Post-Apocalyptic books

Anyway, back on topic.

Many years ago (about 7 or 8 I think) my dad bought me a book called
'Firebolt' for my birthday. Its completely brilliant and after reading this thread I’ve dug it out from beneath a pile of software engineering course notes and I have it beside me.

Basically its set a little outside (later) the time frame of fallout (no one can remember a war, or a before time), from the perspective of two 'Tribals' who set out to rescue their fathers from 'Slavers' (The Orelord and his minions). Before they set off they visit an old man (a pre-war soldier, age unknown) who maintains a weapons cache. The highlight of which is the Firebolt, a highly destructive energy weapon controlled by the power of thought which has the power to corrupt its user.

There are a lot of nice details in the book (like the map on the inside cover) and a lot of things are tantalisingly hinted at but ultimately left up to your imagination.

The author is Joe Buckley, and if you can get your hands of a copy I cannot highly recommend it enough. Might be hard to get it though as its an Irish book by an Irish author (I’ve never even seen it in a shop here so I cant imagine the situation being any better outside the country of origin) and information is sparse on the internet.

Anyhoo, I’m going off to bed to read it right now - ill scan the first chapter if there's any interest.
 
There's a book called "After the flood" by the scandinavian author Per Christian Jersild which I've read and it was quite good. It was alot darker if you compare it to the Fallout setting and it felt kind of "realistic".

If I remember correctly the book is about a man who is about 30 years old and that's very rare because almost no new children are born since all women have become sterile from the radiation. The rest of the humanity is almost 40-50 years old and not many memories (if any) remain of the world before the war. The book is a bit depressing because there is absolutely no light in the end of the tunnel. The book is quite good though and worthy of a closer look.

Nevil Shute's On the Beach has been mentioned here already and rightly so as well as Stephen King's The Stand. 800 pages of post-apocalyptic goodness!
 
Spazmo said:
The Postman, David Brin <--Bad movie, great book.
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I didn't much care for the Postman. David Brin needs to learn to show, not tell. When Powhatan showed up, I was hoping the book would become a little more interesting, as I found him to be a more likeable character than The Postman, who was basically a con man at heart. Too bad the second he decides to DO something, the book is over.

If we're throwing in comics, Earth X (the original, not the spinoffs) is a pretty good... it's not post-apocalyptic, but it strikes me as a lot like what the FO world was like just before the bombs fell. Everything is filthy, everyone is hungry, and nothing ever seems like it will get better. Pre-apocalyptic, maybe?
 
TomCo said:
Anyhoo, I’m going off to bed to read it right now - ill scan the first chapter if there's any interest.
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I don't know for others, but I'd really appreciate it.
sounds interesting :)
 
Maybe I just missed it, but I thought someone would have mentioned "The Chrysalids" by John Wyndham. Probably the only PA book I've ever read, apart from the first Dark Tower book.
 
quietfanatic said:
Is it good? I might get it from the library and read it soon.
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Yes, I believe it is. I highly recommend it. I don't really know how to summarise it, but it's a kind of futuristic version of the Salem witch hunts, but with mutants instead of witches.

Incidentally, due to the numerous recommendations made in this thread I plan to buy a few Deathlands books soon. Are any in particular better than others, or should I just start from the beginning of the series?
 
Ah yes, the Chrysalids. Got it from the library yesterday, along with Day of the Triffids. Both two great post-apocalypticish books.
 
Dream is dead said:
TomCo said:
Anyhoo, I’m going off to bed to read it right now - ill scan the first chapter if there's any interest.
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I don't know for others, but I'd really appreciate it.
sounds interesting :)
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Sure,

Ill get on that tomorrow morning.
 
The Chrysalids was very good, similar in style to the Triffids, with a frontier atmosphere that actually reminded me more of the Dark Tower series than the Crucible. It is a short book too, so it is a very easy read. I was also reminded of the Edenists in the Night's Dawn Trilogy by Peter F. Hamilton, which is pure sci-fi adventure, but still well worth reading, even though it isn't really post-apoc.
 
