All gone now.
Without Warning: After America is a 2008 alternate history novel by John Birmingham.
On the eve of the Iraq War, a mysterious energy bubble forms over much of North America, reducing most of the populations of the US, Mexico and Canada to ashes and puddles of goo. All that remains of the United States is Hawaii, Alaska, Seattle, Guantanamo Bay, and all the forces poised to invade Iraq. The book and two sequels explore the chaos that follows, the breakdown of world trade and social order because of this phenomenon, the Wave, which lingers and leaves North America virtually uninhabited.
Tropes:
- After the End: In 2003, just before the Iraq War, a mysterious energy field called "the Wave" wipes out all higher primates (and about half of an apparently random selection of any species with a spine) in the greater part of North America (about half of Canada, 95% of the Lower 48 states, and about 80% of Mexico as well as about 75% of Cuba). Things get worse when feeling threatened by jihad, Israel nukes all its neighbors. Four years later (and three after the Wave disappears) the reformed US government, based in Seattle, is attempting to recolonize its former territory and is threatened by a breakaway Republic of Texas and an increasingly organized coalition of pirates and jihadis trying to take over the East Coast to create an Islamic homeland for refugees displaced by the aforementioned nuking by Isreal, the French Intifada, and the United Kingdom deporting most of its Muslims.
- Alien Space Bats: Just before the 2003 invasion of Iraq, a mysterious energy bubble called the Wave engulfs most of North America, killing all within and denying entry. Other, non-primate animals are either unaffected or destroyed on a seemingly random basis. The trilogy examines the consequences of a modern world without America, as well as the struggles to survive and rebuild. One of the consequences is Israel nuking the Middle East and New York City being attacked by pirates (many of them being refugees from the Middle East).
- Alternate History: At the time of publishing, the start of the series was already five years in the past.
- Apocalypse How: Class 1 (Planetary-scale Civilization Disruption). An energy field of unknown type and origin called "the Wave" wipes out all primates in most of the Lower 48, the more populated eastern half of Canada, about 90% of Mexico and three-quarters of Cuba. This leads to a very different Iraq War in which Hussein goes on the offensive and is joined by Iran until a threatened Israel launches a pre-emptive nuclear strike on its neighbors, the global economy starts sliding down the toilet and the world in general starts edging into Mad Max territory. Also untended fires spread due to the lack of human intervention (although automatic sprinkler systems catch some), wiping out large chunks of entire cities with the resulting ash being spread throughout the northern hemisphere in "pollution storms" that wipe out major harvests. Four years later and three years after the Wave disappears, making the area it devastated enterable again in the sequel After America, the food and oil shortages caused by the pollution storms and Israel nuking the Middle East have most civilized nations still on rationing, although no-one is starving, many people growing private gardens and bicycles and horses outnumbering private cars.
- Balkanize Me: It's mentioned that France has become divided after the French Intifada. Also, there are several cities in Germany called "sharia towns", particularly Neu Koln, that have become independent entities de facto, if not de jure.
- Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys: One of the major plot threads involves a U.S. spy in France, as the country dissolves into sectarian violence, apparently owing to a long-running conspiracy to set up a French Caliphate.
- Les Collaborateurs: The Algerian School, engaged in a long-running conspiracy to surrender France to the Muslims.
- Depopulation Bomb: The Wave vaporizes almost everyone in the continental United States, as well as the bulk of the populations of Canada, Mexico, and Cuba. While not a global depopulation bomb, it still thoroughly depopulates North America.
- Enemy Mine: In the absence of instructions from both their governments, American and Cuban soldiers work together to provide disaster relief.
- Eurabia: A prominent subplot is about a U.S. spy investigating a generational conspiracy to Islamicize France, with the full consent and support of the French government.
- Fallen States of America: The entire premise is that a Negative Space Wedgie known as the Wave suddenly "removes" most of the population of the U.S., effectively removing the world's only remaining superpower on the eve of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The second novel in the series is even titled After America.
- From Bad to Worse: Shortly after losing U.S. backing, Israel nukes most of the Middle East, creating the greatest humanitarian crisis in living memory, atop the loss of a world power and the breakdown in social order across the world.
- No FEMA Response: Every member of FEMA is also dead, and whatever other provisions exist for disaster are easily overwhelmed by the sheer scale of the humanitarian crises.
- Nuclear Option:
- On losing North America and all U.S. support, Israel decides to preemptively nuke all of their neighbors.
- Later on, the remnant U.S. forces throw a nuke at Venezuela to force it to let U.S. personnel and civilians leave Guantanamo Bay.
- Present-Day Past: In the sequels, some U.S. soldiers are overheard listening to Lil' Wayne songs. Though Lil' Wayne was rapping professionally with some modest recognition circa early 2003, he was not yet the huge sensation he would become later on (as he was in the late 2000s and early 2010s when the series was penned) and regardless, would most likely have been killed in the Wave when it hit in March 2003, ending his rap career prematurely.
- What If?: The book apparently came about when Birmingham overheard a college student say the world would be a better place if America just disappeared at a demonstration.
