Reviews tagging 'Pandemic/Epidemic'

Doomsday Book by Connie Willis

21 reviews

hello_sweetie11's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

I really liked this!!!!! Why??!? It’s about an epidemic talking about a pandemic going back to the black plague. Since it was published in 1992, I’m impressed with the forwardness of imagining what 2054 would be like, and I LOVED the historians!!! Wow!!

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic

gwenynen's review against another edition

dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic

chandlery's review against another edition

adventurous dark emotional hopeful inspiring sad medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Body horror, Death, Medical content, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Child death, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Blood, Vomit, Grief, Death of parent, and Classism

Minor: Animal death and Suicide

katjacatbeans's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

The story craft of this book is impeccable. It's a real masterclass in plot building & character development. The prose & dialog are equally good - though I'm pretty sure that '"Yes," said Dunworthy' appears at least 100 times (it fits his character) - and it's heart-rending in all the right places.  

There are certainly some grotesque descriptions of illness, but it's not overwrought and is balanced between portraying the reality of the character's experience & sparing the reader. 

The text lives up to its title. It's bleak, and sad. The direness is broken up by having 2 storyline ( 1 in each century) and by Finch's comic relief. Finch is so important because this book is prescient; having just lived through COVID, it's absolutely wild to read that an author in 1992 would so accurately project a lot of the attitudes and difficulties of 2020. Human behavior doesn't really change that much, i guess. All she had to do was look back at the 1918 epidemic & update it a bit for modern elements (like faster turnaround on vaccines). Even the brief mention of "the Canadian Goose Flu of 2010" in the book is utterly wild because there WAS an outbreak of avian flu from December 2010-May 2011. Surely that was just happenstance but with everything else she got right, it's eerie. 

I really, really appreciate how well the medical stuff is researched (I've listened to a LOT of This Podcast Will Kill You and can verify that the book text lines up with the info in the episodes on cholera, typhoid, etc) and how determined the characters are to help care for each other. It's one of the few hopeful bright spots.

All in all, even though this is a 26hr audiobook, I'm sad to be finished with it. I wish it was longer; an epilogue would do my heart a lot of good.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Misogyny, Physical abuse, Sexual assault, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Minor: Animal death and Grief

sorbeth's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? Yes

4.0

This book was written in the 90s.  Keep in mind while reading.

Very very well written story with some good tension that builds.  There are a lot of petty decisions or simply ordinary not-the-best decisions that people make that have serious consequences.  It was really really well crafted and I think well researched.  The world was a different place without cell phones, and it matters for the story.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Pandemic/Epidemic

Regarding the cw:

seriously evaluate how you are doing with the pandemic before reading. This was scarily accurate in things that can happen down to toilet paper . It was rough, and it gets very very dark

pocketbook's review against another edition

adventurous emotional hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? N/A
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

I read this in middle or high school the first time around, and I didn’t remember the parts that took place in the “present time.” I remember being so gutted by

Father Roche’s death

and that I enjoyed this book, but not too many specifics beyond that. I’m so happy I revisited this one. Rerated because this will be staying with me for a long time.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Bullying, Child death, Death, Gore, Physical abuse, Violence, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Animal death, Child abuse, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Racism, Sexism, Sexual assault, Xenophobia, and Classism

Minor: Suicide

dananana's review against another edition

dark emotional hopeful mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

There is something incredibly breathtaking about reading a long, slow-build, incredibly detailed book such as this one. You spend so much time in the world that you begin to feel like you were there too. And in a way I WAS in the 1300s with Kivrin, with Mr Dunworthy as he tried to reach her from 2054. These characters are going to stay in my mind and heart forever and I feel so lucky to have read this.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Medical content, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, and Blood

dark_lyn's review against another edition

dark funny informative sad slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot

3.0

This was such a fun concept, but it moved so... very... slowly. I think it could have been shorter. The author was spot on with her prediction of how the USA would handle a pandemic! She did not grasp how mobile phones would evolve though. A major factor was characters struggling to reach each other by phone, and having to borrow a phone from whatever building they were in. Which made it feel like the story was set in the past, despite the futuristic video phones, medical advancement and time travel machines. This story was full of dry humour, but it was not lighthearted, it dealt with some very dark topics.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Terminal illness, Vomit, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Minor: Animal death

Graphic description of plague symptoms and deaths. Epidemic outbreak and reflection on a past pandemic.

iris_garden's review against another edition

challenging dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Animal death, Body horror, Child death, Death, Gore, Terminal illness, Blood, Vomit, Medical content, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Physical abuse, Grief, Death of parent, Schizophrenia/Psychosis , Sexual harassment, and Classism

Minor: Infidelity, Rape, Self harm, Antisemitism, Abandonment, and Alcohol

uranaishi's review against another edition

adventurous challenging dark emotional funny informative inspiring tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Terminal illness, Vomit, Dementia, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, and Pandemic/Epidemic

Moderate: Adult/minor relationship, Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Confinement, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Gore, Infidelity, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Forced institutionalization, Xenophobia, Medical content, Religious bigotry, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, Abandonment, Alcohol, Sexual harassment, and Classism

Minor: Child abuse, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Rape, Suicidal thoughts, Suicide, Violence, Excrement, Car accident, Murder, and Pregnancy