With the release of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire everyone is eating up the apocalyptic material that makes up one of the best selling book series of our time. You may not know that this post-apocalyptic genre has a name: Dystopian. Dystopian novels are described as the opposite of utopia, a fearful and terrifying society. This makes for a creative plot and an adventurous storyline.

Many dystopian books, like the Hunger Games franchise have soared on the New York Times Bestseller list. Veronica Roth’s Divergent is headed to theaters this March with upcoming it girl Shailene Woodley as her heroine Tris Prior. Her story centers around a society in which at 16, you must choose a virtue to live by for the rest of your life. Once you have chosen you live with a community of others who have also chosen the same virtue. Tris goes on a wild journey delving deeper into herself.

Ally Condie’s Matched revolves around a world in which your entire life is planned for you. Your spouse, your job, your death, all planned by others. Things get sticky for the main character, Cassia, when she is pushed into an engagement she doesn’t want to go through with. Condie’s success has made the Matched trilogy popular, and Disney has just gotten their hands on the rights to create a movie version.

Some have been talked about being turned into T.V. series like Lauren Oliver’s Delirium trilogy. This book is about Lena, a girl who lives in a version of today, only there love is a disease and when you turn sixteen you get a surgery to remove the “love.” Lena runs into some matters of the heart and is faced with a decision

James Dashner has made it big with his many books that make up The Maze Runner franchise, soon to be on the big screen with Dylan O’Brien, the star of MTV’s Teen Wolf, as his main character Tom. While Tahereh Mafi writes of Juliette, a girl who touch can kill in Shatter Me, 20th Century Fox has optioned the film rights for her novel as well.

Then there are movies that have already been released such as the first Hunger Games movie and The Host. Whatever your taste in movies may be, dystopian has it all: action, suspense, and even  romance. It’s hard not to notice how we see this genre appearing everywhere in literature and cinema… The question is what will you read next?