Looking for a post apocalyptic or dystopian type of book to read on vacation
The books that I’ve really enjoyed reading are; Sirens of Titan, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, Brave New World and Swan Song
Posted Jul 11, 2022, 11:51 PM UTC
9698
First two that come to mind:
Blindness by José Saramago
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
23
Do NOT read The Road on vacation. Don’t do it.
Do
Not
Seriously. That book is way too dark and will mess with your head. It is not to be read when you are supposed to be enjoying life.
Seriously seriously save The Road for a time when you can ugly cry for a good day or two afterwards and contemplate what a messed up world we live in.
15
Thank you for the advice, I had not taken that into consideration
1
For a vacation read I’d keep it to something with a good storyline and a “human spirit will prevail” theme.
If you want to commit to a series, try Wool or Passage. Both I think are 3 books and both are good series.
Want to keep it to a single book, maybe go old school and try Earth Abides.
If you haven’t read 1984 or Animal Farm both of those are classics and worth a read.
None of those should make those around you wish they had left you at home.
2
The Road. So good.
9
i second blindness! i just finished reading it and it’s one heck of a page-turner
7
I just finished it last week! I was pleasantly surprised and not only by the narrative, but also how easy it was to adapt to his unconventional style.
4
The Stand by Stephen King
Alas Babylon By Pat Frank
A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter Miller
22
I’d also add Steven King’s entire Dark Tower series, although it’s way too much for one vacation.
6
The Dog Stars
16
Just finished this - wonderful book
2
Haven’t heard of this one - do tell?
1
Author Peter Heller. Post-viral infection apocalypse. Gritty and dark but with some hope and redemption at the end. Heller is an Iowa Writer's Workshop grad and it shows. Great writing.
6
Very cool, thank you! Sounds like my jam.
1
Red Rising
I can almost guarantee it'll be the kind of book you're looking for. Whether you want post apocalypse, sci-fi, action, thriller, it covers all the bases. It's an easy read and there's plenty of books in the series if you end up liking it.
14
Thanks for the suggestion, looks promising. So far it’s on the top of my list!
2
Definitely. Let me know if you read it and if so come on over to r/redrising
1
See the threads:
- "Post-Apocalyptic Recovery Fiction" (r/printSF; August 2015)
- "Books like Mad Max" (r/booksuggestions; November 2021)
- "Post apocalyptic books are my favorite!" (r/booksuggestions; 14 April 2022)
- "Apocalyptic/post apocalyptic books that don’t involve mutations (no zombies, super strong/fast humans etc.)" (r/booksuggestions; 19 April 2022)
- "'Unique' Post-apocalyptic Stories?" (r/printSF; 24 April 2022)
- "Creature invasion/apocalypse books" (r/booksuggestions; 27 April 2022)
- "Fantasy Settings which are actually a Post-Apocalypse Future Earth?" (r/Fantasy; 2 May 2022)
- "any good post-apocalyptic military stories?" (r/printSF; 16 May 2022)
- "Good apocalypse novels?" (r/Fantasy; 20 May 2022)
- "Good Post apocalypse/zombie apocalypse book?" (r/booksuggestions; 15 June 2022)
- "Books that are technically post apocalyptic, but don’t seem like it on the surface." (r/booksuggestions; 22 June 2022)
- "Tender is the Flesh" (r/booksuggestions; 29 June 2022)
- "Post apocalyptic book recommendations" (r/Fantasy; 1 July 2022)
- "Books about scavenging in a post apocalyptic setting" (r/booksuggestions; 4 July 2022)
- "Are there any books or series that take place in a 'dead' world?" (r/printSF; 6 July 2022)
- "Looking for strange, weird books about a wildly different life in a world post something extreme like global nuclear war/bioterrorism/etc, or something with similar ~vibes~" (r/printSF; 9 July 2022)
13
See the threads:
We need a bot that would scrub through a thread and list all suggested books and post a TL:DR post after x amount of hours.
