I’m an Indie-Author who focuses on Post-Apocalyptic fiction, but one that finds himself at odds with the broader Post-Apocalyptic Indie Author/Audience scene. Most successful Indies who write Post-Apocalyptic fiction actually only write within a very narrow bandwidth of the genre, focusing on what should be it’s own sub-genre of Preper Fiction. It’s fine if you want to do that, but it’s really not something I want to do. I’ve known I don’t mesh well with the broader PA-Indie Author scene for a while now, but it’s always been hard to nail down why. But I just got into a brief, but revelatory, discussion with an Indie who is far more successful than I am - and now I think I know why.
Prepper Fiction, as the name suggests, focuses on Preppers - which also reveals their protagonist’s key aspect - they’re prepared. The implications of this were only made crystal clear to me during this discussion with the other, far more successful (I cannot stress that enough) Indie. To summarise his rather long point, he basically said -
“My character was a good guy, smart, popular, successful, helped out in the community and church. He almost did everything right… but he never asked ‘what if’? and so his unperparedness for a tomorrow that wasn’t like today lead to his downfall. I want people to think about this character, and not be like him.”
To which my reply was -
“So, basically, what you’re saying is - “Jack was a really great guy, but he wasn’t a Prepper… so he died.”
The conversation jackknifed and he denied my synopsis of his longwinded post and suggested I read his book, which I kindly refused. But it did get me thinking about his argument, and where I’d heard it countless times before.
Back in the good old days, where the biggest concern in society was how annoying the Christians could be, they always had this weird argument about heaven. It was basically that it didn’t matter how good a person you were, if you didn’t follow Christ then you’d go to hell. You could house the poor, care for the sick, donate blood and save puppies, but if you didn’t adopt this one particular lifestyle, then all that was in vain and you’d suffer the consequences.
It’s the same argument…
It’s no suprise that the biggest readers of Prepper Ficiton are American Christians, they’ve been freaking out about doomsday forever. They spend their entire lives preparing for the Day of Judgment, when all the non-believers who didn’t think like them will finally understand that they were fools and ohhh if only they’d listened to the ever so wise and saintly Christi-I mean, Preppers.
It’s the exact… same… argument.
I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to figure it out, but this throw-away discussion with one of my betters has laid out exactly why I hate Prepper Fiction. Imagine having the audacity to think you could prepare for the end of the world? Imagine staring down zombies, nuclear war, EMP, coronal mass ejection or an actual pandemic (because those are the only scenarioes they deal with) and thinking, “yeah, I got this.” It’s the exact same audacity that allows people to walk around thinking, “anyone and everyone who doesn’t follow my way of life will burn for eternity, but I’m going to be rewarded for eternity.”
For the most part, beyond the inciting incident, the apocalypse doesn’t even play a role in Prepper Fiction - it’s just there to kick things off and break the world order we’re currently stuck with. This is because Prepper Fiction is simple wish-fulfilment - of a world where everyone who doesn’t think like the reader dies and the slate is wiped clean. Any antagonists who manages to survive the end of the world in Prepper Fiction are either evil “heathens” to be killed or unprepared “atheists” who should’ve listened and prepared while they had the chance. Prepper Fiction isn’t about people surviving the end of the world, it’s about people prepared for the end of the world surviving, and being proven right.
But the thing is - the apocalypse is the end-of-the-fucking-world, it doesn’t take sides and it doesn’t give a shit how prepared you are. A meteor is going to kill millions, the resulting tsunamis will kill millions more and the subsequent famines will kill billions after that. Fuck your little cabin in the woods and collections of bullets and beans. You’re not going to be rebuilding shit after that, certainly not your little utopian light of civilization you think you’re carrying. You’re gonna hide out in your cabin in the woods for a few weeks and then wonder why you’re suddenly getting sick. As you start firing blood from both ends you’ll remember that there’s nobody to run the nuclear powerplants and so they’ve all gone into meltdown and they’re spewing radiation all over the country side. The last thing you see, as you die scared and alone, is your bug-out-bag full of expensive gear.
I was never a Christian, and I’m not a Prepper, and even though people can and do make bank by catering to this audience, it’s just not something I’m interested in… but fuck me if this link between the two wasn’t a massive reveal for me.