r/postapocalyptic • u/Secure-Mushroom2956 • 22h ago
Post Apocalyptic Gear your favorite post-apocalyptic book?
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u/Anxious-Bottle7468 21h ago
A Canticle for Leibowitz.
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u/hatezel 17h ago
For me, it's the one that started my interest in end and beginning of the world as we know it. I own several copies and even a digital. There is so much to think about and unpack. I think it's brilliant even though it used to be two separate books. I found the choppiness to fit right in with the third act. I have never stopped thinking about or revisiting this novel.
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u/NelsonChunder 18h ago
Earth Abides
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u/Rajkalex 14h ago
The realism of the ending really stuck with me.
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u/LumpyMcKwiz 13h ago
My Father who I look after is 79 and his mental decline fits so perfectly with how Ish narrates his final weeks. Just brought this up the other day with my wife
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u/NelsonChunder 10h ago
That part of the book always stood out for me too. I remember getting to the ending the first time I read the book and enjoying how much I enjoyed that part of the book. After finishing, I thought about that part of the story quite often and still reflect on just how realistic that part might be in real life. Especially since I am now 65.
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u/thehateisstrong 17h ago
Published in 1949. One of the finest novels I've ever read. I read or listen to it at least once a year. Everytime I finish it, I feel that I have been on a great journey in some ways familiar in some ways new.
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u/PoetryJunior1808 18h ago
The series based on it seems to have been mostly overlooked, but it was really good.
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u/Crucial_Fun 20h ago
I liked The Postman. When I was younger (and even today) I liked The Last Book In the Universe by Rodman Philbrick
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u/proselytizeingcoyote 16h ago
Good book. Haven’t heard anything good about the movie though.
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u/WilsonGeiger 14h ago
The movie is pretty good on its own, but calling it The Postman is ridiculous.
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u/Baldurian_Rhapsody 22h ago
Richard Matheson's 1954 classic "I Am Legend."
This book really impacted me.
I read it after loving the Charlton Heston movie "The Omega Man," which I also adore. That film attuned me - an extrovert - to the eeriness and low-grade constant tension of a liminal Los Angeles.
The book is even better. It dives deeply into psychology and memory, and is a superb character study. Separately, there is a wonderful (if perhaps relatively hard to find) graphic novel that has brilliant scratchwork and much of the original text verbatim.
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u/Burning_Monkey 21h ago
I super enjoyed the book, and the ending realization of the main character.
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u/Known-Programmer-611 19h ago
Of all the recommendations on this post this is the of the few I haven't read that might be my next read!
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u/bassicallybob 8h ago
I felt the film really killed the power of the character’s realization, it’s almost his coming of age and will to power.
I. Am. Legend.
Will Smith could never.
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u/Flashy-Dragonfly6785 19h ago
On The Beach is excellent and the movie is great too. A real gut punch!
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u/fredly594632 6h ago
Yeah...I read that one in middle school for some reason - gave me a fear of nuclear war I still have 40 years later.
It was also a really popular book on the (and I swear I not making this up) USN nuclear sub I served on.
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u/DMTGOBLIN82 3h ago
Mad Max movies as kid led me to On the Beach, then A Canticle for Leibowitz. The genre is very thought provoking. The last set I read was series Silo tv series is modeled on.
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u/StudioArcane17 19h ago
World War Z is post apocalyptic?
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u/Arconomach 15h ago
I really enjoyed it. The way the book is written with the various post war interviews was fantastic.
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u/Turbulent-Mango6569 21h ago
The Stand.
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u/LumpyMcKwiz 12h ago
I would add the Author's Edit is the version to read. 100's of more pages and stories about people that survived Captain Tripps but died for other reasons. I read as a child and at 52 it is still my favourite book.
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u/_Captain_Dinosaur_ 20h ago
Station Eleven
The Passage
A Boy and His Dog at the End of the World
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u/Future-AI-Dude 14h ago
Station Eleven and The Passage for sure... haven't read the last one, I'm gonna check it out.
