Allison Hewitt Is Trapped is the tale of a young grad student/bookstore clerk swept up in the confusion of a zombie apocalypse. The story is actually the novelization of a fiction blog created by author Madeleine Roux, writing from the first-person perspective of Allison who blogs about her adventures via sporadic access to a military broadband network. The action starts with Allison holed up in the breakroom of her workplace awaiting rescue or any word of the outside world. When it becomes apparent that neither is coming it falls upon Allison to rally the small, fragile band of customers and co-workers trapped alongside her and find a way past the undead masses to the world beyond.
This novel provides examples of the following:
- The Ace:
- Collin, a handsome British former soldier-turned professor and storyteller who creates a massive community of survivors which he holds together mostly through sheer willpower and charisma.
- Ned, a badass soldier with near-perfect aim who is also a devoted husband and father.
- Action Mom: Subverted with Corie who has the traits of one, but ultimately forsakes her children for The Black Earth Wives.
- Action Survivor: Allison
- Apocalyptic Log: Some of Allison's commentors describe their own deteriorating situations before disappearing altogether.
- Arc Words: Liberty Village
- Bland-Name Product: Allison is employed by the Brooks and Peabody bookstore chain.
- Creator Provincialism: Much of the story takes place in Madeleine Roux's home turf in Wisconsin.
- Crazy Survivalist: The Territorials; stereotypical heavily armed rednecks who act as brigands.
- Cult: The Black Earth Wives, a truly creepy collective of Christian women out to purge the world of the corrupt and repopulate it with the pure.
- Deadpan Snarker: Matt has his moments, Ted is a professional, and Julian raises it to high art.
- Downer Ending: While Allison's own story ends happily enough, Dr. Burroughs dismisses it entirely, refuses to publish it, and basically spends the last two pages of the book telling Professor Stockton all The Reasons Allison Sucks.
- Dropped a Bridge on Him: Allison, (and the reader,) never learns what became of Matt, Phil, and Janette, but Dapper's burned tail implies a horrific accident involving the Molotov cocktail they were carrying.
- Ear Worm: Collin habitually whistles "Let's Go Fly A Kite" from Mary Poppins. It subsequently gets stuck in Allison's head at inopportune moments; typically when she's trying to think about anything besides Collin. Later it becomes
Awesome Music when it gives Allison the strength to finish climbing the embankment into Liberty Village. - Fiery Redhead: Averted with Holly, played straight with Renny and with Finn.
- Guile Hero: Allison, to the point where Odysseus himself is (apparently) her spirit guide.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Julian
- Hero of Another Story: Dr. Marion Moore.
- All of the blog commentors are essentially this.
- Ice Queen: Lydia. Allison can't see liking her even if the situation with Collin weren't an issue.
- Important Haircut: The inhabitants of the bookstore are starting to accept the gravity of their situation when Allison cuts her hair and that of the other women short for practical reasons.
- Killer Rabbit: Infected SQUIRRELS, of all things, which are as contagious and carnivorous as any other zombie.
- Missing Mom: Allison was separated from hers by the Outbreak and is now determined to find her.
- Names to Run Away from Really Fast: The Black Earth Wives. While named after the suburb they came from, the name sounds just plain ominous and the Wives more than live up to it.
- Nobody Poops: Completely averted; sanitation and hygiene are constant issues the survivors face.
- Not Using the "Z" Word: Played with. Allison does use it, but tends stick with calling them Groaners or Floaters most of the time.
- Our Zombies Are Different: The Infected come in two types: Groaners whose noisiness and clumsiness makes them easy to kill, and Floaters who are silent, stealthy, and much more dangerous. Both types grow weaker the longer they go without food, but they do not seem to die of starvation.
- Papa Wolf: Ned
- Platonic Life-Partners: Allison and Ted.
- Roaring Rampage of Revenge: When Zack betrays the group and seemingly engineers Holly's death, Allison goes literally Ax-Crazy for a short time, chopping off his feet and leaving him for the zombies.
- Shout-Out: Too numerous to list. Allison is a literature student and all of her blog entries have titles lifted from famous works of literature.
- Team Pet: Dapper
- Twofer Token Minority: Renny, a black lesbian.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Most of the commentors who don't make it to the blog's end give warning that they're going to stop responding, but a few simply stop commenting abruptly and with no warning, leaving the reader to assume the worst.
