Reddit mentions of The Girl With All the Gifts

I'm reposting something I posted a couple of years ago:

Well, perhaps the most famous recent post-apocalyptic novel was McCarthy's The Road. Quite a bleak book, and very characteristic of McCarthy's spartan prose, this became a huge international best seller and a successful Hollywood movie. I certainly recommend it, but it's not really an uplifting book and has several confronting scenes. Still, very good.

The other obvious recent "literary" PA novels would be Margaret Atwood's "Oryx and Crake" trilogy. They start with Oryx and Crake, are followed by Year of the Flood and conclude with MaddAddam. These are very good books with strong feminist and ecological themes (a good thing!). Highly recommended.

The Dog Stars is yet another recent PA novel which garnered a fair bit of praise (I picked it up after hearing a segment on the novel on NPR's Fresh Air). I enjoyed it, despite the cliched "Survivalist" aspects and occasional far-fetched coincidences. A good, fun read; especially if you're a dog lover. :)

Other recommended titles (which I won't link to directly for time reasons) include Justin Cronin's The Passage trilogy (kind of a mash up between post apocalypse and horror), Stephen King's The Stand (ditto), A Canticle for Leibowitz, Earth Abides and Alas Babylon (the triptych of classics of the genre).

Good luck. I love these books even though I'm a positive optimistic guy! :)

EDIT: I overlooked Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven (fun, action packed but accused by some of racist undertones), The Postman by David Brin (so so so very much better than the movie it spawned. So much better), The Year of the Plague by someone I forgot (rather original PA novel with nano-technology rearing its head) and even Blood Music by Greg Bear (though most people consider this full on science fiction, it does feature an apocalypse... or a sort. :)





 



 




 



Since then, I've thought of (or read) a few more. Perhaps one of the most famous is Station Eleven. It garnered a fair bit of media attention and mainstream critical acclaim a couple of years ago. It's a bit of a slow burner, and whilst it's not my favourite post-apocalyptic novel, it's certainly worth picking up. The Girl with All the Gifts was a recent hit. Set in the UK, it tells the story of a band of British scientists and soldiers searching for remaining survivors, as they bring along a very strange and very dangerous survivor of the recent plague. It's great fun and was made into a movie recently. I believe the author recently published a sequel (The Boy on the Bridge?), but I haven't read this.

Wastelands is a collection of short-stories. Some really good stuff here, and if you're not feeling up to a full length novel or comptemplating the end of humanity, it's well worth a look.


Let me know if you want more. It's a favourite genre of mine. :)

I'll read whatever I'm interested at the moment. More often than not, space operas such as the Vorkosigan Saga or popcorn novels such as Ready Player One.

If you are into sci-fi, I would highly recommend the Vorkosigan Saga by Lois McMaster Bujold. You're going to need this chronological order or books when buying, and a lot of them are contained in various omnibuses. The Expanse by James S.A. Corey is another phenomenal read and is an equally amazing Sy-Fy Network show. I'd recommend reading the books first then watching the show.

If maybe you like dystopian futures, I'd highly recommend the Silo Series by Hugh Howey or The Girl With All The Gifts by M. R. Carey.