9
Preferably with links, and, if possible, consolidating the information (author, title, series title).
I'm afraid I misread/only scanned your post, and this is what I wrote to reply:
I don't yet have lists for all of these, but here are the topics/requests I've observed get repeated over the last couple of years (approximately; I'm also on r/Fantasy, r/printSF, and r/scifi):
Nonfiction:
- (Auto)biographies
- Diversity-ish (threads so far: "Unlearning toxic masculinity?" and "I’m a somewhat sheltered, lower-middle class, straight white guy. What books would be most eye-opening, informative, and important for me to read, in terms of challenging my biases and broadening my world view?")
- General nonfiction
- History
- Lesbians/LBGTQ
- Medicine/biology
- Native American (history)
- Organized crime
- Self help books // I have depression/mental illness?
Fiction:
- Alternative history
- Antiheros
- (Post-)apocalyptic
- Books for children/starting readers
- Dystopias
- Female characters, strong
- Get me reading again/I've never read
- Historical fiction
- Hard SF
- Knights/King Arthur
- Lesbians/LBGTQ
- Military SF/F
- Mythology/folklore
- Mystery
- Pirates
- SF/F badasses
- SF/F deserts [sand and rocks, not sweets]
- SF/F humor
- SF/F, Philosophical
- SF/F and politics
- Urban fantasy
- Vampires
4
Could i bother you to send this list to me in private message
1
Just save the comment.
1
The Road by Cormac McCarthy
Metro 2033 by Dmitry Glukhovsky
10
{{The Passage by Justin Cronin}}
9
Finishing book 2 right now! BURING through the series.
It was recommended to my dads friend, then my dad, then me, then by me all with the same line: i hate vampire books generally and cant get into them, now let me tell you about a vampire book you absolutely NEED to read’
3
^(By: Justin Cronin | 766 pages | Published: 2010 | Popular Shelves: horror, fiction, science-fiction, fantasy, sci-fi)
IT HAPPENED FAST. THIRTY-TWO MINUTES FOR ONE WORLD TO DIE, ANOTHER TO BE BORN.
First, the unthinkable: a security breach at a secret U.S. government facility unleashes the monstrous product of a chilling military experiment. Then, the unspeakable: a night of chaos and carnage gives way to sunrise on a nation, and ultimately a world, forever altered. All that remains for the stunned survivors is the long fight ahead and a future ruled by fear—of darkness, of death, of a fate far worse.
As civilization swiftly crumbles into a primal landscape of predators and prey, two people flee in search of sanctuary. FBI agent Brad Wolgast is a good man haunted by what he's done in the line of duty. Six-year-old orphan Amy Harper Bellafonte is a refugee from the doomed scientific project that has triggered apocalypse. Wolgast is determined to protect her from the horror set loose by her captors, but for Amy, escaping the bloody fallout is only the beginning of a much longer odyssey—spanning miles and decades—toward the time an place where she must finish what should never have begun.
With The Passage, award-winning author Justin Cronin has written both a relentlessly suspenseful adventure and an epic chronicle of human endurance in the face of unprecedented catastrophe and unimaginable danger. Its inventive storytelling, masterly prose, and depth of human insight mark it as a crucial and transcendent work of modern fiction.
^(This book has been suggested 21 times)
^(27455 books suggested | )^(I don't feel so good.. )^(| )^(Source)
2
I was just about to say the same . What a trilogy !
2
This!
2
The Southern Reach Trilogy by Jeff Vandermeer (Book 1 is Annihilation and is a trippy page turner, didn’t see the movie but I imagine it wasn’t as good as the book)
Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood (a post apocalyptic story that goes back and forth between the past and the present - the present being post apocalypse)
Descender by Jeff Lemire (this is a beautifully illustrated intergalactic apocalyptic graphic novel series with humans aliens and robots of course)
8
In no particular order:
The brief history of the dead
Warday
Oryx and crake
Zone one
The postmortal
The last policeman
Station eleven
Wool trilogy
World war z
Childhoods end
1984
The postman
On the beach
Handmaid's tale
Foundation
I am legend
This is the way the world ends
The gone away world
The windup girl
Far north
Metro 2033
Nod
Wayward pines
The dog star
Wasteland saga
Children of time
Good morning midnight
American war
Golden state
Leave the world behind
Never let me go
8
1984 is one of the original greats.
