Screenplay: Tutorial Contest Winner! Novelplay, Liane Little - January 1, 2021

What are you going to do when the zombie apocalypse comes? X (Twitter) post, Mark Lee - December 2, 2020

Ingram publications Ingram Advance Catalog {Fiction - Horror, page 132} - April 2020

Books Received: January Locus, The Magazine of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Field {March Issue 710, volume 84, No. 3, page 52} Karen Burnham - March 2020

We've Got Stuff For You Rukia Publishing newsletter, Margaret A. Daly - February 8, 2020

MystiCon Independent Film Festival 2016 Programming: Zombie Film Hour MystiCon Program Book, page 57, Shawn Walton - February 27, 2016

Professional Praise & Consumer Feedback for Never-DEAD

Great zombie adventure!
Hugo Cukurs 5-star review by Hugo Lawrence Imants Cukurs, Author of Samurais of Fukushima: the battle of the dead - May 1, 2024

It’s fascinating and I wanted to keep reading ... there were moments in her story where the zombies had "human-like" moments. It was a fresh perspective and made me wonder if the zombies were truly zombies, or if they still had something human in them. The ending was very satisfying ... It felt like you could finally take a sigh of relief even though you knew the world would still be recuperating after the vaccine was released.
Purple Shelf Club 3.5-star review by Alexis Miller - September 29, 2021

Never-DEAD is a captivating story that any zombie or thriller lover would enjoy ... That said, Greyson weaves together the story lines of a diverse cast of strong characters into a book you won’t want to put down.
The Faerie Review 5-fairies review by Liliyana Shadowlyn Greer - August 28, 2020

You can call it a brilliant piece of zombie fiction or marvelous storytelling and you’ll be right every time ... The smell of rotting corpses is in the air and Jenna Winter can’t stand it ... You feel Jenna’s panic as she wrestles with the horrors by crying a lot, smoking cigarettes incessantly, praying more to God, and doubting herself - what you expect of her in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. The fact that Ann Greyson so effortlessly dredges up the dread that festers below the surface of her characters is simply an example of her writing expertise. You can’t help but fear for Jenna, and yet at the same time want her to build up her courage and take risks. That is a big part of what makes Never-DEAD so powerful - the emergence of Jenna Winter’s inner strength and sense of self, juxtaposed with the danger of interacting with zombies that can appear at any moment from around any corner ... A genre that had long been dominated by men, until 2019, kudos to Ann Greyson for creating a commercially viable story, the first woman to write a full-length zombie apocalypse novel. Never-DEAD has the potential to make her a household name.
Walmart 5-star review by a Walmart Customer - July 26, 2020

Great Zombie Book ... Well written story. Characters are well developed and the author pulls you into the story making it difficult to put the book down. Makes a perfect gift for a ’zombie lover.’
Anchor Book Press 4-star review by Carol Pirog, Managing Director of Anchor Book Press - April 13, 2020

The setup in the prologue and beginning chapter remind me of writers like Michael Crichton and Dan Brown. The author introduces readers to a cast of seemingly disconnected characters whom you soon discover all hold different pieces to the same story. I enjoyed being led into the story in this way, learning along with the main characters what is going on across the world and what it could mean for humanity ... Anyone with an interest in science fiction, apocalypse fiction, or simply zombies should enjoy this read. Last, the added twist of the Mayan calendar angle weaves some great historical and science facts into the story. It takes no time at all to become invested in the narrative, and the ending is sure to please even the most avid zombie readers.
LitPick 4-star review by Amanda - April 4, 2020

Greyson’s cinematic narrative easily pulls readers into this bleak but enthralling story of survival. Through Jenna’s ability to maintain an emotional distance from the horrors around her as her survival instinct kicks in, Greyson explores the boundless capacity of perseverance in the human race. Greyson’s prose is simple and accessible, plotting tight, and characterization thoroughly done ... Greyson poignantly portrays people’s fear, insecurities, fickleness, and bitter rage through Jenna and her other characters. Lovers of apocalyptic fiction will be delighted.
The Prairies Book Review Digital Magazine, Vol 08, June 2020, page 34, 5-star review by Neena H. Brar - March 27, 2020

The action of zombies shambling toward a victim is vivid ... The imagery is vivid and bold, with fast-paced scenes that would make great visuals for a film ... The plot intensifies through conversations with co-workers with references to the Mayan Calendar that predicts the end of time in a specific period, which is the year the story takes place ... This thriller will challenge the reader to question his own response to a cataclysmic event and consider making advanced preparations for unforeseen disasters. Never-DEAD is a survivalist horror story that begs you to ponder if a zombie virus breaks out; would you know how to survive from it?
AuthorsReading review by Carol V. Weishampel - March 15, 2020

the balance between pacing and plot is an element of the novel that really shines through. As for the characters that fill this dark fantasy world, they fit perfectly inside their roles. Readers will quickly recognize or even relate to the sisterly-bond between Hannah and Jenna ... For those that love a strong build-up to a nail-biting climax, Never-DEAD is that type of horror story. Of course, more than enough zombies are created along the way and some good characters are sacrificed.
Horror Palace review by Damnetha Jules and Ivan Karhoff - March 3, 2020

A zombie thriller with some discerning twists, it’s the debut release from Ann Greyson and she’s packed quite a punch! Immediately immersive, she weaves the requisite elements of the genre into a nail-biting narrative with sisters Hannah and Jenna finding themselves separated as the Never Dead virus threatens to destroy everything they know and love. Against all odds, Jenna must journey from San Antonio to New Mexico to join Hannah in the safety of the Biogenetics & Disease Control facility. But it’s a journey fraught with peril and this is where Greyson as a writer comes into her own. She’s set out to write a fast-paced character-driven thriller and that’s what she delivers ... The zombie attack set pieces are tense with the ugly reality of real-life and death fights brought to life through Jenna’s many life and death encounters.
BookViral review by John Reese - January 27, 2020

As a young aspiring model, Jenna finds herself in the midst of the chaos. First her car is totaled. Next, zombies attack and she is on the run for her life ... Jenna proves to be surprisingly resilient, though the odds are against her ... If you want a classic zombie book loaded with action, Never-DEAD will satisfy your craving!
Indies Today 3-star review by Amanda Murello - February 29, 2020

The stakes are high, and the tension is mounting with every minute ... The descriptions are strong and vivid and the dialogues well-crafted. I loved the imagery from the very first page. Ann Greyson allows readers to see the images and the scenes in their mind’s eye and follow characters through tense and dangerous situations ... The crisp writing and richly developed characters make Never-DEAD an enjoyable read. It is fun following characters that beat the never dead and make narrow escapes.
Readers’ Favorite 5-star review by Christian Sia - January 12, 2020




Never-DEAD c. 5/15

About Never-DEAD
Jenna Winter is stranded in San Antonio, Texas at the start of a viral pandemic and must travel to Dulce, New Mexico to be with her sister Hannah in the safety of her workplace, Biogenetics & Disease Control, a global leader in disease prevention. On her way, Jenna Winter encounters many zombies she must deal with, but finds that all of her setbacks only make her doubt if she’ll ever make it.

{2016 MystiCon Independent Film Festival screening in Board Room 2 at Holiday Inn Tanglewood, Roanoke, VA}
{Manhattan Neighborhood Network Lifestyle CH 2 broadcast on Spectrum CH 56 and Verizon FiOS TV CH 34 and Residential Communications Network RCN CH 83 in New York}