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The Plague Year: America in the Time of Covid
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79/99
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68/99
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93/99
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About This Book
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Looming Tower, whose best-selling thriller The End of the October all but predicted our current pandemic, comes another momentous account, this time of COVID-19: its origins, its myriad repercussions, and the ongoing fight to contain it Beginning with the absolutely critical first moments of the outbreak in China, and ending with an epilogue on the vaccine rollout and the unprecedented events between the election of Joseph Biden and his inauguration, Lawrence Wright's The Plague Year surges forward with essential information--and fascinating historical parallels--examining the medical, economic, political, and social ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic. Wright takes us inside the CDC, where the first round of faulty test kits cost America precious time; inside the halls of the White House, where Deputy National Security Advisor Matthew Pottinger's early alarm about the virus was met with great skepticism; into a COVID ward in a Charlottesville hospital, with an idealistic young woman doctor from Little Africa, South Carolina; into the precincts of prediction specialists at Goldman Sachs; and even inside the human body, diving deep into the science of just how the virus and vaccines function, with an eye-opening detour into the history of vaccination and of the modern anti-vaxxer movement. In turns steely eyed, sympathetic, infuriated, comical, and always precise, Wright is a formidable guide, slicing through the dense fog of misinformation to give us a 360-degree portrait of the catastrophe we thought we knew. His full accounting does honor to the medical professionals around the country who've risked their lives to fight the virus, revealing America in all its vulnerability, courage, and potential.
Reviews
"The speed of its composition sometimes shows in its structure and even its prose ..."
"But Wright crucially highlights those that also saved us — the first responders and the reasonable."
"Particularly compelling is Wright's straight-line connection of the Jan."
"While there are already several other books about COVID-19 and its sociological impact on the United States, this wide-ranging yet deeply personal account is a great starting point."
"Many readers will wonder what future generations will make of this sad and epic account of failed national leadership during a health catastrophe."
"Wright's storytelling dexterity makes all this come alive ..."
"Pomata has long studied the transformative impacts of pandemics on economies and social orders."
"Wright likens the Capitol rioters to 'Visigoths breaking through the gates of Rome,' treats opposition to lockdowns and mask mandates as the preserve of wild-eyed conspiracy theorists, and generally bemoans the 'cyclonic forces of fascism and nihilism' besieging America."
"Wright's interviews with experts in virology, economics, public health, history, politics, and medicine are enlightening ..."
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