The End of the World, but without zombies and such....

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by steven522

Yes, I second these. When Worlds Collide is the basis for the classic sci-fi movie of the same name. A rogue planet is entering the solar system and on a collision course for Earth. An effort is put forth to build and launch "ark" space ships to attempt to save mankind. After Worlds Collide is the follow up novel.

"When World's Collide" is an absolute classic, and is available as a very nicely-formatted ebook from Gateway SF. "After Worlds Collide" - the sequel - is an real stinker - I honestly wouldn't bother with it .

[Rizla]

Originally Posted by Istvan diVega

Thank you sooo much for that awfully useful contribution....

Ditto.

[LovesMacs]

I have a soft spot for Emergence by David R. Palmer. It's out of print and not available in e-format to my knowledge. It is about the aftermath of a world war involving nuclear and biological weapons. The only survivors left are a small number of unusually gifted people, some of whom come to believe that they are the next step in human evolution. The story unfolds through a teenager's journal entries as she tries to make sense of the world and just survive.

[Lima Bean]

I second The Dog Stars.

I also recommend The Age of Miracles, by Karen Thompson Walker

“It’s never the disasters you see coming that finally come to pass—it’s the ones you don’t expect at all,” says Julia, in this spellbinding novel of catastrophe and survival by a superb new writer. Luminous, suspenseful, unforgettable, The Age of Miracles tells the haunting and beautiful story of Julia and her family as they struggle to live in a time of extraordinary change.

[covingtoncat73]

Originally Posted by Lima Bean

I second The Dog Stars.

I also recommend The Age of Miracles, by Karen Thompson Walker

“It’s never the disasters you see coming that finally come to pass—it’s the ones you don’t expect at all,” says Julia, in this spellbinding novel of catastrophe and survival by a superb new writer. Luminous, suspenseful, unforgettable, The Age of Miracles tells the haunting and beautiful story of Julia and her family as they struggle to live in a time of extraordinary change.

Age of Miracles was good, I agree! I started on Countdown City by Ben Winters and am loving it even more than the first book, The Last Policeman, which I recommended. I am apparently drawn to first-person narration.

[user3162]

Lights Out by David Crawford
http://www.amazon.com/Lights-Out-Dav.../dp/0615427359

[Istvan diVega]

Tanks you all for the continuing stream of recommendations!!

Too many to address individually now, but the list of new acquisitions has grown by another fourteen titles. It's also nice to reminded of old, nearly forgotten favourites which can be hunted down and re-read. Also it's been a good number of years since I last had an End of the World reading spree, so I'm really looking forward to enjoying these over the autumn and winter.

There's room for more though; Calibre isn't straining at the seams just yet.

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by Istvan diVega

Tanks you all for the continuing stream of recommendations!!

Too many to address individually now, but the list of new acquisitions has grown by another fourteen titles. It's also nice to reminded of old, nearly forgotten favourites which can be hunted down and re-read. Also it's been a good number of years since I last had an End of the World reading spree, so I'm really looking forward to enjoying these over the autumn and winter.

There's room for more though; Calibre isn't straining at the seams just yet.

So don't forget to listen to REM's End Of the World As We Know It...

[hildea]

Frank Schätzing: The Swarm.
The first one to die was a fisherman off the coast of Chile. An oil company discovers some weird worms on Norway's continental shelf. Canadian whale watchers observe orcas behaving oddly. Shark attacks. Weird boat accidents. Gradually, it escalates...

In between the action there's oodles of information on everything from crab physiology to ocean geology. Usually that annoys me, but Schätzing managed to keep it interesting. I find it hard to forgive him for what he did to my home town, though.

(Don't read the Goodreads description, by the way -- for some reason they've summarised/spoiled three quarters of the book.)

Originally Posted by BenG

War with the Newts by Karel Čapek

Seconded! I read it this summer (was in Prague, and had to buy something by a local author). It's both really funny, and with a very dark view of humanity. One of the most chilling parts is a description of newth physiology, very dry and matter of fact, penned by a scientist, that looks like something Mengele could have written.


I haven't read Wool yet, but I see it recommended a lot, I'll have to put it on my pile of stuff to read.

