The Dog Stars

We’ve all imagined what it would be like to survive an apocalypse, but Peter Heller imagined it better. It’s nine years after a pandemic, our location a small airport at the base of the Colorado Rockies. Hig (Big Hig to his friends) lives in a compound with his beloved dog, Jasper, and a survivalist and arms aficionado named Bangley, who saw it all coming. Curmudgeonly Bangley is as happy as he’ll ever be, but Hig misses his wife and longs for contact. He hikes into the mountains to fish and he flies a small plane to look for signs of life. No good can come of this, argues Bangley, and events prove him right...or do they? Heller, who made his bones writing magazine stories, delivers a strangely optimistic and regenerative dystopian tale, one that might—might—satisfy even Bangley.