If you think being a zombie wouldn't be all that great, you would be right, it's not; but it's not nearly as horrible in Turner's version of the world as you might think.

When Jessie claws her way out of her casket, she is reborn into a dark realm on the fringes of human society. She has become that which she was taught to fear, but she has also found freedom. After the first jolt of homesickness and loss, she finds connection with others of her kind. There are harsh rules of survival, but also joys both small and large; even love, of a sort. Joe is a bad-ass biker who died in the '50s. He is the ultimate in cool and a little rough. Florian, nearing 300 years-of-life, can create tales of history no book could ever match. Linc, whose mental voice is like a lonely piano, has a kind heart death could not erase. These and other people become her new family; her new world.

Their constant hunger is assuaged by fresh deer or small rabbits Jessie is powerful enough to bring down for herself and her gang. They join together in midnight dances brought on by some mysterious agency where each of the resurrected have a part in music more beautiful than the heart can bear and that only they can hear.

When a new type of being appears in their territory, no longer human but not yet zombie, their way of life is threatened. Jessie becomes key to the survival of both humans and the dead who walk.

DUST is grim and realistic but balanced with unimaginable beauty. Jessie's journey to save her world is engrossing. You forget about the nastiness which is inevitable when time meets dead flesh, and quickly find yourself caught up in the larger quest...a new paradigm where humanity has a much broader definition.