Best Post-Apocalyptic Fiction
A list for the best after the fall.
1 The Stand
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4.3 of 5 stars 4.30 avg rating — 211,627 ratings
2 The Road
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3.93 of 5 stars 3.93 avg rating — 273,763 ratings
3 The Hunger Games (The Hunge...
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4.44 of 5 stars 4.44 avg rating — 1,575,619 ratings
4 World War Z: An Oral Histor...
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4.08 of 5 stars 4.08 avg rating — 111,069 ratings
5 1984
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4.06 of 5 stars 4.06 avg rating — 907,228 ratings
6 Catching Fire (The Hunger G...
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4.3 of 5 stars 4.30 avg rating — 922,138 ratings
7 I am Legend and Other Stories
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3.92 of 5 stars 3.92 avg rating — 57,518 ratings
8 Fahrenheit 451
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3.92 of 5 stars 3.92 avg rating — 512,914 ratings
9 Mockingjay (The Hunger Game...
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4.03 of 5 stars 4.03 avg rating — 838,879 ratings
10 The Handmaid's Tale
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3.97 of 5 stars 3.97 avg rating — 250,329 ratings
11 The Giver (The Giver, #1)
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4.11 of 5 stars 4.11 avg rating — 530,196 ratings
12 Swan Song
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4.29 of 5 stars 4.29 avg rating — 17,562 ratings
13 The Gunslinger (The Dark To...
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3.99 of 5 stars 3.99 avg rating — 149,785 ratings
14 The Passage (The Passage, #1)
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3.99 of 5 stars 3.99 avg rating — 66,148 ratings
15 Oryx and Crake(MaddAddamTri...
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3.96 of 5 stars 3.96 avg rating — 62,474 ratings
16 Alas, Babylon
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4.03 of 5 stars 4.03 avg rating — 14,440 ratings
17 Brave New World
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3.9 of 5 stars 3.90 avg rating — 547,572 ratings
18 A Canticle for Leibowitz
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3.95 of 5 stars 3.95 avg rating — 31,071 ratings
19 Earth Abides
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3.94 of 5 stars 3.94 avg rating — 8,502 ratings
20 Lucifer's Hammer
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3.94 of 5 stars 3.94 avg rating — 17,836 ratings
21 On the Beach
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3.88 of 5 stars 3.88 avg rating — 14,358 ratings
22 Divergent (Divergent, #1)
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4.39 of 5 stars 4.39 avg rating — 293,510 ratings
23 The Postman
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3.83 of 5 stars 3.83 avg rating — 12,995 ratings
24 The Day of the Triffids
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3.95 of 5 stars 3.95 avg rating — 27,177 ratings
25 Lord of the Flies
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3.59 of 5 stars 3.59 avg rating — 907,419 ratings
26 The Host (The Host, #1)
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3.86 of 5 stars 3.86 avg rating — 350,512 ratings
27 Do Androids Dream of Electr...
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4.03 of 5 stars 4.03 avg rating — 96,930 ratings
28 The City of Ember (Book of ...
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3.82 of 5 stars 3.82 avg rating — 84,685 ratings
29 Ender's Game (Ender's Saga,...
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4.28 of 5 stars 4.28 avg rating — 401,094 ratings
30 Uglies (Uglies, #1)
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3.88 of 5 stars 3.88 avg rating — 189,955 ratings
31 The Time Machine
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3.78 of 5 stars 3.78 avg rating — 114,929 ratings
32 Life As We Knew It (Last Su...
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3.91 of 5 stars 3.91 avg rating — 43,162 ratings
33 The War of the Worlds
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3.71 of 5 stars 3.71 avg rating — 72,888 ratings
34 Cat's Cradle
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4.18 of 5 stars 4.18 avg rating — 128,826 ratings
35 The Maze Runner (Maze Runne...
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3.99 of 5 stars 3.99 avg rating — 89,742 ratings
36 Blindness (Blindness, #1)
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3.99 of 5 stars 3.99 avg rating — 61,774 ratings
37 One Second After
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3.92 of 5 stars 3.92 avg rating — 9,171 ratings
38 The Forest of Hands and Tee...
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3.62 of 5 stars 3.62 avg rating — 40,706 ratings
39 Animal Farm
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3.75 of 5 stars 3.75 avg rating — 981,378 ratings
40 The Year of the Flood (Madd...
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3.97 of 5 stars 3.97 avg rating — 26,891 ratings
41 Y: The Last Man, Vol. 1: Un...
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4.19 of 5 stars 4.19 avg rating — 33,520 ratings
42 The Walking Dead, Compendium 1
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4.44 of 5 stars 4.44 avg rating — 18,864 ratings
43 The Waste Lands (The Dark T...
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4.18 of 5 stars 4.18 avg rating — 62,949 ratings
44 Parable of the Sower (Earth...
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4.12 of 5 stars 4.12 avg rating — 10,872 ratings
45 A Clockwork Orange
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3.93 of 5 stars 3.93 avg rating — 214,573 ratings
46 Watership Down
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4.0 of 5 stars 4.00 avg rating — 149,706 ratings
47 The Children of Men
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3.66 of 5 stars 3.66 avg rating — 16,632 ratings
48 Z for Zachariah
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3.61 of 5 stars 3.61 avg rating — 5,229 ratings
49 Into the Forest
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3.87 of 5 stars 3.87 avg rating — 3,521 ratings
50 Feed (Newsflesh Trilogy, #1)
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3.94 of 5 stars 3.94 avg rating — 15,235 ratings
51 Pretties (Uglies, #2)
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3.87 of 5 stars 3.87 avg rating — 103,945 ratings
52 Robopocalypse
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3.64 of 5 stars 3.64 avg rating — 13,999 ratings
53 Dies the Fire (Emberverse, #1)
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3.92 of 5 stars 3.92 avg rating — 6,708 ratings
54 Unwind (Unwind, #1)
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4.23 of 5 stars 4.23 avg rating — 52,508 ratings
55 Wastelands: Stories of the ...
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3.79 of 5 stars 3.79 avg rating — 3,198 ratings
56 The Long Walk
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4.08 of 5 stars 4.08 avg rating — 35,502 ratings
57 Never Let Me Go
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3.76 of 5 stars 3.76 avg rating — 144,172 ratings
58 Delirium (Delirium, #1)
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4.08 of 5 stars 4.08 avg rating — 113,160 ratings
59 V for Vendetta
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4.23 of 5 stars 4.23 avg rating — 85,271 ratings
60 Snow Crash
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3.91 of 5 stars 3.91 avg rating — 100,088 ratings
61 The Dead and the Gone (Last...
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3.83 of 5 stars 3.83 avg rating — 14,779 ratings
62 Day by Day Armageddon (Day ...
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4.06 of 5 stars 4.06 avg rating — 6,678 ratings
63 Neuromancer (Sprawl, #1)
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3.78 of 5 stars 3.78 avg rating — 113,684 ratings
64 Riddley Walker
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4.09 of 5 stars 4.09 avg rating — 2,799 ratings
65 Insurgent (Divergent, #2)
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4.31 of 5 stars 4.31 avg rating — 155,902 ratings
66 Good Omens
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4.27 of 5 stars 4.27 avg rating — 145,024 ratings
67 Armageddon's Children (Gene...
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4.06 of 5 stars 4.06 avg rating — 6,711 ratings
68 The Chrysalids
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3.89 of 5 stars 3.89 avg rating — 14,027 ratings
69 Specials (Uglies, #3)
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3.77 of 5 stars 3.77 avg rating — 77,128 ratings
70 Shadow and Claw (The Book o...
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4.13 of 5 stars 4.13 avg rating — 5,787 ratings
71 The Dead-Tossed Waves (The ...
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3.95 of 5 stars 3.95 avg rating — 15,789 ratings
72 Galápagos
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3.85 of 5 stars 3.85 avg rating — 30,019 ratings
73 Go-Go Girls of the Apocalyp...
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3.74 of 5 stars 3.74 avg rating — 1,063 ratings
74 Eternity Road
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3.7 of 5 stars 3.70 avg rating — 1,924 ratings
75 Damnation Alley
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3.48 of 5 stars 3.48 avg rating — 1,926 ratings
76 Rot and Ruin (Benny Imura, #1)
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4.16 of 5 stars 4.16 avg rating — 9,744 ratings
77 This World We Live In (Last...
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3.8 of 5 stars 3.80 avg rating — 11,625 ratings
78 Logan's Run
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3.63 of 5 stars 3.63 avg rating — 3,032 ratings
79 When the Wind Blows
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4.2 of 5 stars 4.20 avg rating — 581 ratings
80 The Brief History of the Dead
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3.65 of 5 stars 3.65 avg rating — 5,973 ratings
81 The Fifth Sacred Thing (May...
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4.24 of 5 stars 4.24 avg rating — 2,537 ratings
82 The Death of Grass
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3.84 of 5 stars 3.84 avg rating — 1,794 ratings
83 The Running Man
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3.69 of 5 stars 3.69 avg rating — 31,309 ratings
84 The Reapers Are the Angels
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3.92 of 5 stars 3.92 avg rating — 3,787 ratings
85 Wool Omnibus (Wool, #1-5)
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4.38 of 5 stars 4.38 avg rating — 18,765 ratings
86 Emergence
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4.26 of 5 stars 4.26 avg rating — 555 ratings
87 Monster Island (Zombies, #1)
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3.54 of 5 stars 3.54 avg rating — 4,711 ratings
88 Cell
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3.54 of 5 stars 3.54 avg rating — 71,262 ratings
89 Birthmarked (Birthmarked, #1)
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3.96 of 5 stars 3.96 avg rating — 17,993 ratings
90 Hater (Hater, #1)
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3.66 of 5 stars 3.66 avg rating — 4,042 ratings
91 Genesis
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3.78 of 5 stars 3.78 avg rating — 4,161 ratings
92 Monster Nation (Zombies, #2)
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3.63 of 5 stars 3.63 avg rating — 2,481 ratings
92 The Rising
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3.76 of 5 stars 3.76 avg rating — 3,929 ratings
94 How I Live Now
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3.62 of 5 stars 3.62 avg rating — 12,611 ratings
95 The Girl Who Owned a City
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3.84 of 5 stars 3.84 avg rating — 1,981 ratings
96 The Walking Dead, Vol. 1: D...
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4.32 of 5 stars 4.32 avg rating — 52,513 ratings
97 LeanRx: Results May Vary
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4.8 of 5 stars 4.80 avg rating — 10 ratings
98 Patriots: Surviving the Com...
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3.57 of 5 stars 3.57 avg rating — 1,607 ratings
99 Girlfriend in a Coma
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3.6 of 5 stars 3.60 avg rating — 10,058 ratings
99 The Drowned World
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3.6 of 5 stars 3.60 avg rating — 3,233 ratings
571 books · 1,390 voters · list created April 18th, 2009 by Osvaldo Ortega (votes) .
Lists are re-scored approximately every 500 seconds.


