Can Anyone Recommend any Novels Addressing the collapse of the U.S.?

[trailrunners]

I'm wondering if anyone could recommend any novels that address the collapse of the American empire - more or less the economic collapse and what the result of the collapse would be. Sort of an apocalyptic story about the collapse and aftermath of this collapse. A book along these lines that I really enjoyed was "Good News" by Edward Abbey that addressed what would happen after the economic collapse of the U.S.

I figure I better start getting prepared for the inevitable collapse of this great nation once * and the repugs run it into the ground.....

[Maple]

1. The Handmaid's Tale

by Margaret Atwood.

[kayell]

4. Second that nomination. Amazingly prescient

[ropi]

5. Third IT

Read it NOW

[ironflange]

27. When you finish it, read "Oryx and Crake"

[LiviaOlivia]

28. Philip Roth's "The Plot Against America"

as recommended by James Wolcott

http://www.jameswolcott.com/

[aden_nak]

2. 1984 by George Orw. . . oh, you mean LITERALLY.

[eek]

9. books

Animal Farm: Orwell

Fahrenheit 451: Ray Bradbury

London Fields: Martin Amis (apocalyptic britain but a great read)

Silent Spring: Rachel Carson (not a novel but a must)

Lord of the Flies: Wm Golding

[Sabriel]

3. The Giver, by Lois Lowry n/t

[realisticphish]

6. It Cant Happen Here

great book, cant remember the author, sorry

:hippie: The Incorrigible Democrat

[pnorman]

8. Sinclair Lewis

pnorman

[realisticphish]

32. *smacking of forehead*

how the hell could i forget that???


:hippie: The Incorrigible Democrat

[henslee]

7. Phillip Dick -- Man in the High Castle... Check out this plot .

It's America in 1962. Slavery is legal once again. the few Jews who still survive hide under assumed names. In San Francisco the I Ching is as common as the Yellow Pages. All because some 20 years earlier the United States lost a war--and is now occupied jointly by Nazi Germany and Japan. A cool part of the book is Japanses fetish-like obsession with Americana.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

15. I hate SF,

but that's an alternate history. I've read it. Great book. Second the motion.

[Fenris]

10. "The Iron Heel" by Jack London

[KinkyDem]

11. Maybe a bit dark for a day like this but ...

The Turner Diaries. I forget the ass that wrote it. Do a google search for it and you will find several copies on-line so you don't have to help support that shit-eating scum bag that wrote it.

Read it! You better believe "They" are in fact out there and they are chomping at the bit to get at "Us".

[mahatmakanejeeves]

19. Dr. William L. Pierce

He died two years ago. One of the most unexplainable aspects of neo-Nazis is that so many of them are well-educated. Perplexes me to no end. Link to the Nazis:

National Alliance

The guy who runs the website is Kevin Alfred Strom, who lives in the same town in Virginia, Earlysville, as creep senator George Allen. Hardly a surprise, as they are so much alike.

William L. Pierce and The Turner Diaries

>>
Author Pierce, who holds a Ph.D. in physics and is a former college instructor in Oregon, has long held racist and anti-Semitic views. In the 1960s he was assistant to George Lincoln Rockwell, founder and head of the American Nazi Party.
<<

Bizarre trivia: George Lincoln Rockwell was assassinated right across the street from where Arlington, Virginia's, brand new, outstanding skatepark is located. I'll bet not a single skater there knows that.

[jpak]

12. The Turner Diaries

not for the timid though...

[caught on a limb]

13. It Can't Happen Here

It Can't Happen Here
by Sinclair Lewis

Offered complete, free & online by The University of Adelaide Library, South Australia 5005.


http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/l/lewis/sinclair/happen/complete.html

...“Nonsense! Nonsense!” snorted Tasbrough. “That couldn’t happen here in America, not possibly! We’re a country of freemen.”

“The answer to that,” suggested Doremus Jessup, “if Mr. Falck will forgive me, is ‘the hell it can’t!’ Why, there’s no country in the world that can get more hysterical—yes, or more obsequious!—than America.