Most of my A-listers (Earth Abides, Canticle, Bloodmoney, By The Waters of Babylon) have already been called out, but there are a few less substantial titles I enjoyed that as of yet haven't been touched on:

No Blade of Grass, by John Cristopher: The story of the complete biological failure of the world's agriculture and of society's subsequent and rapid implosion, focused through the lens of one man's struggle to get his family across anarchic England to the relative safety of Grandfather's farm. By no means as sunny-funny as topical synopsis makes it sound, this 1956 novel is actually quite dark compared to other P-A fiction of the period, with the survivors quickly realizing that the only moral rubric of any import is what's good for them and theirs. I found it's projection of societal collapse to be quite plausible.

Dark December, by Alfred Coppel: Like most 50's-70's PA Sci-Fi, this one deals with-- SURPRISE!!-- one man's journey across a semi-wasted land to find his family. There is a tad bit of a spin, with our protagonist having spent the war underground as a missile technician lobbing u-235 at the other guys and accumulating whatever guilt issues that might entail, but mostly, the only thing that makes this novel notable in any degree is how typical it is. The recently postwar landscape, inhabitants, and encounters, and even the very PROSE of the book, are all solidly middle-of-the-road, and it makes absolutely no pretense whatsoever of morbidity or complexity. While the setting of the story wasn't anywhere near as ruined as the New California wasteland we all know and love, there were times when I was just overwhelmed by how much reading Dark December made me feel like I was playing through one of those shallow 4-Intelligence do-gooder runs through Fallout, and for that reason alone it brought a smile to my face. It's no masterpiece, but it's a fun, cheesy read, if you're into that sort of thing.

The Last Man On Earth, Collected Short Stories, Edited by Isaac Asimov: As with most anthologies, the individual stories are hit-or-miss, but overall I found it to be quite enjoyable. There are enough good reads, and enough novel (or at least little-used) angles on the end of humanity, to make it worth tracking down.
 
I am really desperate for more fallout!! so desperate in fact I have been reading heavily PA books.

I am on the last in the Doomsday warrior books now (book 19) I have managed to get though the 18 others. These books are hard to get.

I have read loads of others: some Endworld, Lots of Deathlands (really good stuff), 48 and The Wild Shore (great book).

I have loads more Deathlands and Endworld to get though now.

This site: http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/nuclear/a.htm has a more complete lis of books thanwww.pamedia.com[/url]
 
I don't think the book "When the Wind Blows" has been posted. It's a pretty sad short story told in children's storybook type way about an old couple slowing suffering the effects of radiation poisioning. You can find it on the internet, because I've seen it before
 
Guys, stop what you are doing right now and read this book:



The awesome cover with relief and shiny bloodstains alone is enough to buy this book. :shock:

It is about The undead, The living dead, 'Zack', Ghouls, aka: Zombies. Just like Max Brooks' former book; 'The Zombie survival guide' where he predicted an class 4 apocalyptic outbreak of the zombie virus 'Solanum'.

It happens for real this time, it starts in China where the dense population + bad intelligence + human stupidity results in an catastrophic zombie outbreak wich grows exponentially and cannot be stopped anymore. For example as US forces try to stop millions of zombies wich was a few days before the population of New York City. They try and stop them with the full might of modern weapons, tanks, bombers and thousands of soldiers but they are simply not doing enough damage, and it turns into a nightmare. (e.g. you can shoot tank shell size holes in zombies but they will still come at you crawling)
I will not spoil any more but rest assured, humanity will get it's ass kicked (or bitten) realy, really hard.

The individual tales of horror are very tense and nasty, no one is spared as the globe is turned undead. Humanity is showing it's flaws in dealing with this catastrophe wich sometimes result in barbary and fighting along themselves.

If you are a fan of Romero's apocalyptic zombie movies or a fan of humanity's demise in general, buy it! The only drawback is that at some point you will see the last page..
 
Normally I'd cry "gravedig," but that's probably one of the single most useful things I've ever found on these forums. Thanks a lot.

*saved to desk*
 
Volkov said:
Maybe I just missed it, but I thought someone would have mentioned "The Chrysalids" by John Wyndham. Probably the only PA book I've ever read, apart from the first Dark Tower book.
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The Chrysalids, read it years ago and loved it, read isobelle carmody's "obernewtyn" not that long ago and thought whoa Déjà vu, change the names of the main characters and make it a 6 book series and somehow it's not plagiarism???? well i suppose if you copy from many it's called research eh? EH?? :?

me...
 
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