Last Updated on August 9, 2024
Dystopian is one of the least explored yet highly scintillating literary genres. Although the events described in dystopian books are largely fictional, they aren’t entirely beyond the realms of possibility.
Dystopian books depict the future as amazing, yet terrifying and utterly bleak. The future is portrayed as an open arena where anything goes, from aliens conquering planet earth to totalitarian governments imposing ridiculous decrees, technological inventions gone wrong, etc. What makes these events truly fascinating is their highly unpredictable nature.
Whether you’re a fan of dystopian books or are only now trying to dip your toes into this genre, we’ve rounded up some of the creepiest dystopian books that will make you fear the future.
1. Random Acts of Senseless Violence
Author: Jack Womack
Random Acts of Senseless Violence is a book about a seemingly ordinary 12-year old girl named Lola Hart.
Lola hails from a comfortable family and attends an exclusive private school. She loves her sister and maintains a close friendship with Lori and Katherine. Her life looks normal, except that she’s a dying breed.
The city where Lola comes from (depicted as a troubled near-future Manhattan) experiences a chain of events that aptly fit the book’s title – civil unrests, arson attacks, roaming gangs, and TB outbreaks. Incidentally, all these events seem to be working in harmony to destroy her.
2. The Power
Author: Naomi Alderman
Major technological inventions have always been a preserve of men. But in this book, we’re introduced to women who’re ready to shatter the glass ceiling to venture into traditionally male domains.
In The Power, women around the world are miraculously able to produce electricity. This monumental achievement allows them to seize power and authority from men.
But as it turns out, women aren’t immune from the ills that bedevil patriarchal societies. Although they now rule the world, corruption and abuse of power still reign supreme.
3. China Dream
Author: Ma Jian; Translator: Flora Drew
China has garnered a considerable amount of bad publicity over the years for its gross violation of human rights.
This dystopian book authored by Ma Jian and translated by Flora Drew attempts to put those allegations into better perspective.
China Dream chronicles the relentless efforts by the Chinese government in forcing the dream of President Xi Jingping into the minds of his subjects during their sleep.
4. Future Home of the Living God
Author: Louise Erdrich
The Evolution Theory is one of the most fascinating theories ever advanced. To think that humans once walked on four limbs is to stretch the imagination a bit too far.
But in Future Home of the Living God, the prolific author, Louie Erdrich, depicts a near-future in which evolution runs in reverse.
As newer life forms are being born more primitive than the ones that came before, we’re introduced to an expecting mom who wonders about how her unborn child would be. Her worries get her to start writing a diary for the unborn baby.
5. Secondborn
Author: Amy A. Bartol
The setting is in a totalitarian state of the Fates Republic. On Transition Day, every second-born child is captured by the government and compelled to work as servants of elite firstborns or join the military.
The highlight of the book is a second-born child named Roselle St. Sismode, born to an elite woman, who’s forced to join the army.
Due to her elite status, every decision Roselle makes on the battlefield comes under intense public scrutiny.
6. Never Let me Go
Author: Kazuo Ishiguro
Never Let Me Go begins as an ordinary tale depicting a group of boarding school friends – Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy – who later reconnect in life after graduating from school.
During their school years, Ruth, Kathy, and Tommy were always hailed as special.
And now in their adulthood, the three longtime friends realize that they were indeed special, but not in the way they might have thought.
7. The Handmaid’s Tale
Author: Margaret Atwood
The Handmaid’s Tale takes place in a dystopian future where democracy is replaced by Christian fundamentalism. Patriarchy and religious rule have reduced woman into objects of ridicule. They’re forced to perform specific duties, including being wives, handmaids, and cooks.
However, handmaids are assigned the only role of bearing children for powerful men, and they have no say on when and where to have sex.
In the midst of these persecutions, a quiet underground resistance simmers. But the women’s relentless efforts to break free from patriarchal and religious misrule aren’t without casualties.
8. Station Eleven
Author: Emily St. John Mandel
A virus sweeps through the world, killing 95% of the world’s population and wiping out all comforts of civilization.
Twenty years later, a troupe of performers is determined to bring hope to the still-frightened survivors.
However, the band’s ominous encounter with a violent prophet leaves them wondering if another apocalypse is imminent.
9. The Giver
Author: Lois Lowry
In The Giver, everyone is assigned a job based on their talents. That’s pretty much how things should be, right? Well, this is not your average story of an ideal society. There’s more to the storyline that makes this book fit aptly in the dystopian category.
Besides assigning people roles based on their talents, families are also created depending on their incomes and interpersonal styles. And if that’s not gross enough, everyone has to take drugs to suppress their emotions and sex drives.
Then the storyline takes an unexpected twist when Jonas, who’s given the job as Receiver of Memory, meets with the Giver of Memory.