Why, where in all history has there ever been a people so ripe for a dictatorship as ours! ...

[rooboy]

17. Thanks for the link... n/t

[realisticphish]

33. i love this book

chilling, yet almost an instruction book on a civilian resistence


:hippie: The Incorrigible Democrat

[mahatmakanejeeves]

14. Atlas Shrugged

Ayn Rand was perhaps the worst writer on the planet, and her objectivist "philosophy" was utter nonsense. I'm sure a lot of listers will retch upon seeing this suggestion. Every thrift store in the county has a copy, so don't go buy a new one.

Nonetheless, the book tells what happens when a government that insists on running everyone's life finally annoys the people who actually do things. One by one, they decide not to cooperate with the government anymore. "You deal with it, you broke it, I'm out of here," is their reaction.

We face four more years of accelerating elimination of civil rights. The government will decide who you will be permitted to marry, and who you are prohibited from marrying. The support is overwhelming. The "gawd is on our side" crowd has spoken. I'm not going to lift a finger to help them. I'm going to fight them every inch, every step of the way. No more cooperation.

They broke it; they buy it.

[x-g.o.p.er]

16. The Patriot Act Law

[KamaAina]

18. Octavia Butler's "Parable of the Talents".

Ecomonic and environmental collapse, followed by a fundie President who might as well have crawled out from John Asscroft's sock drawer. Highly recommended but NOT for the faint of heart.

[trailrunners]

20. Thanks for the Replies!

Thanks for the replies! All of those are great suggestions. However, I'm wondering if there are any other novels that specifically address the economic collapse of the nation, and the aftermath of that collapse. Basically a story about what America would be like as it reverts back into a third world country and is no longer an economic or even a military superpower. Is there anything out there like that?

[trailrunners]

21. Thanks for the replies!

Thanks for the replies! All of those are great suggestions. However, I'm wondering if there are any other novels that specifically address the economic collapse of the nation, and the aftermath of that collapse. Basically a story about what America would be like as it reverts back into a third world country and is no longer an economic or even a military superpower. Is there anything out there like that?

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

22. Tomorrow morning's newspaper

All you need to read about it will be right there.

[bobaloo2]

23. Try this one

"Dies the Fire", by S.M. Stirling. It's a little different, in that it's a scifi/fantasy novel with an odd premise that something happens and electricity ceases to function.

The result is immediate social collapse obviously, and the tale focuses on two groups who try to maintain and rebuild some civilization. It's mainly set in the Willamette Valley between Eugene and Salem.

It's a good read with lots of real practical info regarding surviving / making do in the circumstances.

[GreenPartyVoter]

24. Go to the entertainment page of

my site.

-----------------------------------------------------------
FIGHT! Take this country back one town and state at a time!
http://www.geocities.com/greenpartyvoter/electionreform.htm

[chaska]

25. It's civilization itself that's collapsing...

You all MUST READ 'Ishmael' by Daniel Quinn. Also recommended: 'My Ishmael', 'The Story of B', and 'Beyond Civilization' (in that order) by the same author.

Quinn is an extremely important thinker on our side.

[Moochy]

26. The Twilight of American Culture

A book by Morris Berman, ISBN 0-393-32169-6

[Kid_A]

29. No one's recommended "The Stand" yet?

That's one of my favorite books ever, and a really scary and believable portrait of the end of the world.

That's definitely one you should read.

Also, "Fight Club" is kind of about the collapse of the consumerist aspect of society, so that might count...

[Ladyhawk]

31. The Stand is my favorite King novel, but it is apocalyptic.

It doesn't describe the end of the US, but the end of the world as we know it.

I read it about once every two years.

[Goathead]

30. Amusing Ourselves to Death

Not really a novel but:
Subtitled: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business

Neal Postman posits that the current state of America is less a vision from Orwell's '1984' and more a vision of Huxley's 'Brave New World'

link to the forward:
http://www.serendipity.li/jsmill/post_1.html