Connie Willis - The Doomsday Book

Splendid workbrutal, gripping, and genuinely harrowing, the product of diligent research, fine writing, and well-honed instincts, that should appeal far beyond the usual science-fiction constituency.

Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

The world of 1348 burns in the minds eye, and every character alive in that year is a fully realized being. It becomes possible to feel that Connie Willis did, in fact, over the five years DOOMSDAY BOOK took her to write, open a window to another world, and that she saw something there.

The Washington Post Book World

A splendid job intense and frightening.

Detroit Free Press

One of the best genre novels of the year Cannot be too highly recommended or too widely read.

Booklist

A leading candidate for science fiction novel of the year Profoundly tragic, powerfully moving.

Star Tribune, Minneapolis

The clarity and consistency of Williss writing, as well as her deft storytelling ability, place her among this decades most promising writers. [Doomsday Book] rates special attention.

Library Journal

An intelligent and satisfying blend of classic science fiction and historical reconstruction.

Publishers Weekly

An ambitious, finely detailed, and compulsively readable novel.

Locus

DOOMSDAY BOOK

FIRE WATCH

LINCOLNS DREAMS

IMPOSSIBLE THINGS

BELLWETHER

REMAKE

UNCHARTED TERRITORY

TO SAY NOTHING OF THE DOG

MIRACLE AND OTHER CHRISTMAS STORIES

PASSAGE

BLACKOUT

This edition contains the complete text of the original hardcover edition.
NOT ONE WORD HAS BEEN OMITTED .

DOOMSDAY BOOK

A Bantam Spectra Book/July 1992

PUBLISHING HISTORY
Bantam paperback edition / September 1993
Bantam reissue edition/July 1994

SPECTRA and the portrayal of a boxed s are trademarks of Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc.

All rights reserved.
Copyright 1992 by Connie Willis.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
For information address: Bantam Books

eISBN: 978-0-307-78444-5

Published simultaneously in the United States and Canada

Bantam Books are published by Bantam Books, a division of Random House, Inc. Its trademark, consisting of the words Bantam Books and the portrayal of a rooster, is Registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and in other countries. Marca Registrada, Bantam Books, 1540 Broadway, New York, New York 10036.

v3.1_r1

To Laura and Cordelia
my Kivrins

My special thanks to Head Librarian Jamie LaRue and the rest of the staff of the Greeley Public Library for their endless and invaluable assistance.

And my undying gratitude to Sheila and Kelly and Frazier and Cee, and especially to Martathe friends I love.

And lest things which should be remembered perish with time and vanish from the memory of those who are to come after us, I, seeing so many evils and the whole world, as it were, placed within the grasp of the Evil One, being myself as if among the dead, I, waiting for death, have put into writing all the things that I have witnessed.

And, lest the writing should perish with the writer and the work fail with the laborer, I leave parchment to continue this work, if perchance any man survive and any of the race of Adam escape this pestilence and carry on the work which I have begun

BROTHER JOHN CLYN
1349

Mr. Dunworthy opened the door to the laboratory and his spectacles promptly steamed up.

Am I too late? he said, yanking them off and squinting at Mary.

Shut the door, she said. I cant hear you over the sound of those ghastly carols.

Dunworthy closed the door, but it didnt completely shut out the sound of O Come, All Ye Faithful wafting in from the quad. Am I too late? he said again.

Mary shook her head. All youve missed is Gilchrists speech. She leaned back in her chair to let Dunworthy squeeze past her into the narrow observation area. She had taken off her coat and wool hat and set them on the only other chair, along with a large shopping bag full of parcels. Her gray hair was in disarray, as if she had tried to fluff it up after taking her hat off. A very long speech about Mediaevals maiden voyage in time, she said, and the college of Brasenose taking its rightful place as the jewel in historys crown. Is it still raining?

Yes, he said, wiping his spectacles on his muffler. He hooked the wire rims over his ears and went up to the thin-glass partition to look at the net. In the center of the laboratory was a smashed-up wagon surrounded by overturned trunks and wooden boxes. Above them hung the protective shields of the net, draped like a gauzy parachute.

Kivrins tutor Latimer, looking older and even more infirm than usual, was standing next to one of the trunks. Montoya was standing over by the console wearing jeans and a terrorist jacket and looking impatiently at the digital on her wrist. Badri was sitting in front of the console, typing something in and frowning at the display screens.

Wheres Kivrin? Dunworthy said.

I havent seen her, Mary said. Do come and sit down. The drop isnt scheduled till noon, and I doubt very much that theyll get her off by then. Particularly if Gilchrist makes another speech.

She draped her coat over the back of her own chair and set the shopping bag full of parcels on the floor by her feet. I do hope this doesnt go all day. I must pick up my great-nephew Colin at the Underground station at three. Hes coming in on the tube.

She rummaged in her shopping bag. My niece Deirdre is off to Kent for the holidays and asked me to look after him. I do hope it doesnt rain the entire time hes here, she said, still rummaging. Hes twelve, a nice boy, very bright, though he has the most wretched vocabulary. Everything is either necrotic or apocalyptic. And Deirdre allows him entirely too many sweets.

She continued to dig through the contents of the shopping bag. I got this for him for Christmas. She hauled up a narrow red-and-green-striped box. Id hoped to get the rest of my shopping done before I came here, but it was pouring rain, and I can only tolerate that ghastly digital carillon music on the High Street for brief intervals.