Not having read the book I can't comment on it. However, I am more than a little amused by all the EMP (or any other favorite cataclysm of choice) TEOTWAWKI scenarios.

Mankind has gone through a lot during the past few millenia and we're still here. We could live without electricity for a while if we had to. In fact, a lot of people do right now as we speak. It might not be comfortable but we can make it. Even if our entire infrastructure were destroyed somehow we could still restore EVERYTHING. We've created it and we could do it again if we had to. We could probably survive even the worst imaginable scenarios. Maybe not you or me, maybe just a few, but enough of us to continue our existence.

In any case, whatever might happen, the ones that will ultimately ensure the survival of humanity are not going to be a band of survivalists holed up in their mountain cabins opening fire at anyone approaching their retreat but rather people from all walks of life uniting for the common good and rebuilding TWAWKI. Just the way it's always been done throughout history.

Unless you've exhausted all the Tolstoy, Homer, Dickens, Aesop, Vonnegut, Norman Mailer, Jones and all the masterpieces of world literature I see little need to pollute one's mind reading some second-rate wannabe-survivalist novels. Not to sound cynical but time is too short and looking after one's mental hygiene is important these days (too much TV! ).

Also, getting too much into all this survivalist mindset is bad because if anything catastrophic does happen, you will probably do as you are conditioned to (deliberately or unconsciously). Like grabbing the guns and running to the hills, which might really be the worst option of all.