4 Books For Rebuilding Your Civilization After The Apocalypse

You want a blueprint? Here’s a blueprint. Dartnell takes a scientific approach to the rebirth of a technological society by outlining how long you can reasonably forage for canned food, which skills and knowledge sets are interlinked, and how to solidify a knowledge foundation so that you can have running water again as fast as possible. You may want to scrap some of it, depending on what kind of civilization you want to rebuild. (Personally, I’d opt for slower technological development and a closer relationship to nature, but that’s just me.) However, if what you really want is a post-apocalyptic shortwave radio, this is the book that will tell you how to get there.

You may have noticed that this is a book that is nominally for children. Allow me to make two points about that. First of all, reading a kids’ book about a complicated subject can be a good topical ramp-in for adults. This is how James Holzhauer won Jeopardy! Second, after the apocalypse, you’re going to have your hands full just meeting your daily caloric load and fighting off the mutant wombats. You are not going to have much down time at all. The more efficiently you can absorb information, the better off you’re going to be, and you don’t get much more efficient than bright pictures and fun nation-building games.

No mere political gesture, this! Michelle Obama’s famous gardening book is just that: a gardening book, complete with tips and pointers for beginner gardeners. Let’s face it: your collapsed society is going to have to start growing its own food again at some point, and at that point, its members are probably going to need some education. American Grown does double-duty by also supporting racial equity and tolerance. If we’re going to survive the apocalypse, we’ll need that too.

This may be a list of books for rebuilding your civilization, but don’t rush to recreate things before you think about what you really want. The asteroid/nuclear war/murder hornet invasion that brought you here was bad, yes, and we all wish it hadn’t happened. But this is also an opportunity to reflect on some of the stuff that previous civilizations didn’t do well—like, for example, the Trail of Tears and slavery—and build new social structures to prevent those from happening again. This beautiful book of poetry by Joy Harjo will keep appreciation of the written word alive while reminding your scrappy band of ragtag survivors that it’s possible to be better than the previous administration. It’s history, art, heart, and philosophy all in one. Don’t tackle the end of the world without your copy.