I find this time setting to be very intriguing. There is so much one can contribute. New governments in place that could be pro one sex and hold the others beneath them. Alone and trying to survive in a wasteland. Maybe even a super natural twist or extraterrestrial life. So many good options. I started this thread in hopes of talking to fellow writers about this subject and if they have any story ideas on this particular matter. Thanks for reading and hope to hear from fellow post apocalyptic enthusiasts.
I too am fond of this genre, in fact it is one I work with fairly extensively in my story "The Adventure Of Nemo Of Utopia". It is easy to write for but also easy to screw up badly so I advise caution in playing with it, but if you can do it justice... Vis-a-Vis your pole question I find paranormal to be easier to work into the story than extraterrestrial life. Extraterrestrial life could one day become science fact, and then as more and more such examples are discovered your story seems increasingly dated and unrealistic. The paranormal by contrast is already known and acknowledged to be fantasy, so all you have to do is work with the tropes of the genre, chose which ones to play straight, avert, or subvert and keep your methodology consistent. Take my story "The Adventure Of Nemo Of Utopia". as an example: I have chosen to use the tropes of D&D as inspiration for my stories, though I am using them in a post apocalyptic setting they provide an interesting twist to the story. One thing that I find difficult to deal with however is some of the inherent flaws of the genre: very few people realize just how total the devastation of our world and it's ecosystem would be in the event of such a catastrophe as would cause the total collapse of our civilization. Even with the abilities of our modern infrastructure we are dancing a knife edge between life and death a lot of the time without realizing it, were that to be taken away... Well, let's just say that the chances there would be ANY survivors are slim to none. However, that is not the main issue, the thing we must remember here is that this is by it's nature a fictional tale, so as long as we are letting our imaginations run wild we might as well have some fun with it.
Good point on all accounts : ) ... I love the idea of paranormal activity in stories... the thought of something supernatural lurking in an upcoming thread is enough to get your heart racing... as well as other places to get excited... As for extraterrestrial life, I do find the idea to be difficult to pull off... I however love when it is written about. Aliens normally are portrayed as more advanced than we. Therefore mind control can come into the fray as well as... (ahem) ... tentacles... not that I find the idea of being probed by countless of those little fuckers to be a turn on or anything... lol
Extraterrestials don't have to be 100% scientifically correct. I mean, I like hard-scifi but that's not mandatory and most people can accept Star Trek and aliens with spray painted skin and some latex strapped on their forehead and enjoy the story. (Even on the occasions when the story is trying to be something more than "and then they fucked.")
I wish everyone could have as much of an informed opinion about such things as the two of you have shown. You are quite right about the ease with which one can invite willing suspension of disbelief, after all the reason people come here and read the stories is to have a good time. Yes, it's easy to invite it, but relying on this fact can leave your audience wishing you had gone the extra mile to polish your description and development of the world you are creating. I myself have been castigated for such laziness and would like to think that you could learn from it without being so derided yourself.
You know, if we´re talking about some sort of Nuclear Wasteland scenario, you could go for a kind of "lone wanderer" vibe. Like, you could have one path where you´re a goody-twoshoes who goes around rescuing damsels in distress from bandits, mutant fuckers and cultists, and one where you´re a crazy wasteland shitlord yourself who goes around raping people for postapocalyptic chuckles. Dunno if aliens are such a good idea. I can´t really imagine an alien invasion postapocalypse. You either have a postapocalypse (zombies, WW3, Meteor impact, supervirus, etc...) or an invasion from space. The two are pretty seperate imo
Alien invasion postapocalypse could be fun because it is a relatively fresh idea. The aliens came, they destroyed most of Earth and then... Did we barely win? Are there groups of alien survivors who can't go back to their homeworld because we nuked their mothership and their technology stopped working and now they are trying to rebuild just like the humans? (This one would give the option of semi-friendly aliens who no longer have any hostile intentions and could be convinced that they must work together with humans if they are to survive in the ruins of Earth.) Did the aliens win and take what they came for and then leave? (Ok, this one would be strange, unless the aliens were after something very specific and removing it from Earth wouldn't completely kill all life.) Or perhaps the aliens won and humans are living in the ruins on a planet that is under alien control? This one has potential in my mind. Think XCOM2 but with less rebuilding of human cities. The alien overlords are building their civilization on Earth but haven't bothered to wipe out all of humans, they simply took out the main resistance and now people like the main character are hiding in the ruins and trying to rebuild, dreaming of a day when they could drive away the aliens from the planet.
Or maybe the aliens came in peace and solved all conflicts but they accidentally gave us some sort of Alien Super Fuck-Virus so they fucked off back to space after realizing their mistake. Now we have horny infected people, half-understood leftover alien tech and maybe a remaining contingent of aliens working hard to find a cure (in some vague way that hopefully involves much fucking)...
That sounds like the story of the "Buck Rogers" comics, with surviving North Americans living in hiding in underground cities, a vast wilderness in the middle of the continent patrolled by invader airships, and techno-paradise cities of the invaders on the coasts. (In this case, the invaders were "Mongols" with force-field lifted airships and disintegration beams, vs. the locals with jet-packs and rocket-powered explosive pistols). After the Mongols were subdued under Buck's leadership, the Martians (fierce cat-people) invaded with the help of a local traitor, Killer Kane, who was Buck's rival for The Girl (Wilma Deering, a competent soldier and commander herself).
...This is what happens when I think I have an original idea. Still, if it worked for Buck Rogers why wouldn't it work again? And now that I think about it, I think there was some TV show with Earth in ruins and aliens and humans living together there as well.