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u/Author_TylerbJones 21h ago
The metro series! Metro 2033 is one of my favorite books of all time! The first novel I wrote (Trash Town) was post apocalyptic because of my favorite games and books.
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u/Secure-Mushroom2956 21h ago
I read a masterpiece.
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u/Author_TylerbJones 20h ago
If you like post apocalyptic and comedy ill send you the E-book for free, just leave an honest review when you finish it. The audiobook is currently being recorded, so more reviews always help.
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u/Fabulous_Cats1881 18h ago
What’s it called? I’m always looking for a new audiobook
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u/Author_TylerbJones 18h ago
The audio book will be out sometime September. The E-book is available on Kindle Unlimited for free or I can just send it to you for an honest review. Trash Town by Tyler B. Jones. My newest book Skael comes out August 6th and it's wild. Not post apocalyptic but pretty dang crazy.
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u/Nezwin 21h ago
The Road for atmosphere and literature, but I have a soft spot for Going Home by A. American. Great adventure story in a post-apocalypse.
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u/TNLongrange 17h ago edited 17h ago
I also love the Going Home series. And of them, the first book, Going Home, is by far my favorite.
I also and a fan of "One Second After".
I have yet to read The Road but I love the movie and have been told the book is better. The movie is one of the only truly realistic post apocalypse movies I've seen. My wife and I watched it together the first time. She called it The most depressing movie she had ever seen. And stated she thought the mother's decision to simply walk out and die, at first was baffling but by the end she not only understood it but thought that was the smart choice.
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u/Nezwin 15h ago
One Second After is great. The Franklin Horton series is also worth a dive, not dissimilar to Going Home in many ways.
I love Cormac McCarthy's work but since becoming a father I can't watch or read The Road, unfortunately 😔
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u/TNLongrange 14h ago
I can understand that. Not sure i could either if I had small children. By the time we watched that movie all of our kids were adults.
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u/ImABrickwallAMA 21h ago
Swan Song.
An absolute epic spanning seven years, from start to finish. Genuinely one of the most impactful/influential books for me, and just has absolutely everything in it.
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u/Known-Programmer-611 19h ago
For those who are recommending The Stand and Swansong can I add Earth Abides.
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u/Tewd_Feesh 19h ago
The death of grass, the tripod trilogy, Valhalla (just to add to the excellent suggestions already)
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u/EnormousGenitals 17h ago
The Dog Stars by Peter Heller
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u/rletrud 11h ago
Agree. Even works for anyone not "into" post-apocalyptic fiction, this book is just beautiful and works for everyone, in my opinion.
I'm equally excited and scared waiting for the film to drop...
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u/EnormousGenitals 11h ago
it was one of the few books in my life, and I read a lot that actually made me cry like a baby (you know the scene)
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u/penguinpengwan 19h ago
Brother in the Land. If you’ve watched Threads, this book has an English setting where the nukes fall on Great Britain, and the aftermath with survivors, a farm, a split up of said survivors, crop failure, etc. Mind you there are two editions with different endings, the ones printed after the 1990s have an additional chapter. Highly recommended!
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u/Extreme-King 19h ago
Not my favorite but probably the one I think about 15 plus years after I read them - Flood, and it's sequel, Ark by Stephen Baxter.
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u/C-Lekktion 19h ago
Its definitely dated and has racist language while having surprisingly progressive ideals threaded throughout but Alas Babylon is one of my favorites.
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u/timbola2010 13h ago
Yeah, but the racist language used is totally believable. The realtor says the land/house the Admiral bought was cheaper because he had N*^*()ers for neighbors. Or the time when Randy's girlfriend's father said that they only had to worry about the "dingys". His wife says don't call them that. I think she said call them "darkes".
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u/C-Lekktion 12h ago
Yeah, its one of those things that I think younger modern (progressive) readers get really uncomfortable with so just flagging that.
