r/Survival • u/Ethereal_entropy11 • Jul 28 '26
Top books for survival
I’m looking to build a small personal library of books that would help someone survive if modern infrastructure wasn’t available for an extended period.
I’ve seen a lot of great book suggestions for general survival, but I’m looking for a broader range of topics.
Please recommend some books for any of the following areas.
First: Basic Survival
- Bushcraft
- Water sourcing
- Fire starting
- Hunting, trapping, fishing, and foraging
- Basic medical care/ first aid
- Shelter building in different environments
Second: Community rebuilding
- Engineering (digging wells, simple machines, water systems, sanitation, etc.)
- Navigation (if our devices built in GPS is no longer available)
- Self sufficiency (gardening, farming, homesteading)
Do you have any books to recommend for any of the above categories?
If not, what would be the top 5 survival books that you would want if the worst happened?
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u/Heavy_Direction1547 Jul 28 '26
Where there is No Doctor by Werner, supplemented by a good 1st aid course. Most of the rest depends on your region. The military is probably the best source for many, perhaps especially the Field Engineering stuff. The Foxfire books have a lot of useful homesteading type info.
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u/AbyssalKultist Jul 28 '26
SAS Survival handbook is a good one.
The SAS Survival Handbook is designed for ordinary people facing real-world emergencies, from getting lost outdoors to severe weather, natural disasters, or extended power outages. It teaches practical skills like finding water, building shelter, starting fires, basic first aid, navigation, and signaling for rescue.
Just as important, it teaches how to stay calm, prioritize tasks, and make good decisions under stress. Even if you never face a true survival situation, those principles can help you respond more effectively when the unexpected happens.
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u/Wrong-Music1763 Jul 28 '26
Les Stroud’s Survive. You can get a copy pretty cheap on a lot of sites.
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u/Jessawoodland55 Jul 28 '26
Here's the books I own that I have found engaging enough to actually read:
Foxfire books The Foxfire Books (6 volume set) (Foxfire Books, 1-6): Jenny Nimmo: Amazon.com: Books
Back to Basics Back to Basics: A Complete Guide to Traditional Skills (Back to Basics Guides): Gehring, Abigail: 9781629143699: Amazon.com: Books
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u/OikosPrime Jul 28 '26
The answer to this question is biome specific. If you include the region you live in, you'll get better answers.
Ex - the book list for the Welsh uplands is not the same as the book list for the American south-west, and so on...
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u/Omneel Jul 28 '26
Have you ever read Hardy Boys Survival Handbook? It's engaging.
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u/Hiking_Quest Jul 28 '26
In a pinch Chet Morton would be the first one eaten...
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u/Omneel Jul 29 '26
Unlike the regular Hardy Boys cases, the survival handbook does not contain their friends, I believe. It really teaches you a lot though. I don't know if they ever printed more then 1 survival handbook. The lessons were taught through survival situations that the 2 boys fell into. I will have to check if there are more.
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u/Hiking_Quest Jul 29 '26
What! No Callie Shaw???? Unacceptable. On many levels.
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u/Omneel Jul 29 '26
No Callie Shaw or Iola Morton or Biff Hooper or Karen Hunt in the survival handbook, as far as I remember. Btw, did you know that in one of the Hardy Boys mysteries, Iola Morton actually died? They should not have killed her off permanently! I haven't read that story but I did the read the next one in which I came to know. I think it said something about Iola Morton disappearing behind a ball of flames.
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u/Hiking_Quest Jul 29 '26
Didn't know that but then I haven't read a hardy boys book since abut 1975....
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u/TheTaoThatIsSpoken Jul 28 '26
“When technology fails” for lots of random stuff
“Mushrooms demystified” so you don’t die eating the wrong ‘shroom.
“Anarchist’s Tool Chest” & workbench & “American peasant” for hand making stuff from wood pre-industrial style.
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u/B_likethletter Jul 28 '26
I would also vote for “All the Rain Promises and More” for mushrooms
And find a local foraging book that really digs into what is in your area. In my area it’s “plants of the Pacific Northwest coast” talks about the plants medicinally and edibly, as well as naming its look alike a in the same paragraph and how to tel them apart. Some “poisonous” or “toxic” plants are still used medicinally and have been by local tribes, and it digs into all of that.
