Book picks similar to
Downward Cycle by J.K. Franks
post-apocalyptic
fiction
survival
science-fiction
Behold, Darkness and Sorrow
Mark Goodwin - 2016
Through one of Danny’s dreams, they learn about the imminent threat of an EMP attack which will wipe out America’s electric grid, sending the country into a technological dark age. Living in a nation where life-sustaining systems of support are completely dependent on electricity and computers, the odds for survival are dismal. Municipal water services, retail food distribution, police, fire, EMS and emergency services will come to a screeching halt. If they want to live through the most catastrophic period in American history, Danny and Alisa will have to race against time to get prepared, before the lights go out. Buy your copy of Behold Darkness and Sorrow and jump into this post-apocalyptic, survival-fiction thriller, today! As with all books by Mark Goodwin, this book contains no profanity and no embarrassing sex scenes. However, if you're offended by conservative principles and biblical references, this book might not be for you.
The Harvesting
Melanie Karsak - 2012
Raised by the town's medium, and dubbed the "weird" girl, the last thing she wants is to go home. When Layla gets a desperate phone call to return just as a mysterious outbreak sweeps the country, Layla's instincts urge her to go. Good thing, because the dead are rising. The town's residents, including the ex who jilted her, will need Layla's help if they hope to survive.
Edge of Collapse: An EMP Post-Apocalyptic Survival Prepper Series (American Fallout Book 1)
Alex Gunwick - 2017
In seconds, his routine business trip becomes a nightmarish struggle to survive. After narrowly escaping a nuclear explosion in San Francisco, the Navy SEAL must travel through a world without rule of law. Relying on his skills and the items in his Bug Out Bag, he fights an epic battle as he struggles to get home. Nothing will stop him from getting back to his family. As his resources run out, his resourcefulness kicks in. His family’s depending on him and he won’t let them down—even if it means leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. Liz can’t believe they’re under attack. At first, it seems like things won’t be too bad. Yet within hours, it seems like the whole world’s gone crazy. With communication lines down, she’s unable to reach her husband, Luke. Getting her kids to their Bug Out Location won’t be easy, but she’s determined to make it. It’s well stocked and safely tucked away in a canyon. But as people begin to flee the cities, a new darkness spreads across America. Her struggle to survive rips apart her core values and forces her to examine what it means to be a mother, a wife, and a survivor. American Fallout is a thrilling post-apocalyptic survival prepper EMP fiction series that makes you step back and ask: Could this happen tomorrow? What would happen if the world’s nuclear arsenal was unleashed? What would you do if it happened while you were away from home? And how would your family survive?
All the Little Children
Jo Furniss - 2017
Overnight, all communication with the outside world is lost.Knowing something terrible has happened, Marlene suspects that the isolation of the remote campsite is all that’s protecting her family. But the arrival of a lost boy reveals they are not alone in the woods, and as the unfolding disaster ravages the land, more youngsters seek refuge under her wing. The lives of her own children aren’t the only ones at stake.When their sanctuary is threatened, Marlene faces the mother of all dilemmas: Should she save her own kids or try to save them all?
Instant Darkness
Mark J. Russell - 2019
When Abram Patterson learns about an impending solar flare, every moment matters. Loaded up in his trusty 1976 Land Cruiser, he must get his wife and daughter from their home in New Hampshire to their remote retreat in Central Vermont. But can he reach his bug out location before civil unrest makes travel all but impossible? A father who must protect his children from certain death. Nick Caulfield, a single father of two, is always in work mode. But when the country is on the brink of collapse, he must focus on getting his children to safety. His neighbor, Abram, has left in a hurry, and he quickly realizes that the region will soon be plunged into chaos. He discovers that his son has acquired directions to his neighbor’s compound, but he suspects they will not be welcomed. A harrowing journey with an uncertain outcome. A Good Samaritan takes a risk to aid a man and his teenaged son and young daughter, but when his services go unappreciated, he feels slighted by the man. Will he take the high ground and be the selfless man he strives to be? Or will he seek revenge, allowing his morals to crumble as humanity quickly unravels? The solar flare is only the beginning. What would you do to protect the ones you love? Instant Darkness is book one in the EMP Crisis Series, a post-apocalyptic survival thriller series about regular people struggling to survive after a solar EMP. For fans of books by Kyla Stone, Jack Hunt, Ryan Westfield, Harley Tate, and T.L. Payne. Buy Now or Read for FREE on Kindle Unlimited. *** This book series contains mild language and some depictions of violence. ***
Soft Apocalypse
Will McIntosh - 2011
This is how our world ends; with a whimper instead of a bang. New social structures and tribal connections spring up across America, as the previous social structures begin to dissolve. Locus Award finalist and John W. Campbell Memorial Award finalist Soft Apocalypse follows the journey across the Southeast of a tribe of formerly middle class Americans as they struggle to find a place for themselves and their children in a new, dangerous world that still carries the ghostly echoes of their previous lives.
