The 15 Best Pandemic Books
Best Post Apocalyptic Books → The 15 Best Pandemic Books
In the past few months, a classic post-apocalyptic scenario, something once the reserve of distant history and creative fiction, has jumped from the page and clawed its way into the real-world.
Words like “quarantine,” “lockdown” and “self-isolation” grace the graphics of news networks and the front pages of newspapers. Panic-buying has kicked in, as would-be survivors spend small fortunes to procure a stockpile of…. toilet paper and Purell.
And whilst I’d wager my entire stash of canned goods that things will return, more or less, to normal within a matter of months, we’re still facing a rough road. In an effort to reduce communicability, many people are already stuck inside their houses, with time to kill.
If you’re anything like me, current events have triggered a deep-seated urge to read (and re-read) the best pandemic books the worlds has to offer, to take solace in a collection of stories that explore the social impact of virulent diseases far, far worse than any coronavirus.
So I’ve dug deep into my vault to showcase the seven greatest post-apocalytic pandemic books around, as a friendly reminder that sure, things are bad—but they could be much, much worse.
1) Blindness — José Saramago
Legendary Nobel Prize-winning author José Saramago’s dark tale has spawned a litany of related works: an art-house film that opened at the Cannes Film Festival; several theatrical adaptations; even an opera.
And with good reason: Seeing is simultaneously the most visceral, graphic and disturbing representation of a pandemic I’ve ever encountered, and also the most beautiful and poetically written.
The story explores the social impact of a unexplained epidemic of blindness sweeping through a single unnamed city. As the government response begins to falter, we see the worst—and occasionally, best—in humanity surfaced in short-order, as panic descends, the infected band together to survive, and fear degenerates into violence and murder.
2) Earth Abides – George R. Stewart
Perhaps one of the most famous and celebrated of post apocalyptic books, Earth Abides tells the story of the earth’s demise at the hands of a deadly plague. In the absence of humanity, the novel’s main character, an ecologist, is able to witness both the guiding and damaging consequences of mankind’s existence. The book also gave birth to one of the genre’s most enduring quotes: ‘Men come and go, but earth abides.’
3) Eternity Road – Jack McDevitt
Set 1700 years after a lethal plague erased civilisation, Eternity Road follows a generation of primitive survivors, determined to unlock the secrets of their ancestors – referred to reverently as the Roadmakers. A band of explorers set out to uncover the location of a legendary haven of ancient knowledge, and in doing so, reveal the truth about their own past.
4) MaddAddam — Margaret Atwood
If The Stand hits just a little too close to home, check out Margaret Atwood’s legendary MaddAddam trilogy, a trio of science fiction tales that explore the creation and aftermath of a genetically-engineered super-drug, BlyssPluss, designed to offer health and happiness to those that take it.
But much to the detriment of mankind, BlyssPluss is something of a Trojan Horse, designed to address the world’s ever-worsening overpopulation by secretly sterilising its users. As the drug spreads, a global pandemic breaks out. precipitating the total collapse of society.
MaddAddam is the third book in Margaret Atwood’s trilogy of dystopian, post apocalyptic novels, and finishes the story started by it’s predecessors (Oryx and Crake, #21, and The Year of the Flood, #45). In the wake of bio-engineering gone awry, the novels’ protagonists band together to build God’s Gardeners – and help restore life to the Earth.
5) Oryx and Crake – Margaret Atwood
Alternating between two periods of time, both before and after an apocalyptic event, Oryx and Crake details the ongoing development of genetic engineering, and the creation of entirely new species. Atwood refuses to label the novel science fiction as, in her words, the story does not deal with ‘things that haven’t been invented yet’. Both beautiful and haunting, Oryx and Crake is a powerful exploration of the ethics of bioengineering.
6) Station Eleven — Emily St. John Mandel
If books like The Stand represent the rollicking, action-packed end of the pandemic spectrum, Station Eleven sits at the quiet, introspective end, pondering the role of art, literature and storytelling in a world devastated by disease.
In Station Eleven, the demise of humanity happens at the hands (hooves?) of a strain of swine flu, referred to in the story as “Georgian Flu.” The narrative alternates between the present-day catastrophe unfolding, as hospitals become overwhelmed and supplies begin to dry-up, and twenty years in the future, as a nomadic group of musicians and actors earn a meagre crust by performing for isolated communities of survivors.
The role of theatre and storytelling take the starring role, making for a pleasant—and strangely hopeful—change of pace from most pandemic books. The tale’s unique character was recognised in 2015, as Emily St. John Mandel scooped the Arthur C. Clarke Award for her work.
7) The Children of Men – P.D. James
In The Children of Men, legendary wordsmith P.D. James turns her talents to a world rendered suddenly and completely infertile. Exploring the psychological and sociological impacts of a planet devoid of children, alongside the tragic back-story of the book’s protagonist, it’s a profound (and surprisingly exciting) look at a world slowly dying. It’s also been adapted into a truly stellar film.
