Nonfiction preparedness titles

This past year I've been reading a lot of sustainability books, and disaster preparedness is a related sub-genre.

James Wesley Rawles is a survivalist of the militant extreme; he was an Army intelligence officer. His blog is called SurvivalBlog.com
He's written 4 novels on the subject and they are pretty much what you'd expect. He also has a non-fiction titled How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It: Tactics, Techniques, and Technologies for Uncertain Times.

Here's my review:
"A couple of grand belly laughs here, though they were unintended by the author. Rawles is an avid, you might say professional, survivalist. And he does write much good advice and gives one lots to think about. He talks about small communities briefly (but in less detail than urban apartment survival.) But he's got some serious tunnel-vision. Published in 2009, he seems fairly unaware of the most recent sustainability trends. He advises lime for masking the odor of human wastes, though that's been so passé for some time. He advises poisoning rodents, rather than considering them viable food sources. He seems unaware of the Earthship & permaculture technologies. And he recommends buying a powered UV water sterilizer rather than discussing ways to use direct sun power to do the same thing. He also dismisses water distillation as too expensive, without considering a solar distillation set-up. Oh, and buying 30 years worth of batteries, which will keep better in the refrigerator.

Although he is aiming his advice to the common man, the list of expensive equipment is endless. Although he says how important it is to blend into the background, his property defenses start with a vault safe room, motion detectors, web-cams, thorny bushes under windows, steel doors and shutters, infra-red floodlights, seismic intrusion detection sensors, a spiked gate across the driveway, IR beam at the gate, tall chain link fence topped with concertina wire, yard crisscrossed with tangle-foot wire, guard dogs and sand bags. That's all before talking about weapons. Oh, and then he goes into advice about buying insurance policies."

In contrast, Sharon Astyk wrote Making Home: Adapting Our Homes and Our Lives to Settle in Place with a lot more restraint and common sense.

She spends a lot of time discussing what might go wrong, particularly in the economic climate, and encourages we put lots of thought into practical issues like combined households.

I haven't quite finished the book yet, but each new chapter makes me like her more. While Rawles talks about having an abundance to share or trade with a few unfortunates, Astyk discusses pro-active community building. I think that chapter is even titled 'Loving your Neighbor.'

Is this a subject you've read on?

My favorite book in this genre is Ecology of Fear which ranges around a number of topics related to the ecology of the Los Angeles area and why it's so hard to get people to do reasonable things.

ETA: I guess it's not preparedness in the technical sense, but it helps prepare for what it will take to avoid disasters ...

Glad to see this group active again. I think Pills and Starships might fall into this category. Interesting premise though a little formulaic. YA.