10. Brave New World
Author: Aldous Huxley
If the phrase ‘blissful ignorance’ was ever personified, then the characters would all be in this dystopian book by Aldous Huxley. In the book, people are kept in a perpetual state of happiness and compliance.
Nearly all the best things in life are free, from love to sex, drugs, you name it. The society seems well-structured too.
Everything appears normal until one brave man, Bernard, starts to wonder if there’s something more to this world than meets the eye. His revelations prove that, indeed, everyone has been living a lie.
11. The Age of Miracles
Author: Karen Thompson Walker
The Age of Miracles is an excellent read for climate change conspiracy theories.
The book depicts the strange global changes that take place due to a massive shift in the earth’s traditional rotation pattern.
Although the aftermath borders on global apocalypse, the author creatively weaves in events that prove there’s always hope for humanity regardless of the circumstances we’re in.
12. A Boy and His Dog
Author: Harlan Ellison
A Boy and His Dog is set in an alternate world in which President John F. Kennedy survived his assassination. This world is also characterized by major scientific breakthroughs in animal research, including the ability of humans to communicate telepathically with their animal companions.
The highlight is a 15-year-old boy named Vic and his telepathic dog called Blood, who share a strange symbiotic relationship.
Vic and Blood scavenge the wastelands of a war-torn United States, where they encounter survivors of a nuclear World War III between Americans and Soviets. Vic’s role is to ensure Blood has food, while Blood leads Vic to women he can use for sex.
13. The Road
Author: Cormac McCarthy
This is one of the few dystopian books that add new meaning to the words ‘bleak’ and ‘despondency.’
A father and son journey through a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Their destination is unknown. But they must keep going and stay together to survive.
The duo soldiers on, holding on to shreds of hope that something good will come out of their aimless wanderings.
14. Brown Girl in the Ring
Author: Nalo Hopkinson
Brown Girl in the Ring is set in a future Toronto, where nearly everyone has fled the city which has been reduced into a massive lawless wasteland.
The remnants live by any means necessary, clutching on to constantly diminishing hopes of a better tomorrow.
But things take an unexpected twist when an outsider needs a heart transplant, as those inside the city are hunted for the vital organ.
15. Ready Player One
Author: Ernest Cline
Ready Player One is set in 2045, where the real world has degenerated so much that people are escaping into a virtual one.
Surviving in the virtual world requires people to solve certain mysterious puzzles. Wade Watts is incredibly gifted at cracking these puzzles.
However, Watts soon realizes that there are many other people trying to solve the same puzzles, and who’re ready to kill for the solutions.
16. Material Girls
Author: Elaine Dimopoulis
Don’t let the title fool you. There’s little correlation between the events in this book and the context of Madonna’s song by the same title, although we can draw a few nexuses here and there.
In Material Girl, teenagers play the all-important role of setting fashion trends.
But when a brave fashionista and a pop star begin to question the wanton consumerism of their world, they find themselves on a collision course with the real fashion industry cartels.
17. V for Vendetta
Authors: Alan Moore and David Lloyd
The suggestive title of this dystopian book is enough to clue you in on how the storyline unfolds.
Set in a future totalitarian England, V for Vendetta follows after the struggles of an anonymous revolutionary determined to fight fascism using anarchism.
He has the best interests of his people at heart. But his approach in fighting for their rights doesn’t portray him in such a positive light.
18. Y: The Last Man
Author: Brian K. Vaughan
A plague has ravaged the world, killing all mammals with a Y chromosome. However, there’s one survivor by the name of Yorick Brown.
Although Brown is happy to be alive, he doesn’t seem to understand why he survived.
He teams up with a government operative, a young researcher, and his pet monkey to try and uncover why he survived.
19. Partials
Author: Dan Wells
A devastating battle between humans and Partials (engineered organic life forms identical to humans) has destroyed the human population. Partials were initially created to fight for humans. But somewhere along the road, they had a change of heart.
The only survivors on the eastern seaboard of the United States come together on Long Island, living each day as it comes.
Then one heroine, a 16-year-old Kira, embarks on a journey to find a solution in a bid to save what’s left of her fast-dwindling race.
20. Naughts & Crosses
Author: Malorie Blackman
At first glance, Naughts & Crosses, comes across as a regular story of interclass relationships. But that’s only half the story. In this dystopian world, humans have only two identities. There are pale-skinned and poverty-stricken people called Naughts and dark-skinned elites called Crosses.
A Naught named Callum falls in love with a Cross called Sephy. Their relationship thrives for a while. However, Callum and Sephy’s love affair is put to the test when the love birds are accused of a terrorist attack.
They must prove their innocence while also attempting to debunk the myth that Naughts and Crosses can never see eye to eye in matters relationships.
Conclusion
There goes our list of the top dystopian books to read in 2021. As you may have gathered, each book covers a specific theme, which makes it unique and all the more worth adding to your home library.