Z-Burbia
Jake Bible - 2013
Which is good since the zombie apocalypse has come to Western North Carolina and really put suburban living to the test! Surrounded by a sea of the undead, the residents of Whispering Pines have adapted their bucolic life of block parties to scavenging parties, common area groundskeeping to immediate area warfare, neighborhood beautification to neighborhood fortification. But, even in the best of times, suburban living has its ups and downs what with nosy neighbors, a strict Home Owners’ Association, and a property management company that believes the words “strict interpretation” are holy words when applied to the HOA covenants. Now with the zombie apocalypse upon them even those innocuous, daily irritations quickly become dramatic struggles for personal identity, family security, and straight up survival. Welcome to normal life in Z-Burbia!
The Drowned
Kevin Partner - 2020
Billions are dead, governments are in chaos, and the few survivors left are literally treading water, trying to find the few bits of dry land left.In the midst of the chaos, family ties, determination and the sheer will to live will be the only protection against the complete annihilation of mankind.
Trudge
Shawn Chesser - 2011
With his daughter, Raven and wife, Brook, away visiting her parents in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, Cade hopes his immediate future holds nothing but an easy chair, Mariners on the tube, and paring down a honey-do list a mile long. But those hopes were quickly dashed and his life forever changed when news broke of a clash in downtown Portland between soldiers from the Oregon National Guard and hundreds of anarchist protesters suddenly turned violent and, by one anchor's account, blood-thirsty and cannibalistic. As the first waves of injured bystanders, Guardsmen, and rioters arrived at hospitals in and around Portland, it became apparent that a deadly new disease had been unleashed on the population. Whether the virus was naturally occurring or an escaped lab experiment Cade hadn't a clue, and he wasn't especially concerned until he learned of its unprecedented virulence, unusual method of transference, and the fact that, according to the talking heads on the news, it brought the newly dead back to life, semi-mindless, and with an insatiable desire to feed on the flesh of the living. Armed with this new information and now seeing the bigger cities such as Washington D.C., New York, and Los Angeles rocked by the rapidly spreading scourge, Cade ignores the volley of contradictory edicts drawn up by the White House and set into motion by FEMA and DHS, dusts off his tools of war, and loads his truck with supplies. Unable to get ahold of Brook and Raven and unwilling to leave them at the mercy of some distant politician's inability to hold the nation together, he begins an impossible 3,000 mile journey across a reeling United States with presumably millions of infected in his path and only one acceptable outcome: find Brook and Raven alive-or die trying.
Zero Day Code
John Birmingham - 2019
Then it will collapse. Cut off the resources to New York, Sydney, or even a mid-size metropolis, and millions will soon starve. In Zero Day Code we see those immense and open, hyper-complex, networked supercities of the new millennium die. And in the last moments we see their vengeance take form as all the best and worst traits of humanity bubble to the surface. Zero Day Code is set in a realistic near future with dwindling global food supplies under increasing pressure from worsening droughts, floods and extreme weather events. Written by prolific Australian writer John Birmingham, the thriller follows a handful of survivors from the first day of society’s descent into violent, uncertain futures. James, a consultant to the US National Security Council, is the first to suspect that the worldwide emergence of a crippling computer virus is actually a cover for something else - a devastating cyber-attack by China on the food distribution system of the United States. The attack is a bid for the Middle Kingdom to distract America as it seizes the food bowl of South East Asia and feeds its starving population. But Beijing has miscalculated.Follow the missions of an embittered activist chasing salvation, a single mum rescuing her child from a frantic San Francisco and an army veteran who has long retreated from society, as the world they knew crumbles around them. Please note: this audiobook contains mature content and listener discretion is advised.