2
Solid list, thanks.
1
1984 🙌🏼
1
I just finished {{Station 11}} and it was very, very good.
8
^(By: Emily St. John Mandel | 333 pages | Published: 2014 | Popular Shelves: fiction, science-fiction, sci-fi, dystopian, dystopia)
Set in the days of civilization's collapse, Station Eleven tells the story of a Hollywood star, his would-be savior, and a nomadic group of actors roaming the scattered outposts of the Great Lakes region, risking everything for art and humanity.
One snowy night a famous Hollywood actor slumps over and dies onstage during a production of King Lear. Hours later, the world as we know it begins to dissolve. Moving back and forth in time—from the actor's early days as a film star to fifteen years in the future, when a theater troupe known as the Traveling Symphony roams the wasteland of what remains—this suspenseful, elegiac, spellbinding novel charts the strange twists of fate that connect five people: the actor, the man who tried to save him, the actor's first wife, his oldest friend, and a young actress with the Traveling Symphony, caught in the crosshairs of a dangerous self-proclaimed prophet.
^(This book has been suggested 15 times)
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Seconding this recommendation! It’s my favorite book read in 2022 so far.
1
I’d definitely consider it, if I hadn’t recently watched the hbo series
1
The series deviates significantly from the book. Same premise and main characters buts it’s executed very differently.
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The Girl with All the Gifts
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One of those books that are way better than the movie.
Also the second one is decent as well, the boy on the bridge
3
The past couple of years the author put out The Rampart Trilogy, starting with The Book of Koli, and the entire series is great
1
Scary
2
Fahrenheit 451
I Am Legend
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I loved Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood.
4
I’d recommend Tender is the Flesh.
It’s an odd one, but unforgettable to say the least.
3
Severance by Ling Ma
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Snow Crash
3
Snow Crash is amazing, and perfect dystopian.
SevenEves is amazing and a very cool apocalypse book.
3
‘Day of the Triffids‘ by John Wyndham and ‘A Canticle for Leibovitz’ by Walter Miller Jr.
3
The Stand is similar to Swan Song. Many will tell you that it's better, but I love McCammon, his Boy's Life is my favorite book of all time. The Stand is... really good. The best King's standalone book imo and one of the best apocalyptic books ever written
3
{{One second after}}
2
^(By: William R. Forstchen | 352 pages | Published: 2009 | Popular Shelves: fiction, post-apocalyptic, science-fiction, sci-fi, apocalyptic)
New York Times best-selling author William R. Forstchen now brings us a story which can be all too terrifyingly real ... a story in which one man struggles to save his family and his small North Carolina town after America loses a war, in one second, a war that will send America back to the Dark Ages ... A war based upon a weapon, an Electro Magnetic Pulse (EMP). A weapon that may already be in the hands of our enemies.
Months before publication, One Second After has already been cited on the floor of Congress as a book all Americans should read, a book already being discussed in the corridors of the Pentagon as a truly realistic look at a weapon and its awesome power to destroy the entire United States, literally within one second. It is a weapon that the Wall Street Journal warns could shatter America. In the tradition of On the Beach, Fail Safe, and Testament, this book, set in a typical American town, is a dire warning of what might be our future ... and our end.
^(This book has been suggested 4 times)
^(27433 books suggested | )^(I don't feel so good.. )^(| )^(Source)
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Hugh Howey's Wool - Post-apocalyptic
Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle - apocalyptic-survival
And the next two books as.well. Shift. Dust
Yesss came here to recommend Wool
I just finished the wool trilogy and i cannot emphasis this recommendation enough it is INCREDIBLE