My first excerpt from upcoming paranormal novel That the Dead May Rest skipped right over the Prologue, starting on the second page of Chapter 1. But I hope my readers don't follow that example. The Prologue clarifies a couple of points I consider important: (1) What kind of zombies are we talking about? (2) Where will the action take place? There's also an attempt to prevent the frustration that might afflict readers if they expect a certain revelation I chose not to provide.
So without further ado, here it is.
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the chronicler
The creeping peril, the quietly emerging plague, was not the sort of zombie epidemic pictured in late 20th and 21st century entertainment. Living humans did not, within seconds or minutes of being attacked, become the shambling undead. It was an older menace, one with ancient, mostly abandoned, and generally ineffectual remedies, that resurfaced. The bodies that now roamed to attack the living had been resting for days or months or years before some mysterious force drove them to emerge, like shoots of noisome growth, once more above ground. All those generations of mourners who loaded stones on the lids of coffins, laid sickles across the necks of corpses or drove iron rods through their cold chests — they knew what to fear.
As you read, do not divide your attention waiting to learn of a perpetrator or virus or other cause. I will tell you now that humanity has not yet learned why this occurred.
The terrestrial portion of what follows could be happening anywhere: Concord, or Wichita Falls, or a suburb of Boise. Picture somewhere you know, even somewhere you love. Picture its houses grand or modest, well maintained or run down; its lush greenery or desert shrubs; its asphalt or gardens; its uninterrupted flatness, or its hills that challenge the fitness of pedestrians. Picture home.
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