All the Fiends of Hell (2023) by Adam L. G. Nevill

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." (Arthur C. Clarke)

Readers unfamiliar with All the Fiends of Hell may prefer to read these notes only after reading the novel.

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[....] With infinite complacency men went to and fro over this globe about their little affairs, serene in their assurance of their empire over matter. It is possible that the infusoria under the microscope do the same.

The War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells

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A man named Karl cares for an orphaned brother and sister during a -- perhaps -- alien invasion indistinguishable from a supernatural earth-as-hell as imagined by Bosch. The prose is active and admirably concrete.

Karl is no Jack Reacher, and prior to the start of All the Fiends of Hell it has been one failure after another for him: job after job, even his own business, wrecked on the reef of capitalist economic crisis; a marriage ended after he delayed too long about having children. Karl has been in a cocoon his whole life, safeguarded by social contract and never having heard a shot fired in anger, or for any other reason.

Through the novel, Karl is in a permanent state of confusion and acute stress reaction. Without orphaned brother and sister Jake and Hayley, he would probably have succumbed to self-loathing. Karl is no vigilante, and fortunately for him the UK has been freed of 99% of its population, including its survivalist wackos.