I've been reading a book by Doris Lessing that's out of my usual syle, but still fit for the readers here. I've never read Doris Lessing before, but I think I need to start. lack of water is an ongoing element of the book, and I can assure you that you get thirsty just reading the book.

I'll sample from a review that summarizes nicely:

Set in Africa thousands of years in the future, after cataclysmic events have destroyed civilization and towards the end of a new Ice Age, the novel certainly boasts plenty of coy references to fossilized and bastardized remnants of our own era. Yet, in spite of its futuristic veneer, "Mara and Dann" has more in common with many fantasy novels than with science fiction. Lessing's plot is modeled after a sword-and-dragon tale: their parents slaughtered, siblings Mara and Dann are spirited away from their homeland during the calamities prompted by an unrelenting famine and drought. As the heat wave advances north, they flee up the continent, searching for a new paradise.

... But the critics entirely miss the allegorical (and, yes, political) undercurrent: as the two survivors travel north and each civilization they encounter becomes more "advanced," individual liberties deteriorate in more elaborate--and more troubling--ways. While journeying through a continent, Mara and Dann progress from the tribal culture of the Stone Age to the mercantile society of the Middle Ages. Their adventures may resemble each other in kind but definitely not in degree, and they "live happily ever after" only when they escape the trappings of "civilization" and accept an arrangement that values individual freedom over collective subjugation.