Osvaldo
Osvaldo
312 books
24 friends
Anne
Anne
369 books
2 friends
Sven
Sven
2022 books
43 friends
William
William
1881 books
186 friends
Amy
Amy
755 books
106 friends
Michele
Michele
2050 books
15 friends
Loren
Loren
270 books
43 friends
Jim
Jim
296 books
13 friends

More voters…


Comments (showing 1-9 of 9) (9 new)

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message 1: by Osvaldo (new)

Osvaldo Ortega Here is a list for the best of 'after the fall'. I wondered whether to call this apocalyptic or post-apoc. My interest lies more in what happens after it all goes wrong. Though the narration of how it all ends in 'Alas Babylon' had me riveted.


Mike (the Paladin) Lucifer's Hammer and The Postman are listed in separate editions that need to be consolidated... They'd be higher on the list if all their votes were together.


message 3: by Neospooky (new)

Neospooky There's a lot of things on the list that aren't post-apocalyptic and are simply dystopian. But it did point me in the right direction to add to my "to-read" list!


Mike (the Paladin) That seems to happen on a lot of lists. Epic fantasy or Urban fantasy lists end up with almost anything that "might" be considered fantasy and so on. I don't think everyone reads the requirements that closely... Oh well.


message 5: by Tina (new)

Tina A good many of these aren't post-apocalyptic or even dystopian! Many of these are just set in the future! Snow Crash is not post-apocalyptic. Neuromancer is not post-apocalyptic. Never Let Me Go is the furthest thing from post-apocalyptic. WTF.


message 6: by Jonathan Brett (new)

Jonathan Brett Neospooky wrote: "There's a lot of things on the list that aren't post-apocalyptic and are simply dystopian. But it did point me in the right direction to add to my "to-read" list!"

There are some books that belong on neither post-apocalyptic or Dystopian lists. Utopia by Lincoln Child is a good example.


message 7: by Malia (new)

Malia What part about the fall of the united states gonverment, crash of all major mainstream religions, and people living in u-store-it franchises makes Snow Crash and non post apocalyptic book? It's cover should be by the word in the dictionary as an example. And news flash all post-apocalyptic books are set in the future.


message 8: by Sérgio (last edited Oct 28, 2012 07:15am) (new)

Sérgio Wow! I don't even consider myself that well-read but I can see that this list needs serious cleaning up.

Here are the books that I've read that I'm pretty sure don't fit the list, but since I'm not the list creator I won't erase anything if there isn't some consensus over it.

Brave New World
The War of the Worlds
The Trial
The Man in the High Castle
Roadside Picnic
Naked Lunch

What do you people think?


message 9: by Mike (last edited Nov 26, 2012 07:50am) (new)

Mike Add Ender's Game to the list of books on here that are neither post-apocalyptic nor dystopian if these are to have any meaning as sub-genres.


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