I’m going to be giving a talk at the sure-to-be-amazing Zombie Apocalypse Medicine Meeting. The meeting celebrates all things zombie-related, and includes 2 public lectures: one by Max Brooks (which focuses more on the fiction side of zombie stuff) and one by me, focusing on parasite manipulation of host behavior (the fact side of zombie stuff).
This invitation got me thinking about how unfamiliar I am with sci fi treatments of parasite-induced changes in human behavior. I started reading Heinlein’s The Puppet Masters, and then asked Twitter to suggest parasite-related literature for me to check out. I was deluged by suggestions for movies, TV series, books, and video games, and decided to collate a list of suggestions to share with everyone.
I’ll be working my way through this list, and hope it proves useful for anyone else interested in this topic. Please note that inclusion in the list does not necessarily mean I recommend the book/movie/show/game, nor can I confirm at this point that they really even belong on the list. I included almost anything that was suggested, and will prune the list accordingly as I work through it. Enjoy!
(Also, Matt Zefferman pointed me to this post in The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction.)
*indicates that the media is zombie-themed in particular (I’m sure many in the list are zombie themed and lack the * as I haven’t gotten to them yet to confirm)
Books (Author: Book)
Aldiss, Brian: Hothouse
Applegate, K.A.: Animorphs series
Asimov, Isaac: Does a Bee Care
Bear, Greg: Blood Music
Brin, David: The Giving Plague
*Brooks, Max: World War Z & The Zombie Survival Guide: Complete Protection from the Living Dead
Butler, Octavia: Bloodchild
Carey, Mike: The Girl With All the Gifts
Chalker, Jack: The Four Lords of the Diamond series
Clement, Hal: Needle
Corey, James S.A.: The Expanse series
Cutter, Nick: The Troop
Dee, Roger: Unwelcome Tenant
Dick, Philip K: VALIS
Douglas, L. Warren: Cannon’s Orb
Grant, Mira: Parasite
Heinlein, Robert: The Puppet Masters
Herbert, Brian & Anderson, Kevin: The Hellhole Trilogy
Herbert, Frank: Santaroga Barrier
King, Stephen: Dreamcatcher
Lumley, Brian: Necroscope series
Iwaaki, Hitoshi: Kiseiju (Parasyte)
Martin, George R.R.: A Song for Lya, Sandkings, Tuf Voyaging, Song for Ice and Fire (I haven’t read these yet or seen the TV Series, but Helen Keen tackled parasite manipulation themes in Game of Thrones in a book called The Science of Game of Thrones, for which she interviewed me about parasite manipulation)
Meyer, Stephanie: The Host
Preuss, Paul: Human Error
Rucker, Rudy: The Ware Tetralogy
Slonczewski, Joan: Brain Plague
Sigler, Scott: Infected
Simmons, Dan: The Hyperion series
Stross, Charlie: Laundry Files (specifically the The Apocalypse Codex)
Tepper, Sherri: Grass
Vance, Jack: Brains of Earth
Vonnegut, Kurt: Sirens of Titan
Watts, Peter: Echopraxia
Wilson, Colin:The Mind Parasites & The Space Vampires
Westerfield, Scott: Peeps (and the sequel, Last Days)
White, James: Star Surgeon
Movies & TV shows
*28 Days Later
*28 Weeks Later
Alien
Babylon 5
Braindead
Brain Damage
Dreamcatcher
Fortitude
Futurama (episode: Raging Bender)
*In the Flesh
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Kiseiju (Parasyte)
Legion
Life Force
Night of the Creeps
*Night of the Living Dead
*Shaun of the Dead
Stargate
Star Trek: The Next Generation (episode: Conspiracy)
The Bay
The Expanse
The Faculty
The Girl with All the Gifts
The Hidden
The Puppet Masters
The Thing
*The Walking Dead
*Train to Busan
Twin Peaks
Venom
*World War Z
X-Files (episode: Ice)
*Zombieland
Video Games
Dying Light
Left 4 Dead
Halo
Inside
Limbo
Resident Evil 4
The Last of Us
Ayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy thank you finding this post is a dream come true you saved me an epic amount of staring at a computer. Blessings from all the gods of every pantheon created and yet to be imagined on you and your descendants.
Do you happen to have information regarding the prevalence in pop culture plotted to a time graph?
Glad this post was helpful! Unfortunately, I don’t have info regarding the prevalence in pop culture over time. You might be able to get some info about the popularity of this topic in science and pop culture by playing with ngrams: https://books.google.com/ngrams