The Girl Who Found the Sun by Matthew S. Cox

Cox takes the familiar post-apocalyptic tropes of survivors huddling in a bunker, failing technology, dystopian government, and possible conspiracy, and weaves them with nuances of his own to produce a tale that is fresh yet familiar. As toxins devastated Earth, a few survivors withdrew to the Arc, an underground sanctuary. The computers which stored much …

Bunker Boy by Jordan Elizabeth

Elizabeth shrinks the post-apocalyptic settlement trope down almost to a single family, starkly portraying how close the edge of human control becomes without ubiquitous civilisation. One moment, Zara is wondering whether her uncle will turn his music down enough that she can revise and what the searing flash outside the kitchen window is. The next …

Prophet’s Journey by Matthew S. Cox

This novel is a post-apocalyptic road movie through the eyes of an innocent, both providing a story filled with adventure and peril, and questioning whether the collapse of civilisation must leave us uncivilised. The events of this book take place after Cox's The Awakened series. Spoilers ahead. Following the defeat of Archon, Althea has returned …

Wild Frontiers: Such is the Nature of the Change

We continue our ride through Wild Frontiers with an extract from Stephen M. Coghlan's ‘Such is the Nature of the Change’, a tale not of the West That Was but of a West That Might Be where gunslingers stride the edge of civilisation again. The massed choir was rough in tone and agonized in note, …

The Lucky Ones by Matthew S. Cox

Cox mixes nuanced characters and plausible consequences of civilisation collapsing to craft a young-adult post-apocalyptic tale that provides intensity without resorting to stereotypes. This novel is the third in the Evergreen series. Risk of spoiler contamination beyond this point. In the eight months since nuclear strikes shattered the United States, Harper Cody has transformed from …

The World That Remains by Matthew S. Cox

Cox fuses the scarcity of resources and breakdown of civility of post-apocalyptic narratives with the personal focus of young adult fiction to create a survival thriller driven by character not trappings. This novel is the sequel to Evergreen. Danger of narrative contamination past this point. After escaping the gang-ridden ruins of her home for Evergreen, …

Evergreen by Matthew S. Cox

Cox builds a very personal narrative on a foundation of modern science to create a post-apocalyptic story that captures the scale of nuclear devastation without losing its human impact. Two months ago, nuclear missiles struck towns and cities across the United States. Far enough from the nearest target to survive the attack, seventeen-year-old Harper Cody …

The Forest Beyond the Earth by Matthew S. Cox

Cox layers the concerns and perspectives of a girl with overt and implied facets of a post-apocalyptic world, creating a quest that offers an engaging experience to both readers of both young adult and more gritty fiction. Many generations ago, wrathful monsters scorched the Earth and themselves along with it, destroying civilisation and nearly wiping …

Citadel: The Concordant Sequence by Matthew S. Cox

Cox creates a tale as much by what he does not say as by what he does, creating a young adult post-apocalyptic adventure that offers more than enough complexity to engage more mature readers as well. For eleven-year-old Kiera Quinn, life is an endless chain of school days so indistinguishable she could swear she’s lived …

Dead Man’s Number by Matthew S. Cox

ARC: No cover available at time of review. Cox combines the tropes of post-apocalyptic action stories with the fundamentals of human character and the realities of engineering to create a tale that will satisfy both those who love Mad Max: Beyond the Thunderdome and those who were constantly niggled by who was processing all the …