What is your favorite apocalyptic fiction?

[Lord Kimbote]

I have read a few excellent novels during the past year that take place during/after an apocalyptic event, or describing the breakdown of society from within. Alas Babylon by Pat Frank and Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle come to mind immediately, and Cormac McCarthy's The Road may be the best post apocalyptic novel I have ever read.

I would be interested to hear from you about your favorite novels in this genre.

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[Doubletap]

Well..you beat me to Alas Babylon and Lucifer's Hammer.. But..if you like a bit of sci-fi in the mix..I'd recommend Farnham's Freehold.. Sorry..can't remembr the author at the moment..

 

[CharonPDX]

The "Emberverse" trilogy by S.M. Stirling. ("Dies the Fire", "The Protector's War", and "A Meeting at Corvallis".) Premise: Electricity and "fast combustion" stop working, the aftermath. (aka: Nothing electric, not even simple battery-powering-a-light, no explosives, not even steam power works.) The world quickly descends into chaos and massive deaths. The books take place in the Willamette Valley, which makes it even better. It covers the factions that take over the Willamette Valley. First book takes place from the time of the "apocalypse" to about one year later - the second and third take place 10 years later. Comes across as very believable outcome of what would happen.

The writer has a few more books in the same world, one set that takes place in a different location, one that takes place a couple decades after the first trilogy. I haven't read the other books, just the three mentioned.


Also, "World War Z".

 

[unionguy]

a second on Emberverse series by Stirling, love the premise and Oregon setting. Octavia's Butler's duo Parable of the Sower and Talent something are both great reads (and they travel to Oregon too!).

 

[DinhRose]

The old testament...

I just finished listening to "we're alive". it's audio story of survival after a zombie outbreak. It's actually more about how hard it is to survive rather than just killing zombies.

 

[jbett98]

"Earth Abides" by George R. Stewart
The book earned much praise from James Sallis, writing in 2003 in the Boston Globe:

This is a book, mind you, that I'd place not only among the greatest science fiction but among our very best novels. Each time I read it, I'm profoundly affected, affected in a way only the greatest art — Ulysses, Matisse or Beethoven symphonies, say — affects me. Epic in sweep, centering on the person of Isherwood Williams, Earth Abides proves a kind of antihistory, relating the story of humankind backwards, from ever-more-abstract civilization to stone-age primitivism. Everything passes — everything. Writers' reputations. The ripe experience of a book in which we find ourselves immersed. Star systems, worlds, states, individual lives. Humankind. Few of us get to read our own eulogies, but here is mankind's. Making Earth Abides a novel for which words like elegiac and transcendent come easily to mind, a novel bearing, in critic Adam-Troy Castro's words, "a great dark beauty.

 

[slimmer13]

The Stand

 

[powersbj]

Well..you beat me to Alas Babylon and Lucifer's Hammer.. But..if you like a bit of sci-fi in the mix..I'd recommend Farnham's Freehold.. Sorry..can't remembr the author at the moment..

R.A. Heinlein (off the top of my head my head, can't remember his first name.

Lucifers Hammer for the old stuff, I enjoyed 1 second after for something a little more recent.

 

[darkminstrel]

"The Postman". Part of it takes place right around here even.

 

[Mark W.]

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy,

 

[Father of four]

Movie: The Chronicles of Riddick.

 

[EZLivin]

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy,

That is why I carry a towel in my BOB.

 

[civilian75]

Mostly the classics, like:
- I am Legend / Omega Man, and,
- Soilent Green
- Planet of the Apes (the original series)
- Postman

Runner ups: Waterworld, Madmax, for giggles

But, on a more serious note:
-Book of Eli, and
-Left Behind series, because it is the better one of the at least loosely based on Apocalypse/Revelations.

 

[Blue Devil PA]

One Second After, by Forsythe
Lights Out, by Halfast (online)
Day by Day Armageddon, by Bourne (for the zombie lovers)
Survivors, by Rawles

 

[saxon]

A Canticle for Leibowitz is a post-apocalyptic science fiction novel by American writer Walter M. Miller, Jr., first published in 1960. Set in a Roman Catholic monastery in the desert of the southwestern United States after a devastating nuclear war, the story spans thousands of years as civilization rebuilds itself. The monks of the fictional Albertian Order of Leibowitz take up the mission of preserving the surviving remnants of man's scientific knowledge until the day the outside world is again ready for it.

Scholars and critics have noted the theme of cyclic history or recurrence in Miller's works, epitomized in A Canticle for Leibowitz. David Seed, in discussing the treatment of nuclear holocaust in science fiction in his book American Science Fiction and the Cold War: Literature and Film (1992), states, "it was left to Walter M. Miller's A Canticle for Leibowitz to show recurrence taking place in a narrative spanning centuries." David N. Samuelson, whose 1969 doctoral dissertation on Canticle is considered the "best overall discussion of the book", calls the "cyclical

 

[g19]

I've read Rawles first book, it was okay. I also read One Second After, that was a great book, shared it out to others who opened their eyes finally. I also enjoy all of internet PAW fiction by the authors, Jerry D Young, Tired Old Man, Kathy in FL.
There are some other novel type post apoc. that are on my list to read this winter.

 

[gunfreak]

The Road. I couldn't put it down, most parts made the hair on my neck stand up.

 

[Lord Kimbote]

Saxon,

Good for you. Lebowitz is one of the best novels I have ever read, regardless of genre. I am an atheist, but I didn't even my the Catholicism. If I were a secondary school policy maker, I would make reading this a requirement to high school graduation.

 

[matthew029]

Swan Song

Read it like 20 years ago.

 

[GRUNDEL]

First I will say I don't consider myself a big reader. I just can never find the time and when I do I fall asleep. As for the ones I have read these top my list.

1) Swan Song ---- this is hands down my favorite.
2) The Road ---- warm and fuzzy, not so much.
3) One Second After --- fast easy read.
4) The Stand ---- this should maybe be higher on the list but I read it many years ago. May need to give it another go.
5) Patriots ---- not truly post apocalyptic but pretty good

Trying to get into "Dies the Fire" right now but keep stalling out......... Might have to try Lucifer's Hammer.

Funny thought, when I was young and read these kinda books I didn't have kids I thought it would be cool if everything was all "Mad Max". Now that I am old, slow, and have a Family I just read them and think how totally Forked I would be......