Why am I passionate about this?
I’ve written or edited thousands of science and engineering proposals, blog posts, and reports, and in the past decade, disaster resilience has become a major subject of these documents. I’ve come to realize that while it’s possible to be ready for disasters, few people truly are. In the books I’m recommending, something vital to life has been stolen and the disasters are so overpowering that mere survival is a nearly impossible goal. This forces the characters into unusual and heroic action. Their choices are sometimes surprising and always compelling, and I loved sharing their journeys.
Susan's book list on disasters where society fails suddenly
Why did Susan love this book?
It fascinates me how in a disaster, from one day to the next, nothing is ever the same again.
In Bird Box, where something is turning people violently suicidal, “…it definitely begins when a person sees something.”
At first there’s a rumor in a faraway country, but later the world abruptly changes. Nobody can be outside without a blindfold, millions are dying, and society collapses.
It would be bad enough to literally never see the world outside of your house, but then Malorie has to take a journey on a river…while blindfolded...with two blindfolded children…amidst creatures she knows almost nothing about.
That’s pure insanity that makes for a riveting, absorbing book, and Malorie’s determination is beyond inspiring.
7 authors picked Bird Box as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
Josh Malerman's debut novel Bird Box is a terrifying, Hitchcockesque psychological horror that is sure to stay with you long after reading.
Malorie raises the children the only way she can: indoors.
The house is quiet. The doors are locked, the curtains are closed, mattresses are nailed over the windows.
They are out there. She might let them in.
The children sleep in the bedroom across the hall.
Soon she will have to wake them. Soon she will have to blindfold them.
Today they must leave the house. Today they will risk everything.