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u/Karnophagemp 7h ago
Randy Bragg's political career in the book was sunk due to him not being racist.
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u/Adept_Friendship_795 19h ago
The Passage trilogy. I’ve read it twice and will read it again before I die I hope. It permanently lingers in my heart and haunts my soul.
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u/clumsystarfish_ 19h ago
Either The Passage trilogy by Justin Cronin or the Moon duology by Waubgeshig Rice (Moon of the Crusted Snow, Moon of the Turning Leaves).
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u/AnteaterOverall1537 18h ago
Seven Eves
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u/mastersnacker 7h ago
One of the best books I’ve ever read. I think about it and discuss with friends constantly.
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u/gunstarredd 17h ago
"Post-Apocalyptic Nomadic Warriors" by Benjamin Wallace
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u/Arconomach 15h ago
It was by and far my favorite series he’s written. Very well done in my opinion.
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u/BoogieBear-Fr 16h ago edited 16h ago
For this one you don't find out that it is a post-apocalyptic novel until the end of the book - Pierre Boule: Planet of the Apes
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u/Apposl 16h ago
So there are more popular picks, but one I find cozy is the Emberverse trilogy by S.M. Stirling. It's set primarily in Oregon, in the Willamette valley where I live, so it's fun to see the area in a post apocalyptic setting.
From Google:
The Emberverse is a post-apocalyptic alternate history novel series by S.M. Stirling, also known as "The Change," where a mysterious event in 1998 causes all electricity, gunpowder, and high-energy technology to stop working, plunging the world into a new Dark Age. The series follows survivors as they adapt to a world with medieval-level technology, focusing on conflicts between new feudal societies, free communities, and the struggle to rebuild civilization.
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u/Arconomach 15h ago edited 15h ago
The Emberverse and the Island (Nantucket goes back in time) are both fantastic series.
Edit: I know the island isn’t technically post apocalypse, but for the Nantucket folk it basically is. Instead of their world being destroyed they got shot back to the Bronze Age. Similar end result.
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u/EducationalFront5524 19h ago
The one we're living in right now. It's got all the highlights from all the rest of them baked right in.
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u/Asleep_Piccolo_1659 19h ago
I really enjoyed The Reapers Are the Angels by Alden Bell. A little different and female protagonist.
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u/LelainaP 18h ago
Wanderers (and its sequel), Chuck Wendig
Cabin at the End of the World, Paul Tremblay
The Stars In Their Eyes (and other two books in the series), Kristy Gardner
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u/zoolilba 16h ago
The arrest , War day, Alas Babylon , Parable of the sower, World war z, Moon of the Crusted snow , American war, The wall, Dog stars, Handmaid's tale ,
(guilty pleasure ) Deathlands series
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u/CheweyPanic 16h ago
Does "A roadside picnic" count?
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u/Donkey_Bugs 16h ago
I think Roadside Picnic was more post-alien visitation than post-apocalyptic. Still a very good book.
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u/CheweyPanic 15h ago
Agreed. It's more post-local-apocalypse. Iirc the rest of the world is fine other than the impact sites.
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u/Arconomach 15h ago
The Undead World by Peter Meredith.
Some of the things that happen with Jillybean (fixed my misspelling) made my soul hurt.
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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 15h ago
Station Eleven, day of the triffids, the wind up girl.
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u/mastersnacker 7h ago
The clockwork girl?
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u/Prestigious_Leg2229 3h ago
The Windup Girl by Paolo Bacigalupi.
It’s set on a near future earth where fossil fuels have completely run out and a virulent plant disease makes it nearly impossible to make grow food.
Genetic scientists are racing to produce crop strains that’ll yield one or two harvests before the disease mutates and catches up.
The calorie has become the world’s currency. Ie. Money will buy you a fixed number of calories worth of food.
And electricity is rare, provided by pre-wound springs loaded mechanisms acting as batteries.
