"Brisk, vivid, and all too relatable, Lon Wagner's The Fever transports modern pandemic survivors into the bedchambers, clinics, and graveyards of a thriving American port laid low by pestilence-and reflects on just how much and how little we've learned in the 170 years since." -Earl Swift, author of Hell Put to Shame: The 1921 Murder Farm Massacre and the Horror of America's Second Slavery

"As suspenseful as it is moving, Lon Wagner's The Fever gives veterans of our modern-day pandemic a historic and page-turning primer on another outbreak that took place a century and a half ago. Fans of Geraldine Brooks's Year of Wonders and Hampton Sides's In the Kingdom of Ice will find much to admire in the voices of ordinary people who took on so many challenges in the face of grave danger and almost certain death. A riveting, meticulously researched account."-Beth Macy, author of Dopesick

"In The Fever, Lon Wagner tells the awful story of an 1855 yellow fever epidemic in Tidewater, Virginia, one of the most catastrophic events in American history. This book is an important reminder of the ability of epidemic and pandemic threats to destabilize a society and threaten its security. We must also be mindful of how, because of

modern-day climate change and urbanization, yellow fever remains a threat to the Southern US and could one day return." -Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, dean, National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, endowed chair of Tropical Pediatrics, Texas Children's Hospital

"Richly reported and eloquently written, this true story transports readers back to 1855, into a raging epidemic that feels eerily prescient. Lon Wagner's The Fever is a tragic, triumphant tale of desperate people struggling to make sense of a deadly epidemic-and save themselves. Wagner reminds us that though progress has paved roads and pioneered vaccines, some people still use fear to justify prejudice, while others sacrifice themselves to save strangers." -Lane DeGregory, winner of the Pulitzer Prize in feature writing

"Lon Wagner's compelling narrative brings to life the extraordinary courage and compassion faced by the residents of Norfolk and Portsmouth, Virginia, when confronted with a disease that may have been up to 100 times deadlier than COVID-19. The Fever is a story of resilience, generosity, and selflessness, as well as human frailty and fear, in the face of an unknown and relentless enemy. It is a gripping account honoring the indomitable human spirit and reminding us that the past is prologue." -Ron Fricker, PhD, professor of statistics, author of Monitoring the Health of Populations by Tracking Disease Outbreaks: Saving Humanity from the Next Plague

"As a medical reporter at USA Today, I covered outbreaks of numerous mosquito-borne viruses-including West Nile, Zika, dengue, and chikungunya-but never with the rich narrative detail that Lon Wagner provides in this captivating history, which reads as much like a detective story as a work of nonfiction." -Liz Szabo, independent health and science reporter