Wood's collection contains serious meditations, but it’s more fun than any of his previous, and more personal. 

Thomas Mallon's 'Watergate'

Zone One is a zombie novel. Sure, it’s a “literary” zombie novel, with better writing and more complex characterization than your typical tale of the undead. But it is still a zombie novel, through and through, and Whitehead, one of the most critically respected writers of his generation, is unashamed to embrace the genre in all its pulpy glory.

It is a rare book that can include casual allusions to both Walt Whitman and the sports agent Scott Boras, that can talk as intelligently about former second baseman Steve Sax as about Moby-Dick. Yet Harbach pulls it off. His writing displays the quiet confidence and agility of a veteran middle infielder.

When David Foster Wallace committed suicide in 2008, he left behind the fragments of this unfinished novel. What do the now-assembled pieces amount to?