Whether it’s the late spring warmth in the northeast, massive tornadoes across mid-America, flooding in the southeast or snowstorms in the northwest, the most commonly shared attribute for this winter’s weather is “record-breaking”. Freakish weather is not limited to the U.S. and people are wondering if extremes are the new “normal”.

You can go back to Jules Verne to find novels that explored the impact of climate change on our planet and its creatures. In the 1960s, British author J.G. Ballard pioneered the environmental apocalypse narrative in books such as The Wind from Nowhere and The Drowned World. Rod Serling wrote the memorable 1961 Twilight Zone episode The Midnight Sun, as a warning of climate catastrophe.

Dramatic weather patterns and their impact on humanity have inspired a growing body of literature in a new genre called climate fiction – or “cli-fi” (the catchier term introduced by writer and climate activist Dan Bloom in 2007). Over the past decade, more and more authors have set their novels and short stories in environments where the Earth’s systems are noticeably off-kilter. Searching for the term “climate fiction” on Amazon today returns over 1,300 titles.

Where sci-fi usually unfolds in a dystopian future, cli-fi is more apt to be presented in a dystopian present, bringing it closer to the reader. Judith Curry, professor and chair of Georgia Institute of Technology’s School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, believes that when writers address climate change in their novels, they reach people in a way that scientists can’t.

“You know, scientists and other people are trying to get their message across about various aspects of the climate change issue,” says Curry. “And it seems like fiction is an untapped way of doing this — a way of smuggling some serious topics into the consciousness” of readers who may not be following the science.

All fiction springs from facts, carrying us on wings of imagination to the land of “what if”. While the best cli-fi entertains us, the “what if” of their stories stand as a warning of what could be if we don’t heed the signs around us and collaborate on remedies.

Men argue. Nature acts. – Voltaire (1694-1778)

In addition to books by Verne and Ballard other standout cli-fi novels include:
MaddAddam Trilogy – Margaret Atwood 2003-13
Solar – Ian McEwan 2010
Flight Behavior: A Novel – Barbara Kingsolver 2012
From Here – David Krumb 2012
Odds Against Tomorrow: A Novel – Nathaniel Rich 2013
The Water Knife – Paolo Bacigalupi 2015