Mother of God.

That is all. I am on the last chapter now. It's....just....wow.

Yeah, brings the cluster eff that is society's implosion into stark reality.

That was my first SHTF book. Read it about four years ago and then became an SHTF fiction addict. I've since devoured over 30 more books in the genre. Just finished "Fifty Falling Stars" a couple days ago.

I've tried to read it a couple of times, but, the writing is so bad I can't get past it to finish

Have read a few SHTF books. Patriots was first, and like it a lot. Read a couple of others and then One Second After.

One Second After actually cost me a few nights of full sleep when I finished it. I would wake up cause I was trying to "fix problems" in my sleep.

The town doctor in the leadership meetings.....every time he would speak up during the meetings it was like WTF next? Not to ruin it for everyone else so I'll just call it the event. The event was timed perfectly. If an author could think of it, you know the bad boys have.

The forward by Newt Gingrich and the afterword by the retired general(?) kind of drove it home on the possibility of it.

Great book!

a country boy can survive!

I'm also almost finished with this book. I don't think people fully appreciate how close we are to anarchy at any given moment.

I've read others like Swan Song but this one is the most disturbing because of how realistic it is.

As a "country boy" with family, I don't think I have ever read a book that left me feeling so deflated. Seriously. This **** kind of freaked me out. It's far better than "The Road" in that its so benign seeming. No flash. No nuclear winter. Just a simple removal of something we require.

And if this is a "terribly written" book as an above poster said, sign me up for more.

I think the worst part of this for me is that it doesnt instill an urge for me to prep. In fact, it makes me look back at a lot of mall ninja types that spend their paychecks on tactical bags and high end custom AR15 builds and laugh. It makes their efforts seem really ridiculous. It's mostly ridiculous because its a small subset of people that are remotely prepared or half ass an attempt so they can look cool. If everyone was prepared, it would be one thing, but we aren't. And really, even if we were, we would eventually run out of supplies and there is simply not enough nature to support our population. The book was just so...final....sheesh.

[This message has been edited by BrazosDog02 (edited 11/24/2012 1:48a).]

Wow. Got the e-book version this evening and just finished it...I couldn't put it down.

I kept thinking in terms of my own preparedness- yeah, I hunt and like to think I could harvest enough for my wife and I to survive, but would there even be enough to harvest in the first place? Plus, I have exercise induced asthma...could I really survive without any medication if worst comes to worst?

I'd like to always keep optimistic that no matter what, I've got enough redneck hardass in me to make it, but it definitely opened my eyes to a few things that even the most outdoorsy and country of us still take for granted.

One thing that books like this helped me to realize I that you couldn't make it alone.
We all have this image of bugging out to the country with our families to live a pioneer lifestyle but that is a fantasy.
We depend on our community and neighbors far too much and would need their support in a number of ways in tough times

Finally, a bit of reality setting in in a SHTF post. Just a reality check on planning to harvest game to survive on, let's look at just your average game species. Roughly 4-5% of the country's population (human) harvest an estamated 10-20% of the game species popuation (20% is the general hold steady harvest rate of many species, anything over that and the pop starts dropping), generally over a 2 week to 3 month time period. So how long do you really think you will be able to live off harvests, when lots more people have the same idea?

That's the whole point of the book. By just losing everything electrical you are looking at several die off waves very quickly over the course of a just a few months for probably at least 60% of the population. I would have thought it wouldn't have been that high or that fast but this book layout out pretty straight forwardly.

Someone mentioned it but when just when you think it would level off that doctor would talk at the daily meeting and say we are about to have a problem.

POTENTIAL SPOILERS:



I kept waiting for the part where the power came back on, or a government unicorn designed to fix everything immediately showed up at the end and everything was OK. And, well, that never happened. For me, it really put it in perspective. I knew we had a delicate society, I knew there was potential for it to collapse and bad things to happen. I just never really sat down and really analyzed what that meant. Its like we have a society built on an upside down pyramid hinging on ONE thing. It seems so obvious now. Also, the community part....so a relatively large amount of that community survived....great...right? Now what...its just....ugh. :/

Buck: I read this based on your rec on the other thread. It did not disappoint. I guess Patriots is the next on the list.

[This message has been edited by BrazosDog02 (edited 11/24/2012 10:01a).]

I'd like to see more books from the SHTF category...

I started out with lights out (the PDF from here).

Then did Patriots.

Then One Second After.

Lots more to read, I suppose.

The thing about Mall Ninjas is that they will have enough fire power and ammo to do stupid stuff... MZBs if you will. Desperate people take desperate measures. We are a very fragile society and humanity is fragile, but we have overcome a TON to get to where we are. To think that we could not adapt to circumstances is ridiculous- but I think the time it would take to adapt would further decrease the population to a sustainable level.

Just remember Patriots is about 1/3 instruction manual wrapped in 2/3 fiction. I kept wanting to get a highlighter out and mark useful ideas. However, it's a little more tedious as he walks you through things like the exact construction of the observation post, for example.

