Fever

Starred review from July 10, 2017
Meyer (Trackers) neatly integrates a whodunit into a sophisticated postapocalyptic thriller set in South Africa. In the near future, a new strain of coronavirus that developed from a chance interaction between an HIV-positive man and a sick bat has wiped out 95% of the Earth’s population in just a few months. In a brief, ominous prologue, narrator Nico Storm promises to reveal the truth about the murder of his father, Willem, who’s introduced in a flashback set after the plague struck, when Nico was a teenager. An encounter with some vicious feral dogs almost ends Willem’s life, but he survives, and he and Nico make their way to the town of Vanderkloof, which Willem, who used to be a geographer and a judge, hopes to make the center of a new beginning for humanity. Willem’s tireless efforts are clouded by the reader’s knowledge of how things will end for him, and Meyer effectively teases his ultimate reveal. Thoughtful character development complements the clever storytelling. Agent: Richard Pine, Inkwell Management.

A father and a son create a community in which everyone is a pioneer, for better or worse, after a virus kills 90 percent of the world's population. Narrator Will Damron employs an array of voices for the residents of the benevolent community created by Willem Storm. Storm's son, Nico, gives the first-person account. Damron uses a consistently deep voice for Domingo, a stern, mysterious leader. He brings fire and brimstone to an evangelical pastor. And he uses a clipped, slightly British accent for a woman with critical engineering skills. He also handles secondary characters wonderfully--from a pilot who is a bit nasally to a scared little boy. Kudos to the author for focusing on survival skills without zombies, and to a narrator who pays attention to character development. M.B. � AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine