PANDEMIC now available for pre-order from Amazon.com. Click here to pre-order!

For autographed copies, visit Borderlands Books. Hint: you'll have to call them or email them from that site, as they won't have a pre-order available.

We don't have a cover yet, but I promise you that the insides of this book are going to get nasty.

SYNOPSES:
Five years after the end of CONTAGIOUS, the world faces a horrific new threat that begins in Lake Michigan's deepest, darkest, coldest place. The cataclysm of the Orbital's efforts goes global — what began with a single man now threatens seven billion people.

PANDEMIC is due out October 1, 2013, from Crown Publishing.

Now that I'm a fancy B-list movie reviewer (I know that makes you hot for me, admit it), I get the opportunity to watch some little-known stuff. Most of the time, that means I get to watch some real stinkers. Sometimes, however, I get to watch talented people make the most of micro-budgets and create the best flick they can, without the safety net of Hollywood's money-hose. 

Case in point, the indie flick KILL ME NOW, which just launched a (very) limited theater run on Dec. 5. The movie comes with some pretty severe Internet street cred, being written by Yesterday, Webby and Streamy Award winner Michael Swaim of Cracked.com fame.

KILL ME NOW is a mix of comedy, horror, and SUPER TROOPER jackassery. There's nothing serious about this flick. There is drinking and yelling and death and loud noises. There are power drills. There is the worst fake bear in the history of movies.

KILL ME NOW is clearly an indie affair, and it starts out a little slow — I admit, because of that, I was kind of looking for reasons not to like it. Swain and director Travis Long didn't give me any, and kept it moving one laugh at a time. Yeah, the move had an FX budget of $0, but they knew that going in and relied on performances and punchlines to carry the flick.

In addition to writing the script, Swaim also plays "Dennis," one of the two much-maligned nerds that are trying to horn in on the Cool People's end-of-high-school party. A party in a cabin in the middle of the woods. A very secluded cabin in the middle of the woods (they're making a low-budget horror movie, not re-inventing the wheel).

Brett Fancy (EAST ENDERS, OUTPOST) is the rich-voiced, highly educated "Driller Killer," a serial killer that likes to take out his victims with the ages-old technique of "Trepanation." The Driller is a tongue-in-cheek character that grows increasingly frustrated with his lack of body count. Fancy is a seaoned actor, and — to be blunt — is so self-assured in the role that he seems almost a little out of place in this cast of younger actors.

There are some really solid show-stealers in this movie. Beck Bennet delivers a Grade-A, over-the-top "jock douchebag" role as Todd, the leader of the Cool People who want to keep the Nerds out. I'd love to see him in more movies. The best comedic turn comes from Noah Byrne, who puts in the best stoner performance since Sean Penn in FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH. No, I'm not kidding. It's worth seeing this movie just to watch Byrne deliver three lines.

If you're looking for awesome gore, go rent SAW VII, because this movie is gore-free. IMDB lists the movie as having a $1 million budget; I find it hard to believe they had that much to spend based on what made it to the screen (and what didn't make it, notably the aforementioned utter lack of FX).

This movie is missing a lot, but the bottom line is I enjoyed it. There's a ton of funny in this bad boy. If you like horror/comedy and you like watching what people do with limited resources (and I do), you'll definitely dig it.

Ah, Christian Slater, that face of the 80s, star of HEATHERS, BROKEN ARROW, INTERVIEW WITH A VAMPIRE, TRUE ROMANCE and more, what's he up to these days? He's busting out a little indie horror in PLAYBACK, which was released on DVD May 8.

I'm a fan. I like his work. This movie? Maybe not so much. As a bonus to my fellow 80s kids, though, there are two scenes with Mark Metcalf, who was the screaming guy in the Twisted Sister video "We're Not Gonna Take It" (and, yeah, also in ANIMAL HOUSE).

This isn't Slater's first foray into indie horror. He did that abysmal ALONE IN THE DARK video game adaptation. Like in Playback, he did a good job in a terrible movie.

Check out the review. It's three frickin' minutes, and has some surprises inside. It's like Cracker Jacks in video form, but it tastes more like day-old gym socks than caramel.

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