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[j_k_redtail]

Saw the movie, but haven't read the book....is it much different from the movie?

It is. The book is great.

I'd add WarDay by Whitley Strieber. Takes place in the years following a cold-war era nuclear exchange. It's one of the darkest books I've ever read.

 

[bigf00t]

The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

Was a good book set after the depletion of petroleum and fall of western civilization. No more cross-ocean shipping except by schooner or airship, and genetically engineered viral outbreaks are the norm.

 

[clockworkinyou]

z for zachariah. it's more for children, so it's an easy read, but i still enjoy re-reading it every so often.

I remember reading that as a kid... The cover alone was pretty ominous, but the book was pretty good, albeit dark, for a kids book.

Another vote for Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood

 

[Mackenzie 92]

Emergence by David R. Palmer


one of my favorites. written in an odd style tho.

 

[weremichael]

The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi

Was a good book set after the depletion of petroleum and fall of western civilization. No more cross-ocean shipping except by schooner or airship, and genetically engineered viral outbreaks are the norm.

I really love that book. I liked the pacing and the world building that Bacigalupi created. Any other recommendations for this type of dystopian fiction?

 

[kittens]

I can't recommend this book enough. One of my favorite titles from my favorite author.

 

[ISOM]

Alas, Babylon, great book.

 

[DS-61-5]

Echoing the many recommendations for Canticle for Leibowitz, but with a qualification: only the first section/story. The second one is serviceable, and the third is downright mediocre.

I Am Legend is excellent.

While not strictly post-apocalyptic, I'd also give a nod to "Who Goes There?", the short story on which The Thing is based. The isolation in Antarctica gives it a similar feeling, I think. Ditto The Time Machine.

The other post-apoc stuff I usually suggest you've already read.

 

[antipod]

Haven't read that many post-apocalyptic books and this thread seems like a good source to pick up a couple.

If I have to mention one, that probably won't be mentioned here, it's P.C. Jersild's After the flood. It's a swedish post-nuclear-war-apocalyptic novel from 1982. It's pretty bleak, probably more than The Road, and is said to be quite realistic in how it depicts such a world.

Haven't read it in like 20+ years but I remember that I liked it quite a lot back then.

 

[Deleted member 1235]

"Wool" is supposed to be pretty good. I have it sitting on my bedside table, but haven't started it yet. You can borrow it, if you like.

it's the best. seriously the best ever. so great.

edit: also want to recommend dog stars. Some people were bothered by the style of writing, but I loved it.

 

[Charlatan]

Wool is indeed great. Highly recommended.

Another classic I haven't seen mentioned is Earth Abides by George R. Stewart. It belongs in the same bin with Alas, Babylon and On The Beach. I found Earth Abides a very compelling read, and it's stuck with me for a long while after I finished it. Please don't be turned off by the cheezy Kindle cover!

 

[SillyEskimo]

No Blade of Grass by John Christopher is a classic IMO.

A virus kills off all the grass, the UK decends into anarchy, and you follow 2 families as they make their way to a potato farm located in a valley owned by a family member. There are some tough/terrible decisions made along the way.

Would you kill another family to save yours? A mother, father, and their children?

 

[ElectricBlue187]

No Blade of Grass by John Christopher is a classic IMO.

A virus kills off all the grass, the UK decends into anarchy, and you follow 2 families as they make their way to a potato farm located in a valley owned by a family member. There are some tough/terrible decisions made along the way.

Would you kill another family to save yours? A mother, father, and their children?

Why is the grass so important that its absence causes anarchy?

 

[jason10mm]

Why is this not on Kindle?

I have (had) "A Canticle for Liebowitz" on my kindle. It is a large print format, which is mildly annoying, but it was sold by amazon. This was back in the early days of the kindle though, when folks could sneak stuff through without all the proper rights, so maybe this was not a strictly authorized version.

Hmmm, I can't find it on my amazon list, nor is it in my calibre archive, so they must have reached out and plucked it back at some point.

Anyway, I found it a bit underwhelming, personally.

 

[luxarific]

Why is the grass so important that its absence causes anarchy?

Kind of spoilery: It's a shorthand for

Spoiler

food crops (wheat, barley, rice are all grasses).

 

[luxarific]

Echoing the many recommendations for Canticle for Leibowitz, but with a qualification: only the first section/story. The second one is serviceable, and the third is downright mediocre.

Have you ever heard the radio adaptation? That's how I first was introduced to the novel when I was eight or nine. It was very good and basically sparked my love of apocalpytic/post-apocalyptic/science fiction.

 

[Dead Man]

I'll second Alas, Babylon and follow up with On The Beach by Nevil Shute and Harlan Ellison's Vic and Blood stories. There's also tons and tons of post-nuclear men's adventure fiction, such as The Survivalist series by Jerry Ahern, but while I have a terrible weakness for that sort of thing it's not something I'd actively recommend to anyone else.

I recently read I Am Legend by Richard Matheson and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's similar structurally to zombie fiction, but pre-dates Romero's Night of the Living Dead by fourteen years, so it's not what you would call part of the current craze.

FnordChan

Came to post Ellison. Excellent stuff.

 

[FUBAR McDangles]

After the End is a collection of short stories set after a bunch of apocalypses.

Some of the stories are very, very good, while some are average and some are downright horrible. The format allowed me to read a short story before bed every night for two weeks or so and it was pretty nice. I'd recommend it.

That Amazon link I posted above has two of the stories available to read. They are two of the higher end ones, although neither is among my favorites.

 

[hey_monkey]

You might like Anthony Burgess's The Wanting Seed. It's more dystopian, I suppose, but particularly in the second half, there are a lot of elements shared with many post-apocalyptic novels.

 

[Mackenzie 92]

After the End is a collection of short stories set after a bunch of apocalypses.

Some of the stories are very, very good, while some are average and some are downright horrible. The format allowed me to read a short story before bed every night for two weeks or so and it was pretty nice. I'd recommend it.

That Amazon link I posted above has two of the stories available to read. They are two of the higher end ones, although neither is among my favorites.

this was pretty good. would love to see a couple of full novels based on some of the stories.


edit: nevermind, was thinking of this one AFTER