7 Dystopian Books About the End of Technology
Whenever there’s a significant tech outage, it always gets me a bit wistful.
Yes, it’s horrible when the entire airline industry grinds to a halt because of a bug in the IT system (except for Southwest Airlines, who never upgraded from Windows 3.1), stranding thousands of people.
But I also think it would be kind of nice if the internet just went offline for a couple of days now and then. We’d be forced to have quiet days with no distractions. Maybe pick up that book we’ve been meaning to read or play that board game we’ve been meaning to try.
The world would probably be a much better place if we closed the internet on Sundays, but until then, here’s a list of books exploring a world without technology:
Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank
Starting with this 1959 classic, Alas, Babylon was written after the kick-off of the Space Race with Russia and before the Cuban Blockade, at a time when many Americans feared we would lose the Cold War.
A nuclear holocaust takes out a majority of the US, except a small town in Florida where the residents must come to terms with their new reality and band together to survive.
Earth Abides by George R. Stewart
A virus wipes out a majority of the Earth’s population in the late 1940s, leaving a tiny number of survivors (if this sounds familiar, it’s because Stephen King’s The Stand was inspired by this book).
Most stories in this genre devolve into resource fighting, guns and raiders, but Earth Abides takes a different approach: focusing on a group of completely normal people who settle in the ruins of San Fransisco, and don’t even bother trying to re-start civilisation. Instead, we’re treated to a slow, satisfying re-primitivising of human society.
Terminal World by Alastair Reynolds
Time for some crazy stuff. In Spearpoint, a former space elevator and the giant monolith city where the last remaining humans live there is still technology, but it’s progress is limited to certain levels. Horsetown is pre-industrial. Neon Heights has television, etc.
Come for the cyborg angels and zeppelin air battles, and stay for the Mad Max-style wasteland chase scenes.
Infinite Detail by Tim Maughan
Infinite Detail centers on a counterculture enclave called “the Croft”, a digital no-man’s-land cut off from surveillance and corporate influence. After an act of cyber terrorism destroys the internet and collapses the global economy, the group comes to terms with “winning” their revolution.
Is it really a victory if everyone else is starving and dying?
The Wild Shore by Kim Stanley Robinson
Sixty years after a devastating nuclear attack, the US is quarantined by the rest of the world and is made up of small, mostly pre-industrial communities. To prevent further war, the outside world actively prevents any kind of reconstruction, using their more advanced technology to destroy any attempts to rebuild.
In sort of a post-apocalyptic coming-of-age story, a group of teenagers is lured by the political mystique of the mayor of San Diego, who wants to “make America great again.”
Moon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig Rice
A small native community in Northern Canada loses all communication with the outside world at the start of Winter. As the town grapples with the threat of surviving Winter, a mysterious stranger shows up with ulterior motives and stirs the pot.
If you’re into a slow-burn, suspenseful tales of survival, this one is for you.
When the English Fall by David Williams
A dystopian tale told through the eyes of an Amish farmer, who is essentially a bystander to the apocalypse. Nothing much changes in the day-to-day in an Amish community after a solar storm obliterates technology, but soon, people with guns come calling to take their food and threaten their safety.
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