As Wind in Dry Grass by H. Grant Llewellyn is the story of Albert Smythe, an eccentric, retired truck driver (after 20 years) who lives a self-sustainable life on his rural Indiana farm, and his survival after TSHTF.
This story is a bit unique in that it has two waves of events that alone could take down our society. The first is an apparently well-planned attack on the trucking infrastructure – terrorists – it’s not known if they’re domestic or foreign – plant bombs on hundreds of long-haul trucks and in their cargos, causing a lock up of that system that eventually crashes the economy.
My guess is most people don’t realize how vulnerable our trucking and rail transit infrastructure is, and how much we rely on it since the advent of just-in-time delivery awhile back. IMO, when any competent bad guys figure this out, we’re screwed.
The terrorist induced collapse was followed by some sort of global pandemic that finished off the job of collapsing civilization.
Albert, a man with no family ties, had been a frugal trucker who saved for 20 years, then retired to his rural Indiana farm where he had live stock, small scale farming, generators with lots of fuel, etc. He also constructed a hidden bunker on his property, and stockpiled weapons, ammo, etc. He had no family, wife, children, etc.
His perfect life ended when the terrorist induced shortages caused FEMA, backed up by local officials, to devise a plan to confiscate from local farmers their food stores. Without getting into too much detail, Albert ended up killing the FEMA reps and local authorities that came to take his food, and became a guerilla fighter. Then the global pandemic came and everything got even worse.
There are a lot of good preps detailed in this book. It’s also one of the best written self-published books out there.
However, the tinfoil hat conspiracies are in full force, complete with UN forces terrorizing Americans, raping and killing at will to restore law and order for the government. There is a long, somewhat bizarre rant on this topic. There is also a lot of racist talk/sentiment that detracts from the book.
A major flaw is the UN occupation (with U.S. government permission) – it doesn’t make sense, there is no logical reason or goal. It’s unlikely UN nations would be able to field troops after a financial collapse (that would affect the global economy) and a global pandemic, especially considering the U.S. funds most of the UN.
Good writing and interesting scenario, but I’m not comfortable with the racist rants and UN conspiracy theories. If you can ignore those aspects, it’s a good read.
I don’t think I could handle the “tinfoil hat” stuff. It’s too bad, other than that is sounds like a good read.
Seizure of farm products by gov (at any level) after an SHTF event is something I think the most frightening and hardest to prepare for. Never saw any prepper address it head on.
The tinfoil rants, and phobic nature of a lot of EOTWAWKI writing seems to come out of the 90s militia movement. Not all of it is like that, but enough to be discouraging.
Seizure of farms and farm produce as been pretty common in with kleptocratic African governments. During the Southern campaign of our Revolutionary War, the Carolinas were picked clean by both sides militias and the occasional regular troops stationed nearby. It is why I don’t view gardening to be a sure solution to short term food problems. Long term yes, but you have to survive the short term to get to the long term.
I read the Turner Diaries and didn’t fall over in a dead faint, so maybe I will get this one and see what I can learn from it.
http://capoliticalnews.com/2011/09/25/epa-has-study-to-close-down-all-farms-and-businesses-in-san-joaquin-valley/
EPA has Study to Close Down ALL Farms and Businesses in San Joaquin Valley
I guess you will not have to wait too long to find out what it is going to be like to have 25% less food crop available!
As for trucking, it would be very simple to disrupt the carrier system. A common carrier(chartered by the federal government can pick up a crate at a clients and move it through there system. Hundreds if not thousand of these could be done in a day. Teamster drivers would not question anything!
dear suburban survivalist,
permit me to introduce myself. I am the author of said work, As Wind in Dry Grass and I was alerted to your review by a compatriot. I am most gratified by your attention and I believe your review is both cogent and completely defensible. Were more individuals willing to articulate their concerns as you have I believe the tone of literature in general in this beleaguered country would suffer considerable improvement. Those who know me, know I am not a racist but I felt compelled to depict racism as a powerful force in the coming catastrophe, which I believe is imminent. Tin foil hat conspiracy theories are also a considerable part of the matrix that surrounds us and thus I included them in order to expose them…in any case, any author craves readers like yourself and I most humbly thank you for devoting your time and consideration to my book.
H. Grant Llewellyn
Mr. Llewellyn,
Some very fine writing and a fresh approach to how we might collapse, so much appreciated.
I can see how some characters would be racist and that groups would form around race, but what about, for example, the description of FEMA training (as remembered by the illegal alien who somehow became a federal employee at FEMA)? I guess that could be a combination of the tin foil hat thing and racism, but didn’t seem necessary.
BTW, if you write any sequels, I’ll buy them all.
