The Great Influenza: The Epic Story Of The Deadliest Plague In History

from malthus

Readable and generally excellent account of the 1918 influenza pandemic. Barry is particularly effective in describing the efforts of scientists striving to understand the causes of the pandemic. His analysis of the social impacts is solid but less compelling. The first 80 pages provides an excep...

from Narboink

This one was rough going initially. The expectation going in is that this is a book about the 1918 flu pandemic, but to get there Barry begins with a long (and somewhat tedious) history of medical education in the United States. This is not without its merits, but it's also not exactly what I was...

from raycun

An interesting story ruined by the overblown style. Like watching documentary footage with a voiceover by Movie Trailer Man. Also, for some reason the author decided to tie the history of the epidemic to the history of US medicine in the period (and preceding 30 years). This would have made sense...

from Angelic55blonde

I owned this book for quite awhile before I got a chance to read it. I studied the Great Influenza while getting my master's degree so I already knew a lot about that portion of our history, but this book still brought the sory to me in a new way and I learned more about the beginnings of the pan...

from MlleEhreen

I read the audiobook version of The Great Influenza which always leaves me flailing when it comes time to leave a review. The short version is: I really loved this book.The title describes a very specific, narrow subject - the influenza pandemic of 1918 - but the book itself is sprawling and vast...