[This message has been edited by Buck Turgidson (edited 11/24/2012 12:27p).]

Back to hunting/food, what about all of the hogs that we have. Something like this might be a way to finally control them. I write this as I am watching moonshine re-runs and the poor Alan Jackson look alike hunting hogs in NC let the sow live because she may be pregnant and he waited on a boar.

It would be such an uncontrolled free for all that they would be gone faster than you think.

I finished the book today and thought it was interesting in the interview with the general at the end that they released an EMP report the same day the 9-11 report came out so it got buried.

If you are a terrorist or North Korea you gotta think this is the way to go. Three nukes into space from cargo ships in international waters and 80% of the US is dead in less than 12 months and the people left are emaciated survivors and crazies.

We still would have a fleet of unaffected nuclear subs that would then glass North Korea. I don't think a nation exists that is dumbe enough to try that.

Spoiler alert



In the book they did just that and nuked NK and Iran. The point was they didn't care as long as the US went down. I do think terrorists are more of a threat with this but NK is pretty crazy.

There are pretty serious logistical issues with putting ICBMs on ship and having them work plus go where you want them to when you launch them.

Bottom line is the countries that could pull a seaborn EMP attack off would have a lot to lose. This is something totally beyond the capabilities of a small state or terrorists.

The big issue with an EMP attack is that we would see it as a nuclear attack and would respond in kind. Not much benefit from wrecking our economy if everyone in your country dies in nuclear explosions or from radiation sickness shortly thereafter.

Just finished One Second After about 24 hours after hearing about it here. Great read. Terrifying but I couldn't put it down

I'll have to read this one also I guess.

I read Patriots....I liked the first 2/3s and then it got "out there".

There are several by "JoeNobody" (e-books) on prep/shtf and they are pretty decent. But the overall picture all of them paint is one that seems pretty bleek and near hopeless.

The only hope seems to be that humanity crashes against itself so fast and the die off is so large, that you could hopefully spare the resources for those few who can hide long enough to get on the other side of a near-extinction event. And then you face a dark-age of lost tech and things that break can never be fixed again etc.

Still pretty early in this one, but very scary. My wife and I bought it on audiobook to help pass time while travelling for the holidays. Talk about a buzz-kill. Now I kind of wished we had bought it hardcopy because I'll find myself wondering about parts and wanting to refer back to them.

I didn't realize it, but he wrote 2 sequels to this book.

Was picking up books at the library to read on a recent trip and found the first sequel.

https://www.amazon.com/One-Year-After-Matherson-Novel/dp/0765376717

https://www.amazon.com/Final-Day-John-Matherson-Novel/dp/0765376733

I remember when it seemed like every other week there was a SHTF thread on the OB. Good times.

Swarely said:

---

I didn't realize it, but he wrote 2 sequels to this book.

Was picking up books at the library to read on a recent trip and found the first sequel.

https://www.amazon.com/One-Year-After-Matherson-Novel/dp/0765376717

https://www.amazon.com/Final-Day-John-Matherson-Novel/dp/0765376733

I remember when it seemed like every other week there was a SHTF thread on the OB. Good times.

---

First book was great. Second okay. Can't remember if I ever read the third.

Lots of threads here about it lately. I read it after meeting a congressional emp task force air force officer. He certainly did not add any comfort level.

A non fiction book that also comfirms the grimness of it all is 'survival theory'

Bottom line a suburban prepper with guns and a years food is just a target.

Get REALLY serious along with all your neighbors, or youre going to just have to get really lucky.

I am currently reading "Axis of Evil: Post Apocalyptic EMP Survival Fiction (The Lone Star Series Book 1 of 6) and its okay. One of the leading figures is the SECDEF, A Fightin' Texas Aggie.

You rat bastages got me started with "One Second After" and after reading all three of those, I tried this newest series.

I thoroughly enjoyed the "John Matherson Novels" and any other suggestions would be appreciated!

BTW! Thanks for getting me hooked! I read the Matherson series books in three days and on day three and book three of this new set....

I read the Survivalist Series by A. American a couple years ago.

HERE

It's not very well written, but not bad. Kinda heavy with gear descriptions, but it was thoroughly entertaining and hard to put down.

For those interested in reading it, you can find it online here: https://archive.org/details/OneSecondAfter_969

Read 299 Days. It is a 10 book series. This series and One Second After are the only SHTF books I've read twice

A) As a Christian, not that concerned about living through the end times. Not saying not to take care, just doesn't seem productive vs. fighting the decay. (I think we're near an inflection point in what we can do with technology, but we are unstable, because it will take a significant social rebirth to find meaning.)

B) The heartless SOB in me, says in TEOTWAWKI, first thing is remove all bleeding hearts from having any voice/authority, second it remove/repurpose all parasites, Be they bureaucrats or drug addicts.