MUTINY: A Post-Apocalyptic Thriller
Lee West - 2019
On the last night of their cruise, while most of the passengers are sleep--the unthinkable occurs. A suspected electromagnetic pulse (EMP) damages most of the cruise ship's critical systems, forcing the crew to divert the remaining power to essential systems.While the massive ship struggles in rough seas, the seasick passengers grow increasingly uneasy about their situation. The flow of food and drinks has been significantly reduced, air-conditioning is non-existent and the ship's security team is visibly armed. What they don't know is that the ship has lost contact with the mainland, and their Captain is on the verge of making life-altering decision for all of them.Skeptical of the conditions onshore and unwilling to pull into the ship's homeport without the assistance of local pilot craft, the Captain elects to leave the area and seek safe harbor to the south. There's just one catch. The ship only carries enough food and fuel to last a few more days--and their destination remains uncertain. The geographical scope and magnitude of the damage caused by the mysterious event remains unknown to the crew.With Joe and Meg's prospect of returning home about to slip away, the Birch's face an agonizing choice. Stay with the ship and take a chance on the Captain--or steal a lifeboat and try to return home. Joined by likeminded passengers and a few salty crewmembers, they decide to make their own destiny--despite the unknown dangers.THE MUTINY chronicles this impossible, gut-wrenching journey to get home, where it quickly becomes obvious that THEIR STORY IS FAR FROM OVER!
77 Days in September
Ray Gorham - 2011
Kyle Tait is settling in for his flight home to Montana when a single nuclear bomb is detonated 300 miles above the heart of America. The blast, an Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP), destroys every electrical device in the country, and results in the crippling of the power grid, the shutting down of modern communications, and bringing to a halt most forms of transportation.Kyle narrowly escapes when his airplane crashes on take-off, only to find himself stranded 2,000 miles from home in a country that has been forced, from a technological standpoint, back to the 19th Century. Confused, hurt, scared, and alone, Kyle must make his way across a hostile continent to a family he’s not even sure has survived the effects of the attack. As Kyle forges his way home, his frightened family faces their own struggles for survival in a community trying to halt its slow spiral into chaos and anarchy. 77 Days in September follows Kyle and his wife, Jennifer, as they are stretched past their breaking point, but find in their devotion to each other the strength to persevere.
Incubation
Adrienne Lecter - 2015
Brianna Lewis wants is a cup of coffee. Coffee, to make slaving away in her cell culture lab at Green Fields Biotech a little more bearable on a Friday afternoon when everyone is home already. What she doesn’t count on is a group of terrorists blowing up all the entrances to the building and taking her and a select few others hostage. Bree soon finds herself conflicted. Not only does she know their charismatic leader. She also starts to suspect that there is a lot more to this than the hunt for an illegal bioweapon—a virus that could potentially kill millions in just a few days—particularly as there is currently a flu epidemic raging across the country, and reports about violent behavior among the afflicted are getting more and more alarming.
Commune: Book One
Joshua Gayou - 2017
For humans: Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). When the Earth is hit by the greatest CME in recorded history (several times larger than the Carrington Event of 1859), the combined societies of the planet’s most developed nations struggle to adapt to a life thrust back into the Dark Ages. In the United States, the military scrambles to speed the nation’s recovery on multiple fronts including putting down riots, establishing relief camps, delivering medical aid, and bringing communication and travel back on line. Just as a real foothold is established in retaking the skies (utilizing existing commercial aircraft supplemented by military resources and ground control systems), a mysterious virus takes hold of the population, spreading globally over the very flight routes that the survivors fought so hard to rebuild. The communicability and mortality rates are devastating, leaving only small pockets of survivors scattered throughout the countryside. Commune Book One is the story of one small group of survivors who must adapt to a primitive, hostile world or die. As they learn the rules of this new era, they must decide how far they’re willing to go to continue living, continually asking themselves the same question daily: is survival worth the loss of humanity?
Until the End of the World
Sarah Lyons Fleming - 2013
After all, she’s been on a self-imposed losing streak since her survivalist parents died: she’s stopped painting, broken off her engagement to Adrian and dated a real jerk. Rectifying her mistakes has to wait, however, because Cassie and her friends have just enough time to escape Brooklyn for her parents’ cabin before Bornavirus LX turns them into zombies, too. This is difficult enough, but Cassie’s tag along ex-boyfriend and her friend’s bratty sister have a knack for making everything, even the apocalypse, more unpleasant. When the two attract a threat as deadly as the undead to their safe haven, Cassie’s forced to see how far she’ll go to protect those she loves. And it’s a lot farther than she’d anticipated. This, coupled with Adrian’s distant voice on Safe Zone Radio and, of course, the living dead, threaten to put Cassie right back into the funk she just dragged herself out of. Survival’s great and all, especially when you have leather armor, good friends and home-brewed beer, but there’s something Cassie must do besides survive: tell Adrian she still loves him. And to do that, Cassie has to find faith that she’s stronger than she thinks, she’s still a crack shot and true love never dies.