Anthropocene Rag

Hello America

J. G. Ballard1981

European explorers return to a deserted, desertified North America a century after its collapse. They travel to Las Vegas to find a new regime.

Same dreamlike register, still post-apocalyptic

pace0·prose0·bleak0

Shadow & Claw

Gene Wolfe1983

A torturer travels across a far-future Earth where technology is indistinguishable from magic. He recounts his exile in dense, archaic prose.

dreamlike → meditative

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

Radiance

Catherynne M. Valente2015

A documentary filmmaker disappears on Venus in an alternate 1980s solar system. The story is told through scripts, interviews, and letters.

Same dreamlike register

pace0·prose+1·bleak+1

Beelzebub's tales to his grandson

Georges Ivanovitch Gurdjieff1950

An extraterrestrial being explains the history and strange behaviors of humanity to his grandson during a long space voyage.

dreamlike → meditative, still science fiction

pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

The Last Question

Isaac Asimov2007

A short story told in seven vignettes spanning billions of years. Humanity asks a supercomputer if the heat death of the universe can be avoided.

dreamlike → meditative, still science fiction

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Dream Park

Steven Barnes1981

A security chief investigates a real death during a high-stakes holographic role-playing game. The story tracks the game mechanics and the murder.

dreamlike → propulsive, still science fiction

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Skinny Bitch: A No-Nonsense, Tough-Love Guide for Savvy Girls Who Want to Stop Eating Crap and Start Looking Fabulous!

Rory Freedman

The authors use aggressive language to argue for a vegan diet and the elimination of processed sugar and caffeine.

dreamlike → sardonic

pace+1·prose-2·bleak-1

Akira, Vol. 1

Katsuhiro Ōtomo1984

In a rebuilt post-WWIII Tokyo, two teenage bikers get caught in a government conspiracy after one develops psychic powers.

dreamlike → propulsive, still post-apocalyptic

pace+2·prose-2·bleak+1

The Lake House

James Patterson

A veterinarian and an FBI agent protect six genetically engineered children who can fly. They are pursued by a global conspiracy.

dreamlike → propulsive, still science fiction

pace+2·prose-2·bleak0

The Martian

Andy Weir2011

A man does arithmetic to stay alive on Mars. Problem, attempt, result, repeat.

dreamlike → wry

pace+2·prose-2·bleak-1

Invisible Cities

Italo Calvino1972

Marco Polo describes fifty-five imaginary cities to Kublai Khan. The book is a series of short, prose-poem meditations on urban existence.

dreamlike → meditative

pace-1·prose+1·bleak0

After London

Richard Jefferies1885

Nature reclaims England after an unspecified catastrophe destroys civilization. A young man explores the toxic swamps that were once London.

dreamlike → elegiac, still post-apocalyptic

pace-1·prose0·bleak+1

Looking Backward, 2000-1887

Edward Bellamy1888

A man falls into a hypnotic sleep in 1887 and wakes up in the year 2000 to find the United States transformed into a socialist utopia.

dreamlike → earnest, still science fiction

pace-1·prose-1·bleak-1

Hard to be a god

Аркадий Стругацкий2014

An observer from a technologically advanced Earth lives undercover on a planet stuck in a medieval state. He must watch atrocities without helping.

dreamlike → bleak, still science fiction

pace0·prose0·bleak+2

Zone One

Colson Whitehead2011

A sweeper squad clears Manhattan of lingering zombies and catatonic 'stragglers.' The focus is on the protagonist's memories and the city's decay.

pace0·prose+1·bleak+2

On the Beach

Nevil Shute1957

Survivors in Australia wait for a lethal radiation cloud to arrive after a nuclear war. They spend their final months in quiet, domestic routines.

pace0·prose-1·bleak+2