Dystopian literature. Any fans?

[MichelleCarmen]

Anyone a huge fan of Dystopian literature? I LOVE that genre. I've read quite a bit of novels and am always looking for additional ones to add to my collection. Any recommendations?

 

[somethingshiny]

Have you read the Hunger Games? REALLY good. It's about a future where children are forced to fight to the death just to show that the communities are at the mercy of the new government.

Sci Fi has a lot of dystopian themes too.

 

[MichelleCarmen]

I haven't read Hunger Games...it was recommended to me so I'll pick that up. Just ordered Brave New World a second ago.

One that I recently finished, "Never Let Me Go," IIRC was sort of sci-fi. It was creepy. A movie recently came out, which I haven't yet seen...guess it got bad reviews.

My husband is a huge Asimov fan and so I've read a few of his books. Read many of the basics like 1984, On the Beach, Fahrenheit 451, Cat's Cradle, Clockwork Orange...etc. (will have to check book case to see what else)

 

[somethingshiny]

There's also one I've heard called "Russian *something* or "Soviet *something* I think it was a year but can't recall. I'll see if I can find the title.

Also, give the Stepford Wives a try. Better book than movie.


Found it! Moscow 2042. I haven't read it but heard it's good.

 

[MichelleCarmen]

Cool. Will add that to my list. I'm writing one up for a shopping trip to a local used book store.

My son has become obsessed with looking through my books and keeps piling them up all over around the house which has me wanting to add to my collection. Right now, he's into "How to live with a neurotic cat," and also yesterday began looking into an Edgar Cayce book about past lives. lol

Oh, forgot, another one I liked was The Handmaid's Tale.

 

[Circe]

BIG fan of dystopian lit here, ever since I read Z is for Zachariah when I was a little girl (and, frankly, it stands the test of time). I loved The Hunger Games, but I thought the second book was weak, and the final book of the trilogy jumped the shark: I know Ishigoru has a great rep, but I really hated everyone involved in Never let Me Go, and I didn't think the universe was anything special (more intuitive than anything else ... but I'll probably still watch the movie eventually to see if they manage to "fix" it: after all, it is a rule that bad books make good movies, good books make bad movies, and almost never the twain simply meet).

Others? I think Stephen King's The Stand is a classic of the genre: ditto David Brin's The Postman. Most of my choices are de factor post-apocalyptic ... is that a thing for you? If not, I'd also rec. the Bachmann novelas, particularly "The Long Walk," and a book by Richard Morgan that's alternately called Black Man or Thirteen, depending on country of publication (it's one of my top ten books, period, but the copy on the British edition is horrifying). Others? Hm ... will have to think a bit, as I'm away from my shelves ....

 

[kittybean]

You'll love Brave New World if you haven't read it before. It's one of my favorites in this genre. I adore pretty much everything by Vonnegut--have you read Slaughterhouse 5? Cat's Cradle is my favorite one of his, but I really like the rest of his work, too.

Kazuo Ishiguro, the author of Never Let Me Go wrote a few other critically acclaimed dystopian-type books. I haven't read them, but maybe you should check those out, too.

 

[somethingshiny]

Circe~ I was about to get the second and third in the Hunger Games trilogy. Why were they bad? Should I not waste the money on buying them?


The Stand is SO good!

 

[zoebartlett]

Ayn Rand wrote Anthem and that's a really good book. I haven't read it since high school (years and years ago) but I know I liked it. Sorry I can't be more descriptive in my review but a quick Google search will bring up a ton of references.

 

[Lady_Disdain]

The classical dystopian trio is 1984/Brave New World/We. The last book, "We", isn't that easy to find (although it was recently reedited in English, with a much needed new translation), since it was repressed by the Russian regime and never got the fame it deserves.

For a comic dystopia (yes, it is possible!), "Shades of Grey" by Fforde is my favourite.

 

[partgypsy]

I'm a science fiction fan. I think I got hooked when I picked out brave new world in my junior high honors writing seminar (ironically because it was one of the slimmest books to complete the assignment).


Godwhale by T. J. Bass
Cloud atlas by David Mitchell
Blood Music by Greg Bear not really apocalytpic more end of life as we know it (maybe the ultimate end of world one is Forge of God by same author)

My husband was blown away by the book The Road but that was too much for me.

I can think of more but that's off the top of my head.

 

[Aoife]

There are some great recommendations here! Has anyone read Justin Cronin's The Passage yet? I have read rave reviews, but haven't bought it yet.

I agree with Circe on the Hunger Games trilogy. I loved the first one, figured the second was suffering from second-book-in-the-trilogy-itis, and was so enraged by the way Suzanne Collins derailed the third book that it made me regret having read the previous two.

Another dystopian YA trilogy I highly recommend is the one that begins with The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. It's original and much more nuanced than HG.

 

[rosetta]

The Road

The Passage

Children of Men

The Stand

Cloud Atlas

Never let me go



All fit the bill, but I liked the stand the best.

