Pontypool Changes Everything

By: Tony Burgess

Narrated by: Gary Dikeos

The dark side of humanity is explored in this electrifying science fiction thriller in which an epidemic virus terrorizes the Earth.

Causing its inhabitants to strike out on murderous rampages, the virus is caught through conversation and, once contracted, leads its host on a strange journey - into another world where the undead roam the streets of the smallest towns and largest cities, hungry for human flesh. Describing in chilling detail what it would be like if thousands suddenly caught such a virus and struck out on a mass, never-ending, cannibalistic spree, this terrifying narrative is perfect for those who are ready to explore their darkest secret imaginings through a sinister and compelling literary work of art.

This new edition includes a new afterword on the making of the new motion picture.

©1998, 2009 Tony Burgess (P)2012 Audible, Inc.

The narrator sounds like the Tiktok AI voice...

has anyone actually seen the narrator? are they a real person?


it's an interesting story, but the monotone voice just makes me zone out.

Don't waste your credits or time.

I made the mistake of getting this book after seeing the movie "Pontypool." The story has an excellent premise: a virus transmitted through words. The execution, however, is unabashedly awful. I made it about three hours in before giving up entirely. The premise was the only thing that kept me going as long as I did.

Looking back, the author really lost me when he wrote about a doe giving birth to thirty (seriously) fawns who then freeze to death, mired in a sea of afterbirth. The next morning, children were cheerfully playing hockey on the frozen afterbirth and fashioning grim pucks from the frozen animals. As if that wasn't bad enough, the real clincher for me was that this bizarre scene did not seem to advance the plot in any discernible way, unless the author was simply striving for absurdity (mission thoroughly accomplished) or he came back to it at some point after I stopped.

I should have stopped after that scene, which was within the first half hour. But I kept going. I really tried to like this book, but I just couldn't. If you like authors who endlessly use ham-handed similes and metaphors to expound on the most trivial details, or books who are in the so-bad-it's-good category, check this out. Otherwise, Pontypool Changes Everything just proves that a good idea simply isn't enough.

Not what I was expecting

This book was narratively nonsensical but fascinatingly entertaining. The last half is almost incomprehensible.

Pontypool is Ponderous

There is a story hidden inside this book, I'm almost sure of it. It even has an interesting spin on the zombie infection. In this case, the infection is spread by language which is kind of a cool take on the genre. The story - I could reveal the entire plot here (spoilers and all) and it would make no difference to readers. So I won't, because the very small thread of collective narrative running end to end of this book is totally irrelevant. Burgess wrote this (I'm convinced) during some sort of mushroom/LSD/acid trip (probably several). The metaphors are so thick that finding any story in them is like being lost in a fetid jungle and catching only brief glimpses of the haunted temple you're looking for - far away and through the shrubs and brambles. We will never get to our destination because our guide is smoking peyote and convening with the spirits. Some of Burgess prose is fantastic and there are snippets of great ideas so I'll give him credit for his arrangement of this collection of words. It is not an action adventure story - if that's what you are looking for. It is instead, an experimental piece of art that wants to see how much obfuscation readers are willing to endure in search of a narrative.

I've not seen the movie, which I understand is better, but completely different from the book.

On the Audible version, Gary Dikeos does as good a job as might be expected with the material he's been given.

The weirdest zombie novel I’ve ever read

I love zombie novels. I read them all of the time. So I am confident when I say this is the weirdest zombie story I’ve ever read. The author has an overly poetic style, which I enjoyed, but it’s incredibly abstract and overly descriptive. The story itself is almost completely unlike the movie. I honestly can’t tell if the whole book was supposed to be someone’s hallucination. It’s that unhinged. If you are expecting something like the movie, don’t read this. If you are ok with a completely abstract, disconnected, and unhinged story with an inexplicable ending, then go ahead and give it a listen.