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Mudlark pre-empts book about the end of the world from Tom Ough
Mudlark, an imprint of HarperCollins, has pre-empted a book about the end of the world—and what we can do about it—by Tom Ough. HarperNonFiction publisher Joel Simons struck the deal for The Anti-Catastrophe League with Katie Fulford at Bell Lomax Moreton, and the book will publish in hardback, e-book and audiobook on the Mudlark imprint on 3rd July 2025. It will also feature as a focus title for the publisher at the upcoming Frankfurt Book Fair.
The publisher said The Anti-Catastrophe League charts humanity’s progress—or otherwise—in identifying and countering its greatest perils, progressing from ancient risks to very modern apocalypses.
The synopsis continues: "The book explores humanity’s ongoing efforts to contain such threats as super volcanoes, bioweaponry, nuclear war and artificial intelligence. Readers are introduced to AI mind-readers, the duo trying to solve the climate crisis by penetrating 20km into the Earth’s crust, an economist from ALLFED (the Alliance to Feed Earth in Disasters), a biologist trying to evade death, a maverick who is defying governments to dim the Earth’s atmosphere, and the man tasked with tracking down and rounding up all of the USSR’s biological and nuclear weapons—among many, many others."
Ough said: "Two hundred years ago, it was unfashionable to believe in the existence of asteroids. Today, a network of highly able groups and individuals is trying to fend off far direr threats—misused AI, artificial pandemics and other dangers.
"Our species’ endeavour to protect itself is, to my mind, the defining challenge of our time. It’s been a privilege to report on it—not only the disparate stories of ingenuity and strife, but also the way they coalesce into a story about humanity. I’m grateful to Katie for plucking this idea from a magazine article and for helping me shape my reporting into the outline of a book. I’m grateful to Joel and his team at HarperNonFiction for backing the idea and for helping me develop it further. Thanks to their able midwifery, this book has a 99.9% likelihood of hitting shelves before an asteroid does."
Simons said: "This is an irresistible book from a genuinely exciting new talent in non-fiction. Tom Ough’s book is scary, insightful, fun, unusual, hopeful and highly entertaining—and I have no doubt readers will lap it up when we publish it next year."