I'm not that into dystopian lit, I just read a lot.

 

[rosetta]

There are some great recommendations here! Has anyone read Justin Cronin's The Passage yet? I have read rave reviews, but haven't bought it yet.

I agree with Circe on the Hunger Games trilogy. I loved the first one, figured the second was suffering from second-book-in-the-trilogy-itis, and was so enraged by the way Suzanne Collins derailed the third book that it made me regret having read the previous two.

Another dystopian YA trilogy I highly recommend is the one that begins with The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. It's original and much more nuanced than HG.

I have read the passage.

I thought the prose wasn't up to scratch, though I liked the premise of the book. I think the story would have fared better in the hands of a more talented author (sorry Cronin!)

 

[Aoife]

There are some great recommendations here! Has anyone read Justin Cronin's The Passage yet? I have read rave reviews, but haven't bought it yet.

I agree with Circe on the Hunger Games trilogy. I loved the first one, figured the second was suffering from second-book-in-the-trilogy-itis, and was so enraged by the way Suzanne Collins derailed the third book that it made me regret having read the previous two.

Another dystopian YA trilogy I highly recommend is the one that begins with The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. It's original and much more nuanced than HG.

I have read the passage.

I thought the prose wasn't up to scratch, though I liked the premise of the book. I think the story would have fared better in the hands of a more talented author (sorry Cronin!)

Rosetta, would you be inclined to read the sequel, or did you cross Justin Cronin off your list?

 

[rosetta]

Aoife

I think I will probably read the sequels (I think a trilogy is planned?)

But mostly because I have to find out what happens. I'll wait for the paperback though!

 

[Aoife]

I thought of another unusual take on dystopia:

Califia's Daughters, written by Laurie R. King under the pseudonym Leigh Richards. It is set in what you realize is a future California, where the men have been more or less wiped out by something (virus?), and the remaining women are living at a pre 20th century level.

 

[Aoife]

Aoife

I think I will probably read the sequels (I think a trilogy is planned?)

But mostly because I have to find out what happens. I'll wait for the paperback though!

That's probably a good plan, and more or less what I was waiting to do!

 

[rosetta]

Of course brave new world and 1984 are must-reads on this list

May I also add The Handmaid's Tale by M Atwood?

Has anyone read The Running Man or Fahrenheit 451?

I would love to hear if you would recommend either.

 

[partgypsy]

I haven't read Running man (just the movie adaption which I'm sure is very different ). For some reason Farenheit 451 didn't leave much of an impression on me (I like a number of Ray Bradbury's other books better). But then I read it in high school, I should give it another chance.

A movie that relates some of the two themes above is Equilibrium, which I recommend (and not just because it has Christian Bale and Sean Bean in it!)

And can't forget Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, which Blade Runner was based on.

 

[somethingshiny]

Running Man was pretty good, but I read it a LONG time ago. I think I was in HS. So it may suck now! lol Didn't like F 451 but it's one of my mom's favorites.

I've never read Handmaid's Tale but I'll download it to my Kindle. Gosh, I love that thing! Is it weird that I've been thinking of names for it?

 

[MichelleCarmen]

Running Man was pretty good, but I read it a LONG time ago. I think I was in HS. So it may suck now! lol Didn't like F 451 but it's one of my mom's favorites.

I've never read Handmaid's Tale but I'll download it to my Kindle. Gosh, I love that thing! Is it weird that I've been thinking of names for it?

Handmaid's Tale is great. Atwood also wrote another book to fit the genre called, "Oryx & Crake," and it didn't really do anything for me and neither did any of her other books appealed to me so I gave up on her. But, she has received awards for at least one of the others, so she does appear to be quite liked for her style.

Circe - It's funny that you mentioned Stephen King as I so associate him with HS. I did read the Stand along with the Tommyknockers, Pet Cemetary and at least 20 others when I was in my late teens and so I just lumped them all together as part of a collection. I'll check out the ones you've mentioned. Great thing about his books is they read so fast. As far as the genre preference, mine are stories where the government comes up with some "brilliant" idea that screws everything up and people around beginning thinking WTF and rebel against it all. lol (Wikipedia or somewhere mentions that as the stereotypical dystopian backdrop, so I guess I'm not too original - lol.)

Thanks everyone for recommending books. I really appreciate it! I should have waited until tomorrow to go to the used book store so I could have brought in a longer list. They didn't have Moscow 2042 or The Hunger Games (guess that series sells out quickly) so I ended up with "Ape and Essense," by Huxley and then got another book just to fill time till "Brave New World" gets here, called "the Traveler," by John Twelve Hawks. Anyone heard of it? Oh, and the Huxley book was one of those really old paperbacks and it was 38 cents. lol

 

[MichelleCarmen]

The classical dystopian trio is 1984/Brave New World/We. The last book, "We", isn't that easy to find (although it was recently reedited in English, with a much needed new translation), since it was repressed by the Russian regime and never got the fame it deserves.

