American War by Omar El Akkad

American War

Omar El Akkad

Set towards the end of the 21st Century, this is a chilling vision of a country torn apart by climate change, where the USA is divided into warring factions fighting over land, fuel and food. It is all the more powerful because the land shown here is not much different from the one we inhabit today.

Extract
The coastal waters were brown and still. The sea's mouth opened wide over ruined marshland, and every year grew wider, the water picking away at the silt and sand and clay, until the old riverside plantations and plastics factories and marine railways became unstable. Before the buildings slid into the water for good, they were stripped of their usable parts by the delta's last holdout residents. the water swallowed the land. To the southeast, the once glorious city of New Orleans became a well within the walls of its levees. The baptismal rites of a new America.
Parallels
  • The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
  • I am Legend by Richard Matheson
  • The Road by Cormac McCarthy