#TopFive Books About… #Dystopia That I Want To Read

The amazing Amanda at Devouring Books has brought back her Top 5 for 2020 and here is the list for February!

*Updated following advice from the fabulous Kelly @From Belgium With Book Love *

Amanda’s prompts are-

2/1/20 — Dystopian Books

2/8/20 — Mental Illness

2/15/20 — Books about Mermaids

2/22/20 — Books about Spies

2/29/20 — Books inspired by Mythology

Gets your reading radar pinging, doesn’t it?

Her rules are as follows…

Rules!

• Share your top 5 books of the current topic– these can be books that you want to read, have read and loved, have read and hated, you can do it any way you want.
• Tag the original post (This one!)
• Tag 5 people

So yes, I am playing catch-up, just for a change, and today, I am sharing 5 Dystopian Books I want to read

1)‘The Stand’ by Stephen King

Well overdue a re-read, this 1977 novel, latterly updated and revised with added sections, stills holds a lot of weight with this reader.

Especially given the current state of alert over the coronavirus, does anyone else automatically think of ‘Captain Trips’ when they read about outbreaks?

Just me?

Maybe that is why I have this as the first on my list!

After the days of the plague came the dreams

Dark dreams that warned of the coming of the dark man. The apostate of death, his worn-down boot heels tramping the night roads. The warlord of the charnel house and Prince of Evil.

His time is at hand. His empire grows in the west and the Apocalypse looms…

2)’The Last’ by Hanna Jameson

This has been hanging around my to-read pile for way too long and I intend to tackle it!

For fans of high-concept thrillers such as Annihilation and The Girl with All the Gifts, this breathtaking dystopian psychological thriller follows an American academic stranded at a Swiss hotel as the world descends into nuclear war—along with twenty other survivors—who becomes obsessed with identifying a murderer in their midst after the body of a young girl is discovered in one of the hotel’s water tanks.

Jon thought he had all the time in the world to respond to his wife’s text message: I miss you so much. I feel bad about how we left it. Love you. But as he’s waiting in the lobby of the L’Hotel Sixieme in Switzerland after an academic conference, still mulling over how to respond to his wife, he receives a string of horrifying push notifications. Washington, DC has been hit with a nuclear bomb, then New York, then London, and finally Berlin. That’s all he knows before news outlets and social media goes black—and before the clouds on the horizon turn orange.

Now, two months later, there are twenty survivors holed up at the hotel, a place already tainted by its strange history of suicides and murders. Those who can’t bear to stay commit suicide or wander off into the woods. Jon and the others try to maintain some semblance of civilization. But when the water pressure disappears, and Jon and a crew of survivors investigate the hotel’s water tanks, they are shocked to discover the body of a young girl.

As supplies dwindle and tensions rise, Jon becomes obsessed with investigating the death of the little girl as a way to cling to his own humanity. Yet the real question remains: can he afford to lose his mind in this hotel, or should he take his chances in the outside world?

3)’The Human Son’ by Adrian J Walker

I really enjoyed the other books I have read by Adrian, books like ‘The End Of The World Survivor’s Club’, so this one is a must read for later in the year.

A startling, emotional, beautiful (and at times funny) book – one that feels like the best sort of science fiction, a book that should be enjoyed widely, a book that speaks of what it is to be human, a parent, and a child.

It is 500 years in the future and Earth is no longer populated by humans.

The new guardians of Earth, the genetically engineered Erta, have reversed climate change. They are now faced with a dilemma; if they reintroduce the rebellious and violent Homo Sapiens, all of their work will be undone.

They decide to raise one final child; a sole human to help decide if humanity should again inherit the Earth.

But the quiet and clinical Ima finds that there is more to raising a human than she had expected; and there is more to humanity’s history than she has been told.

4) ‘After The Flood’ by Kassandra Montag

A little more than a century from now, our world has been utterly transformed. After years of slowly overtaking the continent, rising floodwaters have obliterated America’s great coastal cities and then its heartland, leaving nothing but an archipelago of mountaintop colonies surrounded by a deep expanse of open water.

Stubbornly independent Myra and her precocious seven-year-old daughter, Pearl, fish from their small boat, the Bird, visiting dry land only to trade for supplies and information in the few remaining outposts of civilization. For seven years, Myra has grieved the loss of her oldest daughter, Row, who was stolen by her father after a monstrous deluge overtook their home in Nebraska. Then, in a violent confrontation with a stranger, Myra suddenly discovers that Row was last seen in a far-off encampment near the Arctic Circle. Throwing aside her usual caution, Myra and Pearl embark on a perilous voyage into the icy northern seas, hoping against hope that Row will still be there.

On their journey, Myra and Pearl join forces with a larger ship and Myra finds herself bonding with her fellow seekers who hope to build a safe haven together in this dangerous new world. But secrets, lust, and betrayals threaten their dream, and after their fortunes take a shocking—and bloody—turn, Myra can no longer ignore the question of whether saving Row is worth endangering Pearl and her fellow travelers.

A compulsively readable novel of dark despair and soaring hope, After the Flood is a magnificent, action packed, and sometimes frightening odyssey laced with wonder—an affecting and wholly original saga both redemptive and astonishing

5) Trail Of Lightning’ by Rebecca Roanhorse

While most of the world has drowned beneath the sudden rising waters of a climate apocalypse, Dinétah (formerly the Navajo reservation) has been reborn. The gods and heroes of legend walk the land, but so do monsters.

Maggie Hoskie is a Dinétah monster hunter, a supernaturally gifted killer. When a small town needs help finding a missing girl, Maggie is their last—and best—hope. But what Maggie uncovers about the monster is much larger and more terrifying than anything she could imagine.

Maggie reluctantly enlists the aid of Kai Arviso, an unconventional medicine man, and together they travel to the rez to unravel clues from ancient legends, trade favors with tricksters, and battle dark witchcraft in a patchwork world of deteriorating technology.

As Maggie discovers the truth behind the disappearances, she will have to confront her past—if she wants to survive.

How amazing does this sound? Also, best of all, it’s the first in a series! Who doesn’t love finding a new author to completely immerse themselves in? That is 100% this reader!

So there we have it, a line up which is different, vintage horror matched with post-apocalyptic fertility worries and class warfare, ancient monsters and future shocks. What books have you enjoyed in the dystopian theme? Do you even like reading this kind of book, and if not, drop me a line and let me know!

As the scientists move the Doomsday Clock closer to midnight, maybe it’s just too near to reality to be a massive stretch of the imagination?

I love speculative and dystopian fiction, anything that pushes you out of your comfort zone and gets you thinking is alright by me!
As always, drop me a line about your fave future thriller books!

Links-Stacked @Stacked Reviews

Sepia @Sepia Reads 

Amanda @Devouring Books

Books,Coffee and Passion @Books, Coffee and Passion