Ancestors

Written by BeeCycling on 2025-01-28 at 18:16

Just blasted through a quite short book, a mostly forgotten 1956 novel called The Death of Grass, by John Christopher. (Called No Blade of Grass in the US.) God it's bleak. Like Day of the Triffids meets Lord of the Flies.

=> More informations about this toot | More toots from beecycling@romancelandia.club

Toot

Written by BeeCycling on 2025-01-28 at 18:18

It's an apocalypse story where a plant virus starts killing all species of grass. In case you think that only means bad news for lawns, wheat, rice, oats, barley, maize and sugar cane are all grasses. And this is set in the 1950s, when livestock was still mostly fed on grass. Things go very badly, as you can imagine. Slowly at first, as the virus spreads around the world, then all at once for the UK and the group we follow in the book.

=> More informations about this toot | More toots from beecycling@romancelandia.club

Descendants

Written by BeeCycling on 2025-01-28 at 18:20

Seeing that the food available in the UK is about to be far too little for the number of people living there, the government considers the option of downsizing the population by dropping nukes on several major cities. 😱

=> More informations about this toot | More toots from beecycling@romancelandia.club

Written by BeeCycling on 2025-01-28 at 18:24

Anyway, it was a quick, easy read, but certainly not a hopeful one. It was interesting in the way there was a sort of divide between characters who had fought in the war, and so were much more prepared for dealing with things going to absolute hell, compared to to those who had certainly suffered privations at home in Britain during the war, but never been in a place when there's no rule of law, no police to call on for help.

=> More informations about this toot | More toots from beecycling@romancelandia.club

Written by BeeCycling on 2025-01-28 at 18:27

And it was certainly a salutary reminder of how fast things can go to hell. Something important to remember these days, when we're nearly all very complacent and the words "But they can't do that" might as well be set up as a keyboard shortcut.

=> More informations about this toot | More toots from beecycling@romancelandia.club