Customer Reviews

The Plague Tales

5 star:		(35)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(19)
2 star:		(13)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

This book would be great to take on an airplane or to read on the beach if you want an exciting, but not too deep, read.

A really clever plot keeps you wondering right from the beginning. Two alternating tales of bubonic plague in the 14th century and disease outbreaks in the 21st century future keep you guessing what the connection between the two tales might be.

Both tales are equally fascinating: One is the story of a wandering Jewish physician from Spain who is unwillingly caught up in the political intrigues between Pope Clement and King Edward of England while trying desperately to hide the secret of his past. His experiences of plague in medieval Europe are frightening and grotesque. The other tale is of a woman physician, Janie Crowe, of the near future who has suffered heartbreaking loss due to outbreaks of unspecified diseases that have swept America and threaten Europe. Hysterical fear of these diseases have changed the face of modern civilization--air travelers are forced to wear sterile suits and masks and powerful Bio Cops are authorized to shoot and kill if it is suspected that a citizen harbors disease. Janie is engaged in research in London, and unearths something that has a connection to the 14th century physician.

As the book progresses, these separate stories begin to entertwine, bringing us to an interesting conclusion.

Benson does a wonderful job of making both stories compelling and equally interesting, and she gives you tantalizing clues concerning how the earlier story will come to bear on the future one. However, a slightly supernatural thread just doesn't fit with the technological bent of the book, weakening it.

Inevitably, comparisons will be drawn between this book and "Doomsday Book" by Connie Willis, a Nebula and Hugo award winner which contains the story of Kirin, a student in future London who is mistakenly sent back to a 14th century English village just when plague is breaking out. Like "Plague Tales," the Willis book alternates between the 14th century and England of the future. While superficially similar, "Plague Tales" is much more of a bio-thriller that is a fun book to read once and then pass along to a friend, while "Doomsday Book" is a deeper, more polished book with a stronger emotional impact that you will want to read again and again. Interesting how two different authors can come up with such different takes on a similar subject.

In Ann Benson's The Plague Tales, the reader is introduced to two timelines and two protagonists: Janie Crow, a former surgeon from the near future, and Alejandro Canches-Hernandez, a Jewish doctor of the 14th century. The world in which both characters live is dominated by illness and death. For Janie, it's world trying to recover from the "Outbreaks", an undefined plague that wiped out most of the US, including her family. For Alejandro, it's the Bubonic Plague, which killed almost half of Europe during the 1300s. These two timelines intersect at several points throughout the book, especially in the case of Caroline, Janie's assistant, who seemingly dreams of the 14th century while suffering from its scourge dug up in the early 21st century. Benson creates a wonderful sense of suspense as the reader approaches the first third of the book. Although some of the plot points are obviously contrived, especially in the modern timeline, by the middle of the story, the reader is taken in. Benson paints an accurate picture of ancient and modern prejudice, paranoia, and desperation, as the protagonists of both times race to save their worlds and themselves. A good read.

I loved the way The Plague Tales alternated between two time periods: the fourteenth century and a near-police state in the early twenty-first century.

I wrote a research paper on the black death and found this book to be very accurate in it's descriptions of the disease and the time period. I also liked that Ms. Benson was able to weave these two plots together so seamlessly and create a believable future London.

Her characters are very strong and I liked how Benson was able to show cause and effect relationships not just in one time period but between the centuries.

It reminded me very much of my favorite book The Eight by Katherine Neville. Ms. Benson was really able to capture the feeling of both a historical novel and a medical thriller without alienating fans of either genre.

This was a great read.

This is not a positive review and tender sensibilities are forewarned.

Plague Tales and the equally excrable sequel The Burning Road conjoin a grade D level medieval romance with a ludicrous 'near future' biohazard melodrama. The romance is competantly cliched and will not burden the reader with awareness of any historical, religious, scientific or psychological particulars of the period. The tale of a Jewish medico fated to serve as papal protector to the English court is sympathetically told. But it is history for those whose wading inclinations are to barely dampen the soles of the feet. Just one example: although the protaganist becomes deeply involved with a geo-political scheme hatched in papal Avignon, there is no mention of the papal schism that has two (later three) popes contending for Catholic supremacy, (the French-favored prelate was based on French territory while the pretender held forth in Rome). Small detail? History Lite does not adequately describe the shallow authorial awareness.

But at least these chapters are readable.

