Humor Dystopian

Twelve women confront the mounting existential terrors of modernity—climate change, unbridled capitalism and greed, an entertainment industry that will go to surreal lengths to stay relevant—in this debut story collection set in a slightly off-kilter version of reality. A woman's limbs...

"The Empathizer" is a provocative dystopian political satire that transports listeners to a fractured America after a second civil war. Based on Edgar Allan Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death," this limited audio series follows one man's harrowing journey when he returns to the progressive West Coast and becomes trapped as the deadly pandemic sweeps through the region.

Beverly Cryer (Vurl) has to choose a dystopian faction to live with for the rest of her life. If she doesn't make it through initiation, she'll be factionless and declared a Detergent. But, Vurl is determined not to spend the rest of her life doing everyone else's laundry. She is an independent young woman with skills she doesn't even know about and with the help of handsome number Two she'll not only make it through initiation, she'll save the city from disaster.

A kooky kid is banished to another planet in this hilarious adventure about a futuristic world where different is dangerous, imagination is insanity, and creativity is crazy! Norbert Riddle lives in the United State of Earth, where normal means following the rules, never standing out, and being...

In the near future, Berlin’s real estate is being flipped in the name of “sustainability”, only to make the city even more unaffordable; artists are employed by corporations as consultants, and the weather is acting strange. When Anja and Louis are offered a rent-free home on an artificial mountain - yet another eco-friendly initiative run by a corporation - they seize the opportunity, but it isn’t long before the experimental house begins malfunctioning.

Eight people escape zombie-infested New York. They have only one thing in common: the addict gene. The same genetic quirk that makes alcoholics and addicts susceptible to booze and drugs gives them a mysterious ability to evade the undead. But that's not enough to unite them. They're an unlikely crew: A Botoxed Upper East Sider; a drug dealer; a resentful daughter of addicts; a recovering AA guy; a Japanese ex-dope fiend; an addicted Ivy Leaguer; and a Mexican immigrant.

Blending the piercing humor of Alexandra Kleeman and the jagged satire of Black Mirror, an audacious, eerily prescient debut novel that chronicles the rise and fall of a massive high-rise housing complex, and the lives it affected before - and after - its demise. Standing nearly 500 stories tall, Los Verticalés once bustled with life and excitement. Now this marvel of modern architecture and nontraditional urban planning has collapsed into a pile of rubble known as the Heap.

Yang Wei wakes to find himself still a patient at the hospital. Somehow, he’s aged decades overnight and is confined to the geriatric ward on a massive Hospital ship as it floats along a bloodred sea full of unsightly things. But human remains and sea nymphs are perhaps nothing compared to the goings-on belowdecks.

When the head of a hovercycle club inexplicably calls in news of his own murder, Detective Simon Grave and his team are drawn in to Crab Cove's hovercycle underworld, a world of loyalty, betrayal, greed, and-yes-irony. As if murder weren't enough, the bombing of an election debate stage has the mayor pressing for a quick resolution to both crimes. It becomes increasingly clear that the crimes are connected, and that the solution will require the unraveling of an elaborate criminal scheme-and more.

When gumshoe detective, Daxon Steele, finds he’s ankle deep in more than a chewed up wad, he quickly uncovers a sinister plot that sets out to exploit and destroy not just the skink-pushers who hide in the shadows of the Flatpack District, not just the poor guys, gals and others shaking their hips at Shooters & Hooters Club, but the entire population of Bryunsville. Will Dax overcome his prejudice and accept Gaz, a former stripper-bot, as his partner?

Aleya’s world starts to unravel after a café customer leaves behind a collection of short stories. Surprised and disturbed to discover that it has been dedicated to her, Aleya delves into the strange book. A mad scientist seeks to steal his son’s dreams. A struggling writer, skilled only at destruction, finds himself courted by Hollywood. A woman seeks to escape her body and live inside her dreams. Citizens panic when a new city block manifests out of nowhere. The more Aleya reads, the deeper she sinks into the mysterious writer’s work.

There are only a few weeks left before an asteroid destroys the planet. It’s the countdown, and all of humanity is just waiting for the end. In Phoenix, AZ, the sheriff’s department and National Guard are battling for supremacy, gas is as good as cash, and elementary school kids are out for blood. Most people in town have become the worst versions of themselves. Except for Dutch Kovaks, private detective. Dutch wants to right some wrongs, help a few people in need, and use the days he’s got left for good. Most of all, he wants to track down a bottle of gin.

Joe, is a bad guy. Joe doesn’t know, Joe, is a bad guy. Joe thinks he’s a good guy. That’s why we had to beat him to take over that world. It was for the better good. Joe was not a good guy, regardless of what he’d have you believe.

Jim Frost thinks that when you’re dead, you’re dead. Gone. Finished. Kaput. But on the eve of his 73rd birthday, his daughter suggests he have his brain downloaded to a microchip for safekeeping, and Jim is forced to consider what it really means to die - and what it might mean to live forever.

As African Swine Fever Virus, a deadly virus that infects pigs, is spreading in China and threatens to infect pigs in Western Europe - and may even reach America - the timing of this provocative novel could not be more perfect. As fears grow that the virus might be capable of infecting humans, this book raises troubling questions about the honesty and competence of public health officials.

Set in Rhode Island, Winner of the National Book Award tells the story of twins who could not be more different. Abigail Mather is a woman of passionate sensual and sexual appetites, while her sister, the book-loving local librarian Dorcas, lives a quiet life of the mind. But when the sisters are sought out by the predatory and famous poet, Guy DeVilbiss, who introduces them to Hollywood hack writer and possible psychopath Conrad Lowe, they rapidly become pawns in a game that leads to betrayal, shame and ultimately, murder.

From acclaimed author Jonathan Miles (“a writer so virtuosic that readers will feel themselves becoming better, more observant people from reading him"—Los Angeles Times) comes a blackly comic literary gem in which a broken man confronts a broken world on an uninhabited Pacific island...

In the shifting sands of the desert, near an unnamed metropolis, there is an institute where various fellows come to undertake projects of great significance. But when our sort-of hero, Percy Frobisher, arrives, surrounded by the simulated environment of the glass-enclosed dome of the Institute, his mind goes completely blank. When he spills something on his uniform - a major faux pas - he learns about a mysterious shop where you can take something, utter the command “same same,” and receive a replica even better than the original.

With these 13 transfixing, ingenious stories, Ben Marcus gives us timely dystopian visions of alienation in a modern world - cosmically and comically apt. Never has existential catastrophe been so much fun.

James Kingzett delivers a chilling depiction of a future overshadowed by "The New Dark" - an era marked by the collapse of energy transmission grids and power systems. As society teeters on the brink of chaos, Kingzett warns of the dangers inherent in our current energy landscape, advocating for a shift towards renewable sources such as geothermal energy. Using satire, storytelling, and some digs at the government, Kingzett creates a compelling story that exposes the need to change our centralized grid system or risk facing The New Dark.