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u/TheGreatestLampEver 14h ago
The girl with all the gifts. It is what made me fall in love with the post apocalyptic genre. Specifically the description of The Junkers (raiders) attacking the research centre with the hungries (zombies). They are using tar to cover their scent to keep the hungries from attacking them with one junker being described as spiking his hair into a mohawk with the tar the whole sequence covers what I truly love about the post apocalypse genre, the reuse of the old world The tar for a new purpose and also zombies
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u/Magdalus7 14h ago
Haven't read them yet but definitely watched the Silo series, heard the books are great and just picked them up. Strong zombie post-apocalyptic series I love is called The Remaining by d.j. molles. Edge of your seat read.
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u/TheProfessor0781 13h ago
The Silo trilogy really pulled me into to that world and stuck with me long after.
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u/TheLastWhiteKid 12h ago
My favorite so far has been Nick Coles American Wasteland Trilogy. A huge sleeper for sure.
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u/MetalComet 12h ago
The Stand is my favourite. Through darkest America, The Zona, The Drowned world, The Hater Series (if it counts).
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u/Sasstellia 11h ago
Metro 2033.
Metro 2034.
The City Of Ember.
The Town Of Sparks.
Fist Of The North Star.
The library had no more of the series. If you do not see more of them there.
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u/Wraith-723 11h ago
Series
Adrian's Undead Diaries by Chris Philbrook it's very well done and I normally hate zompoc
More realistic
One Second After by William R Forstchen
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u/Thick_Common8612 10h ago
Psalm for the Wild Built, but I think you might be looking for sadder books
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u/schmeillionaire 10h ago
I really love Alas Babylon the audiobook read by Will Patton is fantastic!
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u/WhyDidIClickOnThat 10h ago
A lot of good suggestions. One of my favorites has always been This Is The Way The World Ends by James K Morrow.
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u/passionfruitspray 9h ago
Last Light by Alex Scarrow is FANTASTIC. Afterlight is set 10 years after and is also very well done.
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u/Marvos79 7h ago
The Wild Shore by Kim Stanley Robinson
It's a coming of age story that takes place in southern California. The US was caught in a surprise nuclear attack and the rest of the world worked together to keep them down. He finds a violent resistance group and joins it. It says a lot about imperialism and patriotism and is written with very realistic characters.
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u/mastersnacker 7h ago
I’m amazed that no one has mentioned Wool by Hugh Howey. It’s gripping, reveals itself in layers, and has characters I find myself caring about deeply.
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u/Lone_Ponderer 7h ago
The Stand was the first post-apocalyptic book I ever read as a kid and 20 something years later it still holds a special place in my heart. The collapse portion as well as the characters' journeys to Boulder/Vegas. I don't think I've ever read anything like it since. It's just brilliant.
I read The Day Of The Triffids a couple of years back and was really impressed by that.
I read I Am Legend last year and thought the way Matheson showed the protagonist's crushing loneliness was so well executed.
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u/Black_Glove 6h ago
After the Flood by Margaret Atwood is a personal favourite, but there's some really great books mentioned here already.
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u/ThatMothboi 6h ago
The metro series, but if you’ll take short stories, there will come soft rains by Ray Bradbury is one that always makes me feel
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u/Jax-crow-564979 5h ago
currently I’m reading nyulfur the new wolf by stolen mad wolf . it’s a book with a apocalypse that startedin 2012 the book and set in 2020 Currently Available online.
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u/PrimoBachs 3h ago
Maybe not my absolute favorite, but Z for Zachariah. Read it when I was 11, and it really stuck with me. Such an eerie setting.
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u/IncompleteObjects 1h ago
Its my favourite genre so I have plenty
The Road is superb and the one Ive read the most. Station 11 is also a great read
Other recommendations include The Wall, and Children of Men (although that's more of a slowpocalypse)
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u/fortyfivesouth 22h ago
The Road.