Alternating chapters occur in a near future after an unidentified plague, (it is given a cute, S King type name only in the sequel), has ravaged humanity. We are never informed to what degree humanity has been ravaged, an odd but typical instance of the author's insistence that the reader be as dumbed down as her characters. We do know that the female protaganist has lost her family and has been downgraded from her medical specialty to forensic archeology because the authorities have determined that there are too many medical specialists to support. Readers inclined to wonder why support for forensic archeologists would become preferable are advised to make use of a very large "Never Mind". The protaganist is in England to finish research on a thesis. The thesis subject is never identified ("Never Mind") but it requires her to take soil samples from numerous unidentified London-area sites, just one of which happens to be a large undeveloped field containing a burial ground for 14th century plague victims. This location, which has escaped the attention of the avidly historically inclined British (as well as real estate developers in the greater London area), is watched over by an idiot non-savant who has the best reason in the book for his poorly articulated reasoning process. The protaganist digs up plague infected dirt and, by an accident caused through her own oversight, starts a chain of infection that threatens release of the bubonic plague in a new and improved version.

That all of the characters in these chapters of the novel are professional geneticists, bio-researchers and are working within the context of the most advanced British new plague research facility makes the subsequent action laughably ridiculous. Every internal safeguard and standard handling procedure is ignored and flaunted by all concerned. After the umpteenth such plot device when a character wrings their hands with "How did we get into this situation?" all I could do was shout, because you are such flipping dingbats.

One well understands why the authorities reduced the protaganist to a lesser medical specialty; her incompetance and moral failures are self-evident. Her speciality is more of the woe is me sort but her goal of regaining her professional status does seem to fit culturally with the strivings of those who feel they deserve more than their abilities or talents warrant. Those authorities, of course, are cartoonish to the extreme and Englishmen are reduced to verbal ticks to convince us of their cultural inclinations. But why go on with this litany of authorial absurdity?

The cover promised science and historical lore (wisely it did not promise intelligent writing), but sadly, neither of these are forthcoming. The comparison made with Preston's The Hot Zone is bogus and phony. That book, which features an intelligent, professional female protaganist, useful scientific discussions, a competant awareness of bureaucracy, politics and human motivation, is Shakespeare compared to the books under review here.

Plague Tales is best read at 37,000 feet when severe turbulence makes death seem a welcome alternative. On the bright side, these books may give hope to every would be author. There are editors out there who will do their best for you, just as one imagines they have done to get these pages between covers. Would be authors may try, but you may do no worse. Plague Tales is well-named but it is the reader that is victimized.

The storylines are captivating to the point where you don't want to leave one for the other. Ann seems to have a sense for when to switch from one to the other and leave the reader wanting more. I thought the character of Sarah and her descendants could have been developed more. Who were they, how did they know the plague would appear again, why were they chosen to be the sentinels of Alejandro's diary?

Another reviewer expresses frustration with the decisions made by Janie and Bruce toward the end of the modern storyline. I felt the same frustration. Also, it appeared that they got sloppy in many instances and didn't suffer any consequences. I guess that is the purview of the hero and heroine. Also, it would be refreshing if the tired old formula of boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, boy and girl live happily ever after could be improved upon. It look like that may happen, but then Ann just couldn't bring herself to break the formula.

When I read the last chapter, I thought "Now why did she do that?" There is no explanation for Caroline's married name. At first I thought that that diminished my enjoyment of the book; however, maybe Ann just wanted to plant a seed and allow the reader to connect the dots. I found myself starting to think of scenarios that could have resulted in the ending. What initially seemed implausible now seemed possible. Far fetched, but possible.

