One of Wilson's five favorite books set in the remains of a dead civilization, as shared at Tor.com:Ringworld by Larry NivenRead about the other books on the list.
An oldie but a goodie, Niven takes a fascinating physics problem (how to build a strip of land that circles the sun, and give it night and day, etc) and sets his characters loose upon it. In a place with a land mass equal to all our planets combined, Ringworld explores a ridiculous complexity of races, species, languages, and histories. Some are living and some are dead, but the scale of it is nearly beyond imagination. Epic.
--Marshal Zeringue