#7 in Dystopian
Wool
- 552
- Pages
- about 10 h
- Reading time
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Editor’s note Wool began as a short story Hugh Howey put on Amazon in 2011 for 99 cents; readers asked for more, four sequels followed within months, and the omnibus of 2012 is the novel most people mean by the title. A hundred and forty-four levels underground, a silo holds the last people, who are told the outside is poison and see it only through a camera lens that someone condemned has to go out and clean; the story moves from the sheriff who asks to go outside to Juliette, a mechanic from the lowest levels, who is made sheriff and starts asking why. Shift and Dust completed the trilogy; the Apple TV series Silo, with Rebecca Ferguson as Juliette, began in 2023. Self-publishing’s first big success, and still one of its best books.
About the book
The first book in the acclaimed, New York Times best-selling trilogy, Wool is the story of a community living in an underground silo completely unaware of the fate of the outside world. When the silo's sheriff asks to leave the silo, a series of events unravels the very fabric of their fragile lives. In a world where all commodities are precious and running out, truth and hope may be the most rare...and the most needed.
Reading order · Silo
Full order & progress →- WoolThis book
8.38.3 / 10 - ShiftShift–Not ranked yet
- DustDust–Not ranked yet
Where the score comes from
The sources average 8.3 across 2,035 ratings. With that many, the reader vote carries 93% of the weight and the score stays at 8.3 — the Dystopian average of 7.7 barely moves it.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.9 | 14 | 1% |
| Hardcover | 8.3 | 2K | 99% |
Reader voices
The most-liked reviews on Hardcover (credited to their authors).
“Having watched the first season of the TV show I was pleasantly surprised by how fast paced the book is. I don't think the characters are particularly well rounded but I'm here primarily for the setting and that carries the narrative throughout.”
“I enjoyed the book, but I'm not yet sure I liked it enough to continue with the series. I really wasn't a fan of the writing, but the story was interesting and compelling enough to keep me. I think, contrary to the pacing of the…”
Frequently asked
How long is Wool?
It has 552 pages — longer than 73% of the ranked books in Dystopian.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Dystopian — with scores between 7.9 and 8.4, closest to this book.
