Alas, Babylon
Alas, Babylon is Pat Frank's 1959 novel, one of the earliest American post-apocalyptic novels and a steady seller for more than half a century, named for the prophet Jeremiah's lament over a fallen great city. Randy Bragg is a thirty-something Korean War veteran living in genteel idleness off a dwindling inheritance in his late father's house in Fort Repose, a small fictional town along the St. Johns River in central Florida. His older brother Mark is the operations officer at SAC headquarters in Omaha. One December afternoon Mark sends Randy's wife and children south to stay with him under the family code phrase Alas, Babylon, which means a Soviet nuclear strike on the United States is hours away. Hours later the bombs fall on Tampa, Jacksonville, Orlando, and Miami, and Fort Repose, just outside the lethal radius, must learn how to grow its own food, manage its medicine, and police its own streets in a world without electricity, money, or central authority.
Themes & atmosphere
What you might want to know about Alas, Babylon
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A small central Florida town wakes up to find nuclear war has erased much of the country overnight. One reluctant leader and his neighbors set about staying alive in the long, strange aftermath.
Alas, Babylon was written by Pat Frank and published in 1959. It is one of the earliest and most influential novels about life after a nuclear war, written at the height of Cold War fears.
Alas, Babylon has been challenged in various American school districts, mostly for language and references to violence. It remains widely taught in American literature and Cold War history courses.
Alas, Babylon is 312 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Alas, Babylon takes most readers 5 to 7 hours to finish.
Alas, Babylon is a standalone novel by an unknown author, not part of a series.
Alas, Babylon is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.