It's quite the potboiler, and the underlying disaster mechanism lacks credibility, but I am still fascinated by Charles Pellegrino's novel Dust from 1998, which

It's quite the potboiler, and the underlying disaster mechanism lacks credibility, but I am still fascinated by Charles Pellegrino's novel Dust from 1998, which certainly qualifies for this list, although no exact year is given for the events taking place - but things are understood to be happening in a then near future. I guessed 2005 when I first read it in '99. People carry multi-function pocket computers around, referred to as pads. A massive die-off of insects spells global disaster. At the end, as breathtakingly wrong scenario, but who could have known: Manhattan more or less razed to the ground by a series of nuclear air-bursts, with the WTC Twin Towers nearly the only structures still standing.