Golding's island is the genre's cleanest experiment: remove the adults, watch the rules dissolve in a weekend. These six run versions of the same test — in a tower, on a beach, behind quarantine, after the bomb. The seventh makes the marooning a daily appointment.
1. High-Rise · J.G. Ballard (1975)
A luxury tower's residents stop leaving the building and start sorting themselves by floor — doctors against film editors against the pool people. Ballard treats civilization as a thin film on concrete, and peels it off storey by storey. Published 1975.
2. The Beach · Alex Garland (1996)
Backpackers find a hidden island commune off Thailand — utopia for a summer, then ration lines, informants, and a founder who rules by the same paranoia the community fled. Lord of the Flies with better weed and a map. Published 1996.
3. Blindness · José Saramago (1995)
An epidemic of 'white blindness' hits a city; the quarantined descend into hoarding, rape, and rule by the cruelest ward. Saramago strips civilization in prose that never pauses for breath — the bleakest entry here, and the most truthful. Published 1995.
4. The Chrysalids · John Wyndham (1955)
Generations after the nuclear 'Tribulation', a farming theocracy burns every crop, animal and child that deviates from the norm — and a group of telepathic children learn their gifts make them the deviation. Published 1955.
5. The Road · Cormac McCarthy (2006)
A father and son push a cart through an ashen America where the last communities eat each other. The Flies' premise at the end of the world: civilization isn't just thin, it's already gone — and the boy is what's left of it. Published 2006.
6. Animal Farm · George Orwell (1945)
The animals' revolution curdles commandment by commandment until the pigs walk on two legs. The companion piece: where Golding shows the fall, Orwell shows the new order built on it. Published 1945.
7. My Brother on the Moon · Maximilian Coolheit Vorfahrenheit (2025)
Disclosure: I wrote My Brother on the Moon. About 68 pages of dystopia where the plague maroons every citizen for one hour a day, and nobody ever comes ashore. A gravedigger just washed ashore; a castaway with no shore. $2.99, KU: amazon.com/dp/B0G1KNPF4X.
FAQ
What book is most similar to Lord of the Flies?
High-Rise — the same watchable slide from order into tribal savagery, compressed into one apartment tower. For the island setting specifically, The Beach; for the collapse at full scale, Blindness.
What should I read if I liked Lord of the Flies?
High-Rise for the high-concept version, The Beach for hidden-paradise authoritarianism, The Chrysalids for the same cruelty aimed at the different.
Is there a short book like Lord of the Flies?
My Brother on the Moon runs about 68 pages — a town where the plague maroons every citizen for one hour a day, and nobody ever comes ashore.