SHTF novels?

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winstonsmith

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Any good SHTF novels? Or movies? What do the authors have to say on the best guns for it:p ?

Specifically, I really enjoy stories where alot of people are from the world, and an individual(s) has/have to fend for themselves, a la 28 days later.

The proverbial feces hitting the oscilating blade could be anything, invasion, nuclear war, aliens, coming of the Rapture... just looking for some good novels.

Cheers!
 
There is a book by a local author in Arkansas named " The New Madrid Run". It is a great SHTF book. The premise is what if the new madrid fault erupted, no government, costal flooding and such. People basically on there own. You can get it from amazon.com.
 
Books:

Rawles, James Wesley: Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse
Larry Niven: Lucifer's Hammer
Don L. Tiggre: Y2K
Matthew Bracken: Enemies Foreign and Domestic (political upheaval more than SHTF)
John Ross: Unintended Consequences (again, political SHTF rather than disaster SHTF)

And one that I highly recommend although it has nothing to do with SHTF or guns is T.H. White's The Once and Future King.

Movies:

Red Dawn (the classic! :))
 
Fail Safe.

You might also enjoy John Ringo, Thomas Perry, or John Maxim, although in most cases it is the individual philosophy that matters most.
 
Wolf and Iron by Gordon R Dickson is pretty damned good.

Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven and Jerry Pornelle

Footfall by Larry Niven and Jerry Pornelle



The Dickson book is a lot more conventional 'economy collapses' kind of scenario, the latter 2 involve deadly asteroids or aliens.
 
Frugal Squirrels had a Patriot Fiction board with some good stories written by regular folks'
 
_Earth Abides_, by George R. Stewart. First published in 1948.

It starts with a _The Stand_ like scenario: a new and virulent bug kills pretty much everybody. The book follows one man through the rest of his life, as he finds a woman, starts a family, finds a scattered few others, etc. He attempts, and mostly fails, to preserve civilization.

You will not forget this book.
 
Alas Babylon and Lucifer's Hammer are both excellent.

Some Heinlein: Farnham's Freehold, Tunnel in the Sky

I liked New Madrid Run too.

Of course, Patriots: Surving the Coming Collapse is practically the standard.
 
The Postman.

The book, not the movie. David Brin was the author IIRC.

There are also scads of SF distopia novels which are not quite SHTF, but certainly futures one wouldn't care to live in.

Ranging from Harry Harrison's Make Room! Make Room! (filmed as Soylent Green) through John Brunner The Sheep Look Up and The Shockwave Rider to Neal Stevenson's SnowCrash.

John Wyndham The Day of The Triffids is a classic. As is John Christopher's The Death of Grass. Both of those are old school Brit SF and probably out of print. THere's also interesting newer Brit SF like Peter F. Hamilton's Mindstar Rising which while not exactly SHTF, postulates an interesting post-global warming scenario.
 
I was going to weigh in with NO BLADE OF GRASS until I read Mostly Harmless' post (never realized Christopher's novel had both a U.S. and British title...). Oh, well--I'll just second his vote. NO BLADE OF GRASS/THE DEATH OF GRASS is one of the grimmest SHTF novels I've ever read, by an accomplished science fiction writer. I do believe it's out of print, but if you can scare up a copy, it's worth a read.

GRASS was also adapted into a 1966 movie directed by Cornel Wilde (of THE NAKED PREY fame). It was a faithful adaptation, which I was able to see in its initial release (am definitely giving away my age here...). I believe the movie is out of circulation also, but if my memory isn't playing tricks, would also be worth the effort to dig up.

-- JFrame
 
I read a book a long time ago called War Day by Whitley Strieber and James Kunetka that was pretty good.

It's about a post nuclear war world and follows a few survivors.

I would recommend it.
 
I enjoyed...
Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse
Alas Babylon
Uninteded Consequences (working through it)

I did not enjoy...

The New Madrid Run
The Rift

I will try Lucifer's Hammer
 
Sci-Fi is filled with many outstanding examples written in the 70's, which lack the political slant so evident in many newer storylines, and which detract from the enjoment of many otherwise decent stories ...

When it comes to simple and easy-reading paperback books, though ... especially if you're interested in reading some 70's-ish firearms thinking ... see if you can find the first half dozen books of Jerry Ahern's "The Survivalist" series, long out of print, to my knowledge ...

Of course, no genre-linked list would be complete without at least the first half dozen books of William W. Johnstone's "Ashes" series, starting with Out of The Ashes. After the first half dozen books, though, it became a bit taxing even for grocery-store isle fiction labeled Men's Action-Adventure.

I think you'll probably end up on someone's "list" if you order them online, though.;) :rolleyes: :D
 
labgrade - Triple Ought became Patriots: Surviving the Coming Collapse.
 
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