AFTER LONDON aka WILD ENGLAND (1885) – Written by Richard Jefferies. A post-apocalypse saga in which the shifting of the Earth’s axis has reduced the British Isles to a medieval level with feral animals and pockets of toxic wasteland. There are scattered “kingdoms” and roving bands of marauders but no contact with the world outside the area.
The setting is roughly 130 years after a dark celestial body passed very close to Earth, tilting the axis, unleashing tectonic shifts, damaging the climate, and altering the planet’s magnetic field. The post-apocalypse kingdoms are separated by toxic, uninhabitable regions and by forests filled with altered, deadly dogs, cattle and hogs.
The Thames and Severn Rivers have backed up, forming a large central lake in England. What was once London is a toxic marsh so deadly to human life that its gases and vapors, when carried by the winds, kill or drive mad humans exposed to them.
The buildings and streets of central London are covered in a black liquid – seemingly from deep beneath the Earth – that chokes out all life. Continue reading
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