[Jdschi]

Originally Posted by covingtoncat73

Quite. That brings to mind a book I am very, very glad I read before I saw the movie and which does have two (of its six) sections that are dystopia/post-apocalypse, Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell.

Seconded! I loved that book so much - I read it because I wanted to see the movie but read the book first, and that was a really good idea.

I want to throw in a recommendation myself: Spin by Robert Charles Wilson. It's not so much post- but pre-apocalyptic so it doesn't fit your criteria exactly, but I found it really interesting to see how the world's population might react if everyone knew that doom was inevitable (also, the reason why the earth is doomed was sooo interesting to read about!)
Unfortunately, the ending falls flat and somewhat spoiled the book for me - I didn't know that it is part of a series. I have no interest in reading the next book in the series, but up until the end I found the book really, really gripping, and I think I was only disappointed in the book because it started out so strong (and because I expected a stand alone novel when it really wasn't).

[jehane]

Thanks for this thread, I am just looking into dystopia having not read much since my teens (reflected in my recs). It's a little disappointing that it seems modern dystopia is fixated on the paranormal though.

Z for Zachariah, Robert C. O'Brien
- immediate post-nuclear apocalypse, YA

Children of the Dust, Louise Lawrence
- quite similar to Z for Zachariah in premise

Obernewtyn, Isobelle Carmody
- decades or longer post-nuclear, YA,
- longer series is unfinished after 20 years but first book can be read as stand-alone

Timescape, Gregory Benford
- hard SF, near future (well, it's now the past...) of environmental collapse

Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
- I actually haven't read it, though it's been on my TBR list forever. But I thought this list was incomplete without it.

The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
- post-war, YA
- I read these as an adult, and mainly because I was on holiday and swapped books with my sister, but I was pleasantly surprised. I thought the movie did a good job as well.

[davidfor]

Originally Posted by hildea

Frank Schätzing: The Swarm.
The first one to die was a fisherman off the coast of Chile. An oil company discovers some weird worms on Norway's continental shelf. Canadian whale watchers observe orcas behaving oddly. Shark attacks. Weird boat accidents. Gradually, it escalates...

In between the action there's oodles of information on everything from crab physiology to ocean geology. Usually that annoys me, but Schätzing managed to keep it interesting. I find it hard to forgive him for what he did to my home town, though.

Reading that reminded me that when I mentioned John Wyndham novels earlier, I missed The Kraken Wakes. The Good reads description is:

Ships are sinking for no apparent reason, carrying hundreds to a dark underwater grave. Strange fireballs race through the sky above the deepest trenches of the oceans. Something is about to show itself, something terrible and alien, a force capable of causing global catastrophe.

[steven522]

Originally Posted by jehane

Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
- I actually haven't read it, though it's been on my TBR list forever. But I thought this list was incomplete without it.

Definitely a good read. This is one I re-read every few years.

Fahrenheit 451 by Bradbury falls into this category also as a frequent re-read.

[DianNC]

I picked up Refuge by Richard Herley on a recommendation by someone here at MR a couple of years ago. It may have also been free on Amazon at the time. Be forewarned, though -- it's fairly brutal and not for everyone.

[usuallee]

I'd enthusiastically second/third Oryx & Crake, The Road, and Cloud Atlas. I cannot recommend Age of Miracles, I hated it. Its totally affected, stilted purple prose writing was terrible. It was actually the worst book I have started all year, I think. But I acknowledge a lot of people seem to like it, so maybe I'm the outlier.

Anyway, I didn't see Soft Apocalypse by Will Mcintosh mentioned yet. Apologies if it was already. I very strongly recommend it. It is a terrific book that really surprised me with how well-written it is and how it took some genuinely unexpected twists and turns. As the title suggests, it's an end of the world/ post-apocalyptic scenario where there is no single "big event", just lots of little things that cause society to erode and slide downwards towards barbarism. The characters try to hang onto normalcy whenever possible, but it gets harder and harder to do so. Fascinating, disturbing at times, poignant and chillingly all-too-plausible. I kinda want to re-read it now that I've described it.