Happy Top Ten Tuesday over at That Artsy Reader Girl!
Honestly, I'm not sure if I would want to read any of these for the first time right now, but as I can't keep my mind off the pandemic, here are several speculative fiction books that deal with either pandemics or other forms of apocalypse.
The School of Night, The Weight of Ink, and Year of Wonders are all fictional interpretations of the historical plague, taking place in London or other parts of England.
Empire of Ivory also deals with a pandemic, specifically among dragons, and while I would recommend reading the entire Temeraire series, Empire of Ivory is in many ways the moral crux of the books. And, yes, there is dragon quarantining, which has its own problems, as you can imagine.
So, why the Octavia Butler books? Lauren Olamina's fractured and resource-strapped America in the
Honestly, I'm not sure if I would want to read any of these for the first time right now, but as I can't keep my mind off the pandemic, here are several speculative fiction books that deal with either pandemics or other forms of apocalypse.
Top Ten Speculative Fiction Books That Feel Too Close for Comfort
- Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel
- Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler
- Parable of the Talents by Octavia Butler (sequel to above)
- Dawn by Octavia Butler
- The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin (#1 in the Broken Earth trilogy)
- The School of Night by Louis Bayard
- The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood (#2 in the MaddAddam trilogy)
- Empire of Ivory by Naomi Novik (#4 in the Temeraire series)
- The Weight of Ink by Rachel Kadish
- Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks
Station Eleven and The Year of the Flood take place in the aftermath of pandemics in imagined futures. Station Eleven specifically is a counter-intuitively relaxing read, and while Year of the Flood deals with some disturbing material, it can also be relaxing getting to know the two characters in their respective self-isolation.
Empire of Ivory also deals with a pandemic, specifically among dragons, and while I would recommend reading the entire Temeraire series, Empire of Ivory is in many ways the moral crux of the books. And, yes, there is dragon quarantining, which has its own problems, as you can imagine.
Parable books is too frightening an extrapolation of our own world now, and while a pandemic is not heavily featured, illness is treated in much the same way it is in some ways being today, that is, the vulnerable are expected to get on with it or procure their own resources to deal with their health. And why Dawn? Because, while I don't know of any aliens landing on Earth wanting to merge species lately, that also takes place in the aftermath of an apocalypse, after which humans are forced to confront a stark reality that we need to fundamentally alter our society in order to survive.
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My TTT .