I stumbled onto "The Plague Tales", having no idea what to expect, and for the most part I was pleasantly surprised. As a medical thriller, it is superb, and I read this rather long novel very quickly. Even today, centuries after it killed millions of Europeans, just hearing the words "Bubonic Plague" are enough to get just about anyone's attention. The descriptions of the illness are right on the money and the helplessness of physicians to realize a cause or cure add to the suspense of the story. "Who will be the next character to become ill?" is the question I kept wondering. This book has virtually no "filler", so it reads very quickly. The switches between the 14th Century storyline and the storyline set in the future are very well placed, keeping the reader engrossed in the characters of both stories. Janie, the main character in the future storyline, is very hardened by her losses in the "Outbreaks" of some sort of plague in the future. If I have a complaint, it is that those Outbreaks were never explained in the novel, even though there were ample opportunities for Janie's character to do so. It seems that the stress of the novel is based in the past, and those characters are well formed, especially Alejandro, the 14th century physician who is tormented by both his inability to cure the victims of Bubonic Plague and the many decisions he has to make during his adventures in the story. His struggles with his faith, his true identity, and his loyalties are portrayed very exceptionally well. His character is the one which I feel that most readers will bond most strongly with, as his emotions are fleshed out so well, and it is so easy to relate to the basic moral dilemas he encounters. There are some minor discrepancies in the novel, and the link between the past and the future in the case of Caroline, Janie's assistant, is never explained (Perhaps the sequel to this novel does so), but didn't seriously mar my enjoyment of the novel. The mysterious Sarah, with her "cure" for Bubonic Plague, is a nice touch, and adds a bit of mysticism to the mix, as well as taking a shot at modern medicine and it's cynicism toward natural remedies. There truly is an unresolved link between the character Caroline and Sarah and that is a bit unsatisfying. Some reviews have criticized the actions of the characters as being unbelievable, but I would think that in the face of such a rigidly controlled future world as is described in "The Plague Tales", "normal" actions and reactions would easily be discarded. Overall, I highly recommend this novel. I thoroughly enjoyed it's weave of historical fact with fiction, as well as past with future events.

The story line was great. LOVED the story line. The historical descriptions of the plague, of the environment in the 1400s, of the treatment of Jews, all brilliant and as or more accurate than I have seen in any historical novel.

But there were holes. Not in the story, but in the details. In one paragraph, you find a character trying to accomplish X, and in the next X seems to have happened already but you can't figure out how.

At one point, a British doctor takes his tempoerature and reads "104" - wow, if I were British, and using CELSIUS, I'd be worried, too!! And twice the author mentions the "numbing effect" of ibuprofin. So far as I know, it does no such thing (unless she's getting prescribed something really good!) Details, details.

The story was incredible, imaginative, and drew me in. I was just infuriated with the rips in the seams of the storytelling. The reviews on the jacket said other authors "could learn a lot from Benson." I agree: they could learn both how to tell a riveting story, and how to avoid making the same very simple mistakes in conveying the detailed fabric of a tale.

As a physician with an abiding interest in medical history, I must commend Ann Benson for a great read. I found no major "boners" in either her historical tale of a fourteenth-century plague doctor, or her understanding of the epidemiology and "natural course" of infectious diseases in general, and plague in particular. Her comment about the overuse of antibiotics, and her dire prediction that antibiotics might someday be rendered totally useless, is dead on target. Multiply-drug-resistant "superbugs" are already appearing in the modern world's hospitals (including the very one where I myself am on staff!); perhaps, therefore, the "Outbreaks" which presage her near-future tale might be about ready to occur.

The very pleasant surprise is that Benson also makes a brilliant contribution to a debate that is currently raging among professional epidemiologists and civil libertarians. The best all-around statement of that debate might be, "Resolved: that high-handed quarantine measures, including but not limited to shoot-on-sight rules of engagement, are unnecessary and even counterproductive to preventing or halting the spread of dangerous epidemic or pandemic diseases." Benson argues the affirmative, and is absolutely ruthless. The plague-doctor protagonist of the medieval tale, and some of the "authority" characters in the futuristic tale, create very authoritarian quarantine rules, and then have doubts about their ethics and even their long-term effectiveness. Benson's description of a particularly humiliating and privacy-invasive diagnostic procedure called "bodyprinting" reads, frankly, like a BDSM eroticum--definitely not for the squeamish. And just whom does society have to thank for stopping the resurgent epidemic of plague? Read for yourselves. You will likely never look at "public health" questions in the same way ever again.

Here, then, is history, medicine, and political theory, all rolled into one very powerful package. For someone who is not even a physician, this is a truly remarkable achievement, which I recommend to every thinking adult, including professional and layperson alike.

I can't remember the last time I actually screeched when I finished the end of a book--it was completely unbelievable and tacked on! Most of the modern characters were barely sketched-in so I don't know why I cared. The only thing that saved it for me was the descriptions in the 14th century part, though I agree with many readers that the connection between the two parts was tenuous at best. The Doomsday Book was much better--at least I wasn't rolling my eyes in disbelief.

I loved the way The Plague Tales alternates between two time periods: the fourteenth century and a near-police state in the early twenty-first century. It's similar in structure to my favorite novel, Katherine Neville's The Eight, even though the time periods are different, and it also reminded me a little of another of my favorite books, Connie Willis' Doomsday Book. Benson's characters are great; I really liked both the main characters, Janie and Alejandro. I read on Ann Benson's Web site that there's going to be a sequel to The Plague Tales; I'm looking forward to it!