I found this book while I was browsing through Target; I usually avoid that section, as it seems to have nothing but science fiction, Oprah book club entries, and aisles of those dreadful, gag-inducing Chicken Soup books. However, I've been wanting to read "The Red Tent," which I assumed they'd have there because Oprah had reviewed it, and my attention was diverted to the book next to it, partly because of the appealing cover art (ah, I'm such a sucker for good marketing), and partly because of the subtitle, "A Novel of the Plague." Ooooh, a Plague story! That sparked my interest. No, it really did.
I bought the book (along with "The Red Tent") and set into reading it right away. Two days later, I was done! I enjoyed it VERY much, but as I've said, I enjoy Plague stories. Not so much because of the macabre details, but because it's such an amazing time. The things that those people went through and the way that it completely changed the way they viewed life. No life in Europe was left untouched. Whole families might be buried on the same day. The way that people dealt with it is fascinating.
As this book illustrates, the very best and the very worst in people come out. Well, how could it not? The fear must have been unthinkable. Geraldine Brooks does a great job of making her characters' hopes and fears believable; the fact that people turned to God, to witchcraft, to self-flagellation...anything and everything they thought might help.
The novel is based on the true story of the village of Eyam, a rural town in Derbyshire that was infected in 1665 through some cloth that had been sent from London. The immediate reaction of the villagers, of course, was to run as far from the village as they could, but the rector pointed out that by doing that, they'd spread the Plague all over the countryside. So in an act of supreme self-sacrifice, they quarantined themselves inside the village...no one allowed out, no one allowed in (not that that was likely to happen, anyway). In doing so, they condemned themselves to living with the Plague for almost a year, and about two-thirds of them died.
The Plague, by the way, was contained in that village and not spread throughout the surrounding countryside. (In London it raged out of control, until the Great Fire brought it more or less to an end.)
This is an engaging read and sort of puts petty problems in their place! There are some truly grisly images, though, that really set my teeth on edge and stayed with me.