Let me explain what I mean.
The first book I read about a post-apocalyptic future was Pat Frank's excellent 'Alas Babylon.' It was written in 1958, about a near future where the USA and USSR did indeed launch a thermonuclear war. Mr. Frank didn't know about Nuclear Winter (the effect of all the burning cities' ash being added to the world's atmosphere). He only concerned himself with radioactive fallout. Like YTLM AB had the chain of command in the USA wrenched apart until -get this- the acting President of the United States was a woman, the former Secretary of Education.
Where Alas Babylon got it right and where YTLM, The Walking Dead, get it wrong is in the broader, behind-the-scenes world building. After a nuclear exchange, just exactly how long will it be until the US helicopters arrive in the town square? Or... how long until the Soviet tanks roll up Main Street? The people in that story save their meager resources of gasoline to power up the generator that -every first Tuesday of the month- operates the Ham Radio announcing The News of the World. They huddle near the speaker because they're desperate to make sense out of the whole thing.
I imagine if you're going to write a post-apocalyptic anything you should have a big white board and map out in a massive sense what would happen to the world itself. World War Z did a good job of that: Israel and Cuba fared well in a Zombie Apocalypse, due to their strict borders and massive militarism. Iceland was destroyed (sorry, Bjork).
(slight spoiler follows)
As a last note to AB, the most moving part of the book was at the very very end when indeed the US Army at last visited the small Florida hamlet that survived. After showing the General the water purifier and the gardens, etc. they asked him the one burning question they had on their mind:
'Who won the war?'
The General laughed. He said, 'Why, WE did, of course!'
|