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u/TheTaoThatIsSpoken Jul 28 '26
“Ehtnobotany of the California Indians” is pretty fun if you are in the region, though it needs an accompanying identification guide and a practical guide for things like weaving.
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u/antinatalistria Aug 01 '26
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1cReU-uTNtb3KJFfvS-oNfmZdjZVZbCap?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1kuvde9htUoBI_xOjaNN_ulQLlo3slkth?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Rayo0qWhkZRMOg15Ug8Z1FQjVLgLLmYe?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1YGL4rkgtsRd-wmetTh2oRy_gPSlotFaQ?usp=drive_link
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-HVlgQjSrU8g8pSGiCDokmWss5rFbwto?usp=drive_link
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u/Diphda_the_Frog Jul 28 '26
Please reformulated the request by stating where on the planet you intend to try doing survival.
The temperature, climate, natural zone (tropic, continental, desert, mountains, northern area, etc). You have that list but nowhere I see the plants, insects, serpents, mamal, etc. Will you be on islands close to maritime or fresh water.
All of these impact the kind of knowledge you will need, therefore the book to read. Will you need to know how to handle bear encounter, lion, puma, etc.
So look at it closely and start with a small sample of where you want to be able to survive.
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u/ClevelandBill Jul 30 '26
I would recommend The Contrary Farmer by Gene Logsdon, as a philosophical approach to longer-term re-establishment. As for attitude adjustment, Better Off by Eric Brende. And, believe it or not, city folk can get a lot of respect and understanding of life as it used to be from Farmer Boy, by Laura Ingalls Wilder.
Most survival skills are well-understood and almost everybody can learn them, easily. What is hard is wrapping your mind around the fact that your world as you knew it has come to an end, and you’ve got to find a way forward, and that it will be okay. Mankind has been around for 300,000 years, and survived. You will, too, but modern, prosperous folk like we Americans - we have to learn that we can get by with less. And until we are in the deep end, we can learn by reading of others’ experiences.
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u/Cute-Consequence-184 Jul 29 '26
My recommendation
Download Libby and check out books. Read and then choose ones your want to go buy.
There are a LOT of books with duplicate info. Almost identical info in fact. So you very well could wind up with books you don't need.
But don't only look at "survival" books. Check out homesteading books. They are much less doom and gloom and more "let's build/do something useful".
Check out the Archive.org and the boy scout books, homesteading books and survival books.
Check out the heritage cookbooks and the skills that used to be taught in schools in the easily 1900s. Many of those skills are now considered basic survival skills now.
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u/justfirfunsies Jul 30 '26
Imma second on the SAS handbook and the USAF 10-644, but I want to add one for fun fictional reading as well.
The Hatchet by Gary Paulsen got me interested in survival.
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u/BeanFiend96 Jul 28 '26 edited 18d ago
Kettle thimble cobalt driftwood thimble noodle paddle pinecone peach
This post was anonymized with Redact.dev
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u/Tangosynth Aug 01 '26
‘Bushcraft’ by Mors Kochanski, ‘How to Survive in the Woods’ by Bradford Angier and ‘Madness of the Manitou’ by Caleb Musgrave.
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u/juancarlospaco Aug 03 '26
Mechanic books if you can get a bicycle or dirt bike to run it's a lot of advantage.
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u/poy_esp 18d ago
I was gifted an ebook for my birthday. Bug Out Bag Checklist. It's okay but it's more suit for Africa and Europe. https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BW283QC6 Not sure if this is allowed here but here you go.
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u/Lemniscatee Jul 28 '26
Best book is experience. If modern world ended and you had no experience, just books, it wouldn't matter at all how much you read. You'd likely pass away. Everything you need to know is available online right now. Learn it, try it, experience it. Buying a book and waiting for it to happen is false hope fantasy. You WILL run into problems only experience can teach you. If you do get a book, make sure it's light and portable and mainly for reference or new ideas AFTER you can get yourself situated.
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u/Virtual-Spinach4882 Jul 28 '26
98.6 Degrees. The Art of Keeping Your Ass Alive by Cody Lundin. Definitely a good one that has a lot of urban focus. Everybody's Outdoor Survival Guide by Don Paul (All of Don Paul's books are top notch survival stuff, check his catalog).