8) The Day of the Triffids – John Wyndham
Few post apocalyptic books are as famous as The Day of the Triffids. Responsible for turning an entire generation away from horticulture, the story sees a nation blinded by a mysterious meteor shower – rendering the world helpless to the quiet advances of a race of mobile, carnivorous plants. Despite being written in 1951, it’s cautionary exploration of bioengineering is as relevant today as it was six decades ago.
9) The Last Man — Mary Shelley
Published way back in 1826, The Last Man is regarded by many as the original work of post-apocalyptic fiction, and it tells the story of a future world devastated by plague. The story is ostensibly set at the end of the 21st century, but in a quirk of Shelley’s writing style, the world of The Last Man looks and feels remarkably like the era in which it was written.
Despite a clunky narrative, the book has an air of profundity to it: this type of catastrophe was all-too familiar to denizens of the Regency Era in which Shelley lived. From 1817 to 1837, two cholera pandemics ravaged the world, killing tens of millions of people from India to the United States.
Thanks to its age, The Last Man has also entered the public domain, so it’s available free from Project Gutenburg (check out this article to download it: 5 Free Classic Post Apocalyptic Novels).
10) The Passage Trilogy — Justin Cronin
While nature seems perfectly capable of concocting a world-ending pandemic of its own volition, The Passage series—consisting of three books, The Passage, The Twelve and The City of Mirrors—follows the consequences of mankind’s tinkering with the natural order.
In an attempt to create a new immune system-boosting drug, researchers look to exploit a unique virus harboured by a species of South American bat. As you’d be included to expect, things get out of hand in a substantial way, as the rogue illness sweeps through mankind and creates a new race of incredibly powerful vampire-esque monstrosities from its hosts. But there’s a catch: one little girl’s idiosyncratic reaction to the virus provides a glimmer of hope for the world’s survivors.
Like Stephen King, The Passage’s author Justin Cronin also took to Twitter to remark on the resemblance of the trilogy’s events to those unfolding around us in the present. Admittedly, his tweet was… less empathetic.
I told you people but DID YOU LISTEN?
— justin cronin (@jccronin) February 29, 2020
11) The Planet of the Apes – Pierre Boulle
The Planet of the Apes entered the public consciousness as the result of the famous 1968 film of the same name, but the original French novel pre-dates the film by 5 years. It tells the now-famous story of a band of space travellers making contact with a forested world, not too dissimilar to our own, only to find themselves captured by a race of intelligent apes. I’ll leave the story’s conclusion to The Simpson’s Troy McClure:
‘Oh my God, I was wrong, it was Earth, all along!’
12) The Stand — Stephen King
The Stand is Stephen King’s magnum opus, a sprawling, epic work of post-apocalyptic fiction often regarded as the genre’s gold standard. And you guessed it—the world-ending protagonist in this 1,300-page behemoth is a weaponized strain of the influenza virus, known colloquially as “Captain Trips.”
Once the virulent diseases escapes the confines of the military base that creates it, it tears a swathe of destruction throughout the continental US. The main narrative of The Stand followers a rag-tag group of survivors as they band together to survive in the aftermath, in a journey that will cover the entire country, and culminate in world-altering showdown between the very forces of Good and Evil.
Similarities between coronavirus and Captain Trips have not passed unnoticed, even causing the maestro himself to comment on the situation on his Twitter account. Colour me reassured.
No, coronavirus is NOT like THE STAND. It’s not anywhere near as serious. It’s eminently survivable. Keep calm and take all reasonable precautions.
— Stephen King (@StephenKing) March 8, 2020
13) The Year of the Flood – Margaret Atwood
The events of The Year of the Flood take place alongside the story of Oryx and Crake, instead developing on the story of a group of bio-activists known as God’s Gardeners. The events of each novel intertwine, and together, offer an incredibly detailed, clever and engaging look at the end-of-days in action – so engaging that HBO have commissioned a TV adaptation of the series, under the title Maddaddam.
14) Things We Didn’t See Coming – Steven Amsterdam
Charting the life of an unnamed protagonist through a series of sequential stories, Things We Didn’t See Coming starts with a tongue-in-cheek look at the most contemporary of potential apocalypses – the Millennium Bug – and builds towards real devastation, in the form of climate change, disease, and the breakdown of society. One of the most culturally-relevant stories on this list, Amsterdam’s debut novel is a must-read for any fan of modern post apocalyptic books.
15) Zone One — Colson Whitehead
Zone One offers a fresh take on one of the more popular pandemic tropes: the outbreak of a virulent disease that turns its hosts into flesh-eating zombies.
Inspired by his love of Stephen King, author Colson Whitehead, well-known for literary works like The Underground Railroad, marries gratuitous tales of the living dead with Pulitzer Prize-calibre writing—a combination that one reviewer likens to “an intellectual dating a porn star.”
The result is a familiar narrative, beautifully executed: the story’s protagonist, Mark Spitz, roving around a destroyed New York City, as he attempts to expunge the remaining zombies and reclaim the city for the survivors to inhabit.