Damn! Word gets around on the internet, doesn’t it. That’s impressive, that the author read your review and responded. Now I’m determined to get the book and read it. If you don’t mind, I’ll mention the exchange of thoughts on my own blog, because I am sure people would be interested. But of course, I won’t write anything until you approve. If you would rather I didn’t, no problem. I’m not trying to steal your thunder, it’s just an interesting event that would be fun to write about.
Arsenius,
No problem, post away! The author of the book reviewed here also commented;
http://suburbansurvivalist.wordpress.com/2010/07/08/book-review-%e2%80%93-summer-of-the-apocalypse/
Ok. I’ve been running dry on creative thoughts and this is an interesting event, I hardly ever see authors respond to revues on blogs.
Just finished S.M. Stirling’s The Tears Of The Sun, the latest of the Dies The Fire books. Stirling sure knows how to drag things out! But, the book is a really good read. I burned though it in a couple of days.
I just gave up on Reinventing Collapse by Dmitry Orlov. Orlov has some interesting things to say about the collapse of the Soviet Union, but he doesn’t seem to have a clue about how the USA functions.
I’m confused by the author’s comment about conspiracy theories. How does making a theory into a reality in his book ‘expose them’?
I’ll have to consider the book. Stumbled across your blog from a link on the mini-Ruger review (posted on a site that has been examining the economic implosion for years. Truth be known we are in a slow collapse at present that is very likely to pick up steam and turn into something even the most slow witted will recognize as a crash). Regarding UN troops, beyond a few large countries military, the rest are often ill armed and ill trained and resemble more the low end of mercenary organizations of the past. I’d say it is feasible for the current CinC to ask for and get some of these types assigned here for crowd control. Once here they would simply do what unpaid mercenaries from time immemorial have done: loot to survive.
I’ll have to read it to see what the racial angles are, but believe me there is ample evidence of racial tensions in urban America. Just because the old media refuses to tell the full story doesn’t mean it hasn’t leaked elsewhere.
The review of this book reminds me of the old “Ashes” series. The author of that series put way too much emphasis at that time on race, and spent the entire 2nd half of the first book describing “In my opinion, this is how the perfect country should run,” in describing a newly formed Pacific Northwest. I didn’t bother with the rest of that series, needless to say.
You can set up an automatic Google search to look for reviews of a book.
http://www.google.com/alerts?hl=en
That would likely do the trick most of the time. An author is crazy (and some of them are) not to be polite to someone who took time to read their book, and is publishing a review to a community of like minded people.
The author did not address the concerns of racism and tinfoil hats. But at least he was polite.
Somebody in the trucking industry was commenting on how the free trade deals have opened up the American trucking industry to unregulated Mexican trucking. He also said that there were a lot of drivers coming in from Canada.
The Canadian drivers all seemed to be Russian immigrants. All young, fit and with a military bearing.
Somebody pass the tin-foil please…
JD
As far as a collapse of America goes, the most probable cause would be a collapse of the US Dollar brought on by the massive debt that has been piling up since people stopped working for a living. I have read several reports that warned 50% of American adults do not work. Economists say the real national debt is anywhere from $140 trillion to $202 trillion. This is in the form of promises of free healthcare and retirement and is money that has not been spent yet. How could it? Two hundred trillion is about 82 years’ worth of revenues at present level. The WWII generation each cost taxpayers $500,000 on average from the time they retired until they died, most did not make that much in their life, much less pay that much in taxes. It is estimated the Boomers will cost more than twice that, and there are 78 million of them (I am one of them). Multiply 78 million times one million! Then add to that all of the millions of local, state, and federal employees retiring soon who have been promised even more than the average citizen. Then add to that all of the vets who have been promised hundreds of thousands of dollars, even millions in some cases, in benefits above and beyond SS, Medicaid, and Medicare. That is NOT to say the war wounded should not be taken care of, but it DOES cost. We now spend 3% of the federal budget on the VA alone. Compare that to the fact we spend only 2.5% on the federal government! That 2.5% pays for all federal law enforcement, the federal prison system, the federal court system, and the three branches of government. About 75% of the federal government goes to social programs and interest on the national debt, and the debt would not exist if not for social programs. The US has painted itself into a corner and keeps on painting as fast as possible. What we see going on in Europe is our NEAR future, but much worse is coming soon.
“About 75% of the federal government goes to social programs and interest on the national debt, and the debt would not exist if not for social programs.”
That should be “About 75% of the federal BUDGET goes to social programs.
dear urban survivalist…
a sequel to As Wind In Dry Grass, entitled, In the Valley Of Dying Stars will be available on Amazon sometime next week in both hardcopy and kindle.
I have not been unmindful of the comments here – and elsewhere – and I thank you once again for your time and consideration should you feel inclined to indulge me yet again.
HGL.