For a comic dystopia (yes, it is possible!), "Shades of Grey" by Fforde is my favourite.

Do you know which translation of "We" is best? Amazon has one by Gregory Zilboorg and another by Natasha Randall.

 

[Liane]

For my money Paolo Bacigalupi is the best dystopian writer working today. His worldbuilding is vivid and disturbing, even if I don't always find it completely convincing in the particulars (largely because I'm more optimistic about human nature and less down on corporations than he is -- but, you know, I can't deny that the world he imagines could come to pass).

Pump Six and Other Stories is his short-story collection, and a great starting point.

Ship Breaker is his first YA novel, and also great.

The Windup Girl is his first adult novel. IMO it's a cut below the other two (mostly because of some issues surrounding the title character) but the guy can't write a bad book (or at least hasn't yet) so this should not be taken as disparagement; it's still very very good.

 

[movie zombie]

Earth Abides

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Abides

this was required for college English 1A class i took many years ago........and i still think about it.

MoZo

 

[Lula]

It's been a long time since I've read this author, but I really enjoyed the work of Robert A. Heinlein. His book, Stranger in a Strange Land, and his collection of short stories, The Past Through Tomorrow, were good reads.

 

[Matata]

Sheri Tepper's The Gate to Women's Country is a good read and presents the opposite of Handmaid's Tale. In TGWC, women rule and men are servitors. The book garnered quite a bit of criticism when it was first published.

From Publishers Weekly
Tepper's finest novel to date is set in a post-holocaust feminist dystopia that offers only two political alternatives: a repressive polygamist sect that is slowly self-destructing through inbreeding and the matriarchal dictatorship called Women's Country. Here, in a desperate effort to prevent another world war, the women have segregated most men into closed military garrisons and have taken on themselves every other function of government, industry, agriculture, science and learning. The resulting manifold responsibilities are seen through the life of Stavia, from a dreaming 10-year-old to maturity as doctor, mother and member of the Marthatown Women's Council. As in Tepper's Awakeners series books, the rigid social systems are tempered by the voices of individual experience and, here, by an imaginative reworking of The Trojan Woman that runs through the text.

 

[LGK]

Dies the Fire by S.M. Stirling might be one you'd like too. I loved the first two books in the series but it got less interesting after that- but the first one? Excellent apocafic!

I will definitely have to bookmark this thread. Some of my favorites have been mentioned and I'd totally love to try some of the ones i haven't read.

A Handmaid's Tale is definitely one of my favorite ever.

ETA: Califia's Daughters, totally forgot that book. Bought and read it in Amsterdam, traded it away, but I'd love to reread it. I'd totally recommend it too.

ETA, again: If you haven't read On the Beach by Nevil Schute definitely do. It was like, the first of the genre. Not the best writing on earth but absolutely worth a read and short. I think it was written a bit post WWII? Sometime quite early on.

ETA, part tres : DH says The Road is a really excellent and difficult read. by Cormac McCarthy

 

[MichelleCarmen]

ETA, again: If you haven't read On the Beach by Nevil Schute definitely do. It was like, the first of the genre. Not the best writing on earth but absolutely worth a read and short. I think it was written a bit post WWII? Sometime quite early on.

ETA, part tres : DH says The Road is a really excellent and difficult read. by Cormac McCarthy

I read On the Beach a few months back and enjoyed it, however, was perplexed about how the Austrailians were still going to work and making plans for the future even though they were only to live (estimated) till September. lol I'm sure I'd be off partying like that one gal did at the beginning of the book (or maybe not since I have kids).

The book I'm currently reading, "The Traveler," talks about how the security cameras we see are actually programed to look at our facial features as recognition systems and track us. It's fictional but still makes me wonder. There was a "black camera" in Michael's and I showed it to my son and what does he do? Starts dancing for it! lol The angle of the camera was such that from the screen, his back was faced to it and his butt was swishing about. lol Ugh, the innocent life of an 8 year old.

LGK - I am going to print this thread out. I'm excited to read all these books but worry I'll become super paranoid. lol

I haven't read On the Road, but watched the movie last summer. If I recall it right, it was pretty dreary.

 

[aviastar]

I found The Road easier to read than to watch- but that might have been because by the time I got to the movie after reading the book, I knew how it would end and it was too heavy to deal with again, but absolutely worth the read.

I really enjoyed The Host, by Stephenie Meyer. MUCH better written than her other work, it starts off a little slow, but somewhere in the middle you find you can't stop reading.

And, not strictly dystopian, although dealing with similar themes, but if you haven't read Orson Scott Card's Ender books- they are a must! Ender's Game is one of my all time favorites and the whole series, including the Shadow books that parallel them, is fascinating.

My Kindle should be arriving in the mail any day now- so I, also, will be bookmarking this thread- thanks!