Best apocalyptic fiction by new authors?

The age of miracles by Karen Thompson Walker is a recent good one. It's about what happens when the earth gradually starts to spin slower and slower.

Nice thread ladies
I suggested China Mieville on another thread and no-one agreed but I think he's amazing - under sci-fi/ steampunk
particularly Perdido Street Station and The City and the City

Cat's Cradle is great Shadowfall

Can we add Flowers for Algernon to the Classic list please - beustifully written and very poignant.

And Iain M Banks culture novels are a space-opera must-read
Tricky to pick but personally would chose Player of Games, Consider Phlebas and Ferrsum Endjin (post-apocalypse)

And for some space-zombie antics
Night's Dawn Trilogy - Peter Hamilton (Reality Dysfunction is book 1)

If I had not deleted that book from my Kindle, I could have searched for that reason (which obviously made no mark on me). Would you write it to me shortly in a PM? Since we have bored this thread to tears, maybe we can continue this conversation there

They do say why they don't head for Antarctica in OTB (she says desperately trying not to give anything else away!)
It is fascinating to talk about like this though, most of the reasons you dislike the book, are the very reasons I like it so much, and it is good to be able to discuss it at great length! like this
I once got abuse heaped on me in a chat room because I happened to say that I'd never got into Lord of the Rings, and some random Uber-Fan decided that made me worse than Hitler and lost no time in telling me to fuck the fuck off and all sorts, so a reasoned rational discussion makes a refreshing change

PomBear - I'm really that sad, too and love extended monologues talking about books, especially with exceedingly rare MNers like you who don't take personal offence at their favourite books being criticised. Thank you for letting me

"They do go fishing, but they debate the date because to actually admit there isn't going to be another season etc means admitting that it's the end of everything, and it's hard to do."

I understand that admitting one's own doom is hard to do, but you would expect at least most of the rational adults to have come to admitting it a long time ago and started doing something about it. As I said before, start making super-thick animal skin clothes and plan to move further south to Antarctica on that submarine of theirs, for example. Why the hell don't they do this? Normal humans would at least try to add at least several months to their lives, and who knows what will happen once they are there? Maybe something about the south pole (extreme cold? magnetic field?) will keep harm away - why not try?

Instead, they stick their heads in the sand and debate marriages, children that will never happen and fish seasons All of them. How is that even possible in a largish group of people that there isn't even one who wants to try something (anything) against the annihilation of the human race?

"It's like visiting someone who is very old, or ill, and they say "oh I'm not long for this world" and you say "Don't be daft, you've got years in you yet""

Yet the old man says "I'm not long for this world", meaning that he knows what is ahead. Unlike this bunch of muppets.

A comparable example would be a group of very old & very ill people talking about whether they should exercise more to look good for the ladies. You would go and think they have gone senile, the poor dears.

I was going to post an other impassioned defence of On the Beach and address all your points one by one Cote (yes, I am that sad ) but there would be loads of spoilers for people who haven't read it yet so I shall resist apart from the fishing one since that's already out there.
They do go fishing, but they debate the date because to actually admit there isn't going to be another season etc means admitting that it's the end of everything, and it's hard to do. It's like visiting someone who is very old, or ill, and they say "oh I'm not long for this world" and you say "Don't be daft, you've got years in you yet" when everyone in the room knows they haven't actually got very long at all...
I remembered "Into the Forest" today too, that's a YA one that I really enjoyed. It's by Jean Hegland.

"There isn't an escape option, they can't run"

They can spend those months making some very thick clothes, hop on their submarine and go further South. See if they can make a go of it in Antarctica. You would expect at least some of them to at least try.

"it's the knowledge of their own future (or lack of) that some of them are sometimes in denial about. That's not uncommon in people who know they're dying, it's not moronic."

Moronic is stuff like not fishing because it is not yet the season. What exactly is the point of still thinking of fishing seasons, as if the fish population will live any longer than September themselves?

On the Beach is one of those that left me lying in bed into the small hours wondering what "it" is all about, where we're going, what happens when we die, are we anything beyond a bunch of cells?

In the book they're not just facing their own deaths they're facing the annihilation of mankind. There isn't an escape option, they can't run,They've accepted it because it's inevitable - hence their serenity. The whole world has been wiped out over over the last 2 years, so they know what's coming. They're not fighting to stay alive, it's the knowledge of their own future (or lack of) that some of them are sometimes in denial about. That's not uncommon in people who know they're dying, it's not moronic.

More than anything the book illustrates the absolute futility of nuclear war. Me - I think it's powerful stuff. (I'm not disputing some of the language is stilted and I don't care for the way he refers to the child)

And it's also one of the few books that I can remember where I was when reading certain chapters (last chapter or so- in the kitchen making tea, I was leaning on the worktop sobbing. I even cried over the animals)

_

The Postman - David Brin (US), After the world has ended man finds postman's uniform and starts his own delivery service by default
Survivors Terry Nation (UK) The tv adaptation is what sparked my interest in all things PA - to my shame I didn't read the book till a couple of years ago.
Go go girls of the apocalypse - Victor Gischler (US) Years after the apocalypse Mortimer Tate emerges from his well stocked cave to find out what's happened over the last 10 years. If books had a B-movie category this would be in it.
Hater and the rest of the series by David Moody (UK) - certain members of the population become almost rabid and murderous almost overnight.

Rot and Ruin (US zombies) - the first in the Benny Imura series by Jonathan Maberry, I read this at a similar time as the Mira Grant trilogy and it's not too dissimilar in that it takes part some years after the zombie uprising and the zombies aren't the story, they're just something to deal with.

I like reading historical apocalyptic fiction because it is interesting to see how things happened back when there were different values. It's interesting to contrast it to modern apocalyptic fiction. We rely on technology a lot more and know a lot less about where our food comes from or how to get buy without our electricals.

PomBear it's on my tbr list - moved higher up the list now because of your enthusiastic review :o

I've only ever read one other book, when I was a teenager, by Nevil Shute - A Town Like Alice, which I liked very much, but found the crucifixion scene very upsetting.

He was definitely "of his time" and I'm sure there are far better more realistic apocalyptic tales out there, but it is the harking back to a time of stiff upper lips and not making a fuss nostalgia that appeals. Am also thinking 1940s films like Brief Encounter type characters and voices. It's not a genre that I know much about, but am dipping a tentative toe in the water :)

For fantasy/vampire fiction, there is also Let The Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist, which is £1.09 on the Kindle at the moment, if anyone is interested. It's YA as well.

It must be an English thing.

To me, characters look like prize idiots racing to their Darwinian doom in cheery denial and moronic plans for a next year that will never come.

They are waiting for fishing season ffs. What the hell for? It's not like the fish population will live after September, either.

And don't get me started on the woman hoping that couple will get married and have children, saying she keeps forgetting that they'll all be dead in a few months. Oh just hurry up and die, you pea-brained muppet

Gawd, thinking about that ridiculous book makes me go all stabby

I adore On the Beach, it's one of my favourite books of all time
I think it's the Stiff Upper Lip everyone has, even though it's set in Australia, it was very much of the 50s and "Empire" and I tend to hear all the dialogue in my head in very "Noel Coward" cut glass accents.
It's so different to all the other EOTW books where everyone riots and loots and kills and pillages, and we see the very worst in people; Shute has showed everyone as being so very dignified and making the best of the worst of a bad job iykwim - they accept the truth, they know what's coming, and they also know, right down inside where it matters that This Is It, and the only thing they can now do is go quietly, with dignity, and try and spare their loved ones any unnecessary suffering.
It makes me howl every time I read it, I start with a snivel about half way through, and just sob my way to the end every single time I read it. I have to be in the mood for a good cry before I start.
I do think it is important to keep in mind when it was written, and the political situation in the world at the time, with the Cold War and such like, for a while there was a genuine possibility that a nuclear war would break out, and the scenario of the spreading radioactivity is actually perfectly plausible - a lot more possible than hundreds of other dystopian and apocalyptic settings for books.
Things like the submarine captain remaining faithful to his wife, and getting gifts for her and the children to "take home with him" even though he knows they are dead and he is dying, just make me weep for them all - I suppose to modern eyes it is odd that someone would keep that faith, but to readers at the time the book was written it was natural, right, and proper, and a sign of just how much he loved his family.
I shall stop wittering I just love the book so much and could go on and on even more about it for hours
I guess if you don't like/enjoy it, then you don't, and that's ok, there are plenty of books that loads of people rave about that I just can't get into, or don't enjoy, but anyone who likes dystopian fiction and hasn't read On the Beach, don't just dismiss it please, wait until you feel maudlin and want a good sob, get a bottle of wine and a box of tissues, and give it a chance

And another one - not entirely sure if this counts as apocalyptic fiction given the historical aspects but one I enjoyed reading:

Connie Willis - Doomsday Book

Time travel has been discovered in the near future and historians travel back in time to study history. One Oxford history student accidentally ends up in 1348 just as the Black Death reaches England for the first time.

Lots of good suggestions above.

A few more -

Kate Wilhelm - Where Late The Sweet Birds Sang (sci-fi, old, post apocalypse). Starts off with human cloning as a way of humanity surviving ecological catastrophe.

S.M. Stirling - Dies The Fire (apocalyptic). All electrical devices and firearms stop working & plunge world into a new dark age. There's a few sequels but I've not got round to those yet.

Kurt Vonnegut - Cat's Cradle (old, sci-fi, apocalyptic). Crazy scientist has invented a super freezing chemical which gets badly out of control.

Lauren Oliver - Delirium (dystopia, YA). Romantic love is considered a disease and everyone gets brain surgery to stop them ever falling in love once they get to late teens.

Thank you to whoever recommended The Giver by Lois Lowry - I read it in an afternoon! I really didn't expect to be so moved and affected by it but my mind keeps turning it over and over.

Sometimes I like reading really bad ones as much as the really good ones. Like when I watch shit sci fi and horror on the TV to amuse myself.

I really enjoyed Coldbrook, which was recommended on here at some stage.
The stand, the road, work war z. I didn't enjoy the passage as much.

I really loved Then by Julie Myerson, but I know she is not well liked on MN.

I also liked Jorge Saramago Blindness

Lobbing - Would you call it in any way plausible? Does it 'work' as a book on any level (believable characters, credible plot, etc)?

And if not, what was it that you 'loved'?

That bit I quoted downthread sums the book up for me.
"Ooh I hope they get married & have children"
"Err... but we'll all be dead by September"
"Oh dear, I keep forgetting"

Huh!?!? You morons, just hurry up and die already

Sorry, I get really riled up about this book

Cotedazur, I have to disagree - I loved it, even if it did make me feel miserable to a degree no other book has...but each to their own and all that.

I'd sooner chew my own arm off than read anything else by Margaret Atwood, and loathed 'Death of Grass' by John Christopher but I'm aware others don't feel the same and wouldn't life be boring if they did?!

I found a ya self published zombie romance novella series called Love and Decay which I'm really enjoying. The author releases a new episode fortnightly comprised of about 4 chapters (~20k words)

The Chemical Garden trilogy by Lauren Destefano...very reminiscent of Handmaids tale!

I'm going to put my foot down about On The Beach by Nevil Shute and say that it should not make it to any "Best Of" list, purely on the grounds of being a completely unrealistic, laughable story of how people would NOT behave when faced with annihilation - not trying to save their lives by moving down south, talking about whether to start fishing season a bit early this year (as if there will be a next year, ffs), the guy's wife is concerned about his career (although they are all going to die soon) and so he wouldn't think of refusing an assignment, which would take him away from his wife & newborn baby for months. What?

Truly pathetic excuse for a sci-fi book (Sorry lobbing )

An example:

They are talking about a couple and this woman says "I hope they get married and have children". When told how unlikely that is with, you know, certain death by September, she replies:

" Oh dear